Chapter 19

NINETEEN

Owen

T hings were good, maybe for the first time in my life, but I don't want to say it out loud because I don't want to jinx it, which makes the idea of leaving for training camp worse.

What if while I'm gone Colin finds someone else? What if he starts flirting with Ryan again? What if he could really have something with Ryan? What if he forgets about me? What if he realizes he hates me while I'm gone?

What if, what if, what if, until I'm buried under a pile of them and I'm back under the chaise lounge.

Maybe I shouldn't go to training camp.

Maybe I should just stay here.

The dark, warm safety of my chaise lounge and the familiarity of life here makes me not want to leave. Am I agoraphobic? Maybe I'm becoming agoraphobic.

I search around for my phone, finally finding it.

Owen: Am I becoming agoraphobic?

Owen: my anxiety seems worse.

Owen: Should I talk to my therapist about this?

Oliver: did you take your anxiety meds?

Owen: Yes.

Oliver: You answered too quickly. Let me message Colin.

Owen: I am an adult and set alarms for my own meds now.

Oliver: did Colin kill you and is now pretending to be you to throw me off your scent…

Oliver: Answer the video call.

I roll my eyes and answer it. "I'm alive."

"Where is your husband?"

"At class I think, so don't call him." I roll out from under the chair to stare up at my ceiling in the low light. "I need to paint the ceiling."

"That is your neurodivergency talking. Do not go buy paint."

"But wouldn't it look cool midnight blue with stars?"

Oliver pinches the bridge of his nose. "I am surrounded by children."

I crawl back under the chaise, deciding food and water can wait until later. Talking to Oliver didn't help. I was in such a good place before today, and it all came crashing down. But that's the fucking thing about anxiety? It didn't matter how much I know it's not rational or realistic. Nothing's rational when I spiral. And it builds like this and keeps going like a fucking runaway train. The weight on my chest becomes too much to bear, and I'm reduced to a shaking mess that can't do anything for himself.

And then starts the even more fun part when my depression gets triggered and all the existential dread piles on my existence. Then I'm back in the black fucking hole that sucks everything good in and spits out garbage.

Why can't my fucking brain be normal? I should be on top of the world, but I'm laying on the floor in my room seriously considering how much happier I could be if I died this very instant because I can't stop thinking about all the ways all of this was going to go horribly, terribly wrong.

Most of which is centered around my husband. The marriage should have removed stress from my life, but it added to it. All of these new feelings and none of them make any sense. I shouldn't care if Colin likes someone else. He deserves to be loved for real. He deserves someone in his life who will support him, but he got me. I keep reminding myself that he went into this willingly, but my brain rejects it.

Colin appears out of nowhere and shoves himself under the chaise with me. "What are you doing?"

"Wishing I would vanish into thin air."

He turns his head to look at me. "I guess we're staying in then." Colin doesn't sound mad. "Both of us can camp under the chaise until you feel better."

"There is no way both of us can fit under here."

"We won't know until we try." He shoves closer to me, pressing his bare arm against mine so we are shoulder to shoulder and hip to hip.

"This is absurd."

"It's only absurd if you make it absurd. If you can lay under here, so can I."

"This is my safe space."

"Am I not allowed to be in your safe space?"

I glare at him in the dark, although he probably can't see me.

Colin laughs, and I love the sound. "I know how to make you feel better. I make you feel better all the time."

"My dick is not a magic cure for my depression or anxiety." But why am I half hard at his words?

"I wasn't calling it a cure. I was calling it a temporary fix."

I roll my eyes, but my dick is already responding to him as it so frequently does now.

Colin is some clairvoyant seer and presses his lips to the corner of my mouth. "I can feel you're getting hard."

"How do you always know?

"You get this carnal look in your eyes. Almost like your brother does. But he wears it all the time. You get it when you're about to ravage me."

"Don't say ravage." I cringe.

"That's what you're doing, isn't it?"

"Maybe it is. But that word sounds derogatory." Why does it have to feel like I'm using him? I don't want Colin to feel like I'm using him.

"It's only derogatory if the person you're ravaging thinks it's derogatory. And I happen to be delighted by it."

"Colin, have you ever considered there might be something seriously wrong with you?" I ask him carefully. He's in therapy, but maybe he should consider more. I always consider more. Like it could be another layer over my mental illness.

"Oh, I've more than considered it. I got told that my whole life. So, yeah, pretty sure there's something seriously wrong with me. But, no, I decided I like who I am and all of those parts of me. You should too." If only we could all have the confidence of Colin, who could just be happy with something seriously wrong with himself.

Why isn't life that easy? Even my brother took his worst traits and loved them, then used them on his husband who also loves them. I was the only one who seemed to be rational about any of this.

Colin's lips find my ear, drawing me out of my head again. "Come play with me, husband." His words come in a sultry tone, bringing back all the fear that if I'm not here, he's going to find somebody else.

And is that even fair? Our marriage is a sham. He deserves somebody who loves him. He deserves someone who would do this for real with him instead of just me getting out of marrying his sister. I feel like the biggest asshole in the world. My brain likes to seemingly forget he had willingly gone into this with me. But it feels like it's under false pretenses now.

I roll toward him in the confined space and cup his cheek, bringing my lips to his. "I think it's time I got you off."

Colin freezes, lips pressed against mine. "What?"

"I haven't made you come all this time, but you keep making me come. I want to get you off and give you what you've been giving me." I need to make him feel good before I leave, so he thinks about my hands on him for the next two weeks.

I don't want him to even have the urge to look for somebody else while I'm gone. Selfishly, I want to keep him completely to myself. But I'm not going to tell him that. But maybe if he's getting constant orgasms, he'd be happy to stay in the fake marriage.

"I thought you said you weren't into it."

I grab his dick to shut him up. "How about you let me decide what I want to do myself."

He quickly stiffens in my hand, getting so fucking hard. He is big, too. Almost as big as my cock. And thick. I wonder what he'd taste like. How my lips would feel stretched around him.

I've been curious for a while now since he seemed to love swallowing my cum. I kiss him again.

"You're serious, aren't you?" he whispers into my lips.

"Of course I am."