The Perils of Intimacy by Rick R. Reed

Author:Rick R. Reed [Reed, Rick R.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: gay romance
ISBN: 978-1-63533-638-2
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Published: 2017-04-30T16:00:00+00:00

Thursday

Chapter 10

MARC

I WAKE to sunshine. Brilliant. Summerlike. Let’s celebrate!

Appropriate? Hell no.

Today’s the kind of day that should be what one would order up for a funeral—gray, low-hanging clouds, lots of rain, everyone walking at a dazed, zombified pace, carrying big black umbrellas, garbed in all black as well. There should be a cold wind out of the north, blowing trash and rusty tin cans along the street. If I turned on the radio, the music that would play would be dirgelike or one of Leonard Cohen’s more downbeat songs. Or perhaps, since I’m gay, a Sondheim selection. “Send in the Clowns”?

Ah, fuck it.

I’m lying in bed, half staring out my window, half dozing in a depressed, disappointed, down state. I came home, drenched, just a few hours ago. Heedless of my soaked state, I collapsed into bed. Despite the trauma of my discovery about Jimmy, I fell quickly into a deep sleep. I have vague memories of dreams, and all I can recall from them is the terror of outstretched hands, trying to grab me.

Now, outside, the sun glints off Lake Union, causing sparkles to shimmer on the water’s surface, as though someone cast diamonds upon it. I rented this place because every window looked out on the inner city’s big lake. I’ve always considered myself fortunate to have found my place, even though it’s a small one bedroom with about 850 square feet. Yet the view is killer—boats on the water, seaplanes landing and taking off, rowing crews out in the early morning. Sunrises that can be a riot of orange, deep blue, violet, and slate gray. Rainbows across the water. Gas Works Park, a little south.

Now I just resent the view. It’s so pretty—with this sunlight that’s so especially wrong for winter, for Christ’s sake—and I feel like it mocks me.

I know I should be getting up, hitting the shower, making a smoothie, and heading out to Dexter Avenue to catch the number sixty-two bus downtown. My normal routine. But today’s not normal. We are having our very own real-life Throwback Thursday here—and the picture is not pretty.

I feel like I can’t move. Lethargy has a death grip on my limbs. I could lie in this bed all day, and I’m really, really tempted to do just that. A smoothie? God, I’m not even hungry enough to down something that’s mostly liquid, even if I made it a sweet one with bananas, peanut butter, almond milk, and a little stevia for good measure. And a shower? Who cares how clean I am? I may never shower again.

I turn over in bed, away from the view, and give out a forlorn laugh at myself and my misery.

He’s just another guy. Don’t beat yourself up about it. I know you’re disappointed and you thought there was some there there. But there isn’t… and there wasn’t. He’s a loser, a creep, a drug addict. Except for the last thing, he’s like most of the guys you have the bad luck to meet, which is why you’ve been kind of off the market for the last several months.

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