Moving On by Ash Penn

Author:Ash Penn [Penn, Ash]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Erotic Romance Fiction
Publisher: Totally Entwined Group Ltd
Published: 2014-04-15T00:00:00+00:00

It was nice of Greg to come with him. Cody had hesitated before accepting because the last person he’d want as witness to his panic attacks would be Greg. Last night he’d given the guy his body and that had all worked out rather well. A trip to the shops might work out equally as well, and Justine might finally believe he was trying his best to move forward. Maybe he and Greg might become friends.

He waited at the main doors, trying to ignore his heart bounding around in his chest. He’d only ever been able to go out with Justine before—or his parents. Past Cody used to go out on his own all the time. He had trouble remembering the mind-set that would allow present Cody to do the same.

The door clicked open. Warm air blew in off the street, tainted with traffic fumes and a whole lot of sounds. Car engines. Footsteps. A distant rumble of a motorbike. When a car horn punched the air, Cody’s bones shuddered and lurched, independent of his mind, back into the cool and quieter sanctuary of the foyer.

“What do you think might happen were you to step outside?” Greg asked, still calmly holding the door. “Something you’re expecting today that didn’t happen yesterday when you were lugging boxes back and forth on your own.”

It made no sense. But phobias didn’t need to make sense.

“I don’t know.” Thinking about having an attack often brought on an attack, but he hadn’t had one in months. He needed to keep pushing himself to fit in to society again, as part of his new start. “If I panic out there and people start looking at me like I’m street theater—”

“Here.” Greg offered out a water bottle. “You’re sweating.”

He didn’t feel hot so much as chilled. He moved forward and took the water, steadying his hands as best he could.

“What happens if they start looking at you like street theater?” Greg asked as Cody took a sip of lukewarm water. “No one knows you. What if they look? Let them. You’ll be out. You’ll have got your achievement. You’ll have proved to Justine you can do this. Isn’t it worth the risk?”

Yes, it probably was, but did he want someone he’d slept with seeing him that way? An object of pity rather than of lust. Well, so much for acting cool and aloof, as though last night had been nothing special. How did he go about finding the part of himself that reveled in an abundance of casual sex partners and not fixate on a particular one who had fulfilled more than Cody could ever have imagined in such a short space of time?

“You don’t have to,” Cody said quietly as he gave the bottle back. He could do this himself. He didn’t need Greg to hold his hand. No, but Greg had held his hand last night before touching him—and had made everything safe. Perhaps the same might happen out there. Outside.

“I know, but I’m going anyway.

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