Jesse

Ash seemed ok. He'd said that it was the first time anything like this had happened to him, but somehow, he really did seem ok.

I was not ok. The moments I'd held him in my arms thinking that I'd lost him. The way he'd looked spread across the bed when I'd burst in. The weight of his body against my lap. The stillness. The quiet. I couldn't let them go. It was all I could see when I closed my eyes.

I fought sleep. I'd lie in bed holding him tightly in my arms, listening to the sound of his breath, feeling the beat of his heart, grateful that they'd come back to me. That he'd come back to me. I knew that when I closed my eyes, the panic of losing him would overwhelm me.

Life went back to normal. I went to class and had my weekly dinners with Bethany. I checked in Ash's clients, took their payments, and helped them reschedule their appointments. I refilled the water bottles, did the dishes, and changed the sheets.

Every time I walked past Ash in the shower at work my eyes would quickly scan his body, checking for scratches, bruises, anything that would let me know something else had happened that I'd been unable to protect him from. We'd cook dinner together, eat together, lie together reading our books or watching the entertainment screen, and from the outside, it probably looked like everything had gone back to normal. I felt anything but normal.

My fingers traced his skin anytime he was near. If possible, I was even more sexually ravenous than I'd been before the incident. I'd slip my fingers under his waistband for a few stolen moments when we lay together in the garden. I'd drop to my knees and suck him into the warmth of my mouth before he even had time to harden as he stirred something on the stove. The moment we fell into bed I'd pull him to me. I needed him. I needed to feel him shudder and moan under my touch. I needed him to press his body inside of mine, filling me until nothing else in the world existed.

If Ash realized anything was wrong, he didn't say. He responded instantly to my touch, laughed at my jokes, and held my hand when we walked. The corner of his lips quirked up into a smile when he noticed I'd caught him watching me. He'd always done those things.

All my life panic had found me. Anytime I'd found the smallest measure of peace or happiness it had slithered in, trying to convince me that it wouldn't last. That everything was bound to fall apart.

I'd had to fight my whole life to keep it at bay, to convince myself that everything really was ok. I was nice enough that those boys really did want to be my friends in the fifthgrade. I was hard working enough to help my family succeed on the farm. I was smart enough to get into medical school.

Somehow, I'd done it. Somehow, I'd pressed through the panic and built a life I'd never have dreamed was possible. I'd found Ash. But the panic had been right. Someone had tried to take him from me, and I hadn't been able to keep him safe.

I took my deep breaths. I focused on the color of the paint on the walls and the sound of birdsong in our back yard, but it was barely enough. I watched him every time he left the room, struggling not to run after him and watching the doorway until he returned.

I knew he was ok. I knew he was with me, but the panic wouldn't let me go. I needed to be with him. I needed to keep him safe. He was everything to me.