The crying jag had left AJ drained. It had taken everything that he had just to be able to walk upstairs to the room Brian had ready for him. Even then he needed Brian’s assistance to make it up the staircase. Halfway up he noticed that Brian was touching him, holding him up, and it didn’t add on any fear to what was already there. He actually didn’t mind Brian touching him. But he was too tired right then to bother thinking about it.
He kicked his shoes off by the bed but didn’t bother to take anything else off. Fully clothed, he allowed Brian to tuck him down under the sheets. Before Brian even left the room, he was asleep.
For a while he slept the deep sleep that comes with exhaustion. His sobbing had taken a lot of physical energy out of him. Evening was gone and night was halfway through when the nightmare first hit. It started as it always did, with sounds and smells. The music playing in the background. The scent of alcohol and sweat. Blood and sex. Next came sensation. He could feel the hands gripping his hair; the pain that made him feel as if he was being torn in two. He could even feel the belt biting in to his ankles as he bounced with the force of their thrusts. His shoulders started to ache.
AJ tossed and turned as the nightmare tried to suck him under. Even asleep he knew that it was a dream and was fighting to claw his way out of it. With a loud gasp he shot upright in his bed. Every part of his body hurt just as it had the night it had happened. From head to toe he was trembling. Air was whistling in and out of his lungs, making the room spin. It was a full scale panic attack building, and he had nothing to do to head it off. No way to prevent it from growing.
A scream was sticking in his throat, trying to claw its way up. He tried to hold it all in, but he just couldn’t anymore. Ever since he had opened up to Brian it seemed that everything was just pouring out of him. What little he’d been able to control now ran rampant in him. The scream ripped its way free, echoing through the room. He grabbed the pillow and buried his face in it as the screams continued, making him hoarse.
His hands came up, gripping fistfuls of his hair. “Stop, stop, stop! Stop it!” he screamed, yanking on his hair. Everything they had said to him, even their laughter, bounced around inside his skull. He hit his head, trying to knock the voices out of there. Anything to make them stop!
He heard his door open, and he knew that it was Brian rushing in, but he couldn’t stop any of it. He felt Brian climb into the bed and actually relished the feeling of those strong, warm arms enveloping him. They gave him something to center on, to cling to.
“Alex, oh Alex. I’m right here. I’ve got you.” Brian whispered, rocking him as AJ continued to scream and sob. He reached up to try and loosen AJ’s grip. He was terrified that AJ was going to pull out his own hair. Finally he managed to get AJ’s hands to loosen, and threaded their fingers together, letting AJ squeeze him.
Just being in Brian’s arms was starting to bring the panic attack down. “Why doesn’t it go away?” he wheezed, managing to pull the screams back inside himself. “Every night I dream about it. I have to hear them all the time. What was it about me? Do I just look like a whore? Do I look easy? Was it really just my skin? Because I look like a girl?”
“You don’t look like a girl, Alex.” Brian was quick to reassure him. “You have never come off looking like a girl to me.”
“Then is it the skin? Or am I just really a whore?”
“Oh, baby, no. No, no.” Now Brian gathered him closer so that they were plastered against one another. He wasn’t thinking, only reacting to the hurt of the one he loved. “You do have soft skin, but that’s ok. These people just use those as excuses, as reasons to do what they do. It’s not you, baby, never you. They’re the ones that are wrong. They’re sick. It’s not your fault.”
“I want to believe you so much. But I can’t seem to. There had to be something I did. Otherwise it makes no sense!”
“Sometimes things don’t make sense to us, Alex. Some things we have no idea of reasons behind them. But baby, it wasn’t you.”
“Don’t leave me, please. Stay with me, like this.” AJ begged him. He didn’t understand it, didn’t have any explanation as to why he wasn’t scared of Brian’s touch at the moment, but he didn’t want to lose that feeling. It had been so long since he had been able to be held, and it felt so good. Just knowing that he was safe and protected. “I don’t know if I can go back to sleep.”
Brian laid them down gently, keeping AJ in the circle of his arms. They shuffled for a little, and Brian pulled the comforter up over them. Softly he began to sing. “I can see it in your eyes. Broken windows, fallen skies. Baby, baby what you hiding from? The light that followed you around, lately nowhere to be found. Don’t you know that I’m your place to run? You been holding on so long, trying to make believe that nothing’s wrong. Not letting it show. There aint nothing you can do to make me turn away from you. I need you to know that you can let go.”
AJ had never heard the lyrics before. They seemed to fill him, chasing away everything but the words that Brian was singing to him.
“Sifting through shattered dreams. Livin' in the in between. Baby, babe it's gonna be alright. When you're lost, let down, disappointed and jerked around in this cold, cold world I will always be by your side.”
It was a beautiful song. AJ drifted on it as Brian continued to sing. Slowly the tension in his body lessened, and his breathing became easier. The lyrics were true. Here, in the safety of Brian’s arms, he knew he could let go of everything. He didn’t have to pretend anymore, or hide it.
“Don't be afraid when you're falling apart. Don't hesitate I'll be right where you are. Open your eyes there's a crack in the dark. You never let me see you cry. You locked it somewhere deep inside. Baby, baby let me hold you tight. Make it alright. Baby, baby gonna be alright, cause I'm by your side when the whole world turns against you. Not letting it show. Baby, babe gonna be alright. Cause I'm by your side when the whole world turns against you. You can let go.”
At peace, AJ slid into sleep.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The next few days started a transformation in AJ. He had his first meeting with his counselor, a woman named Jessica, and he liked her. She encouraged him to talk when he wanted, and allowed him silence when he didn’t. For the first two days he had no idea what to tell her. Their meetings were privet, but he usually ended up telling Brian some of them.
Each night since the first, AJ slept in the warmth of Brian’s arms. He didn’t understand what had changed, or why Brian’s arms felt so right to him, but he wasn’t going to argue with it. This was the man that he knew he loved, and knew loved him. He just, wasn’t ready for a relationship with him. He told Jessica about it, and she agreed that it was too soon for a serious relationship, but that when they were done at this house, they should try to date.
After the first week he finally broke down and told her everything. Through the second week she helped him walk through things, and analyze them in a different light. She told him the process to healing was a long one, even longer for him because he’d gone so close to the edge before he’d got help. But she put him on anti-depressants, as well as an anti-anxiety medication. She warned him that their effects weren’t instantaneous. Only with combined effort of medication and counseling would he begin to heal.
By their third week there, Brian noticed more and more changes in AJ. He wasn’t back to his normal self, but bits and pieces of him were coming back to life. He was smiling again, just a little, but it was there. One night Brian even got him to laugh.
Their true test came when, after being there for almost a month, Kevin called to say that management said one month was all they could give AJ. By contract he was required to come back to work once his thirty days had been used up. Finding out had sent AJ in to his room for the whole afternoon. What he did in there Brian didn’t know. But at one point Jessica showed up. He was out back when she left; he could hear her car go down the drive.
The back door opened, and Brian heard AJ’s hesitant footsteps. Sometimes it still amazed him how much about AJ had changed. So much so that even his walk was hesitant where it used to be a stride that dared people to get out of his way. He stayed perfectly still, letting AJ come to him. Though he was much better about touching, he was still jumpy if he wasn’t expecting it, and he did a whole lot better if you let him initiate it.
A second later AJ was standing beside him, hand stuffed in his pockets. Their arms brushed lightly, but that was all the contact they had. “I set up to do phone counseling with Jessica.” AJ said suddenly. “She says it’s not quite the same, but that it would be beneficial for me. On top of that, we agreed that once every one to two months as needed, we’ll get together face to face. So long as I stay on my medication and keep in contact with her, she thinks that I’ll be fine on the road. She says I’ve come a long way in the past month.”
“I’m proud of you, J.” Brian said softly.
“I wouldn’t have done any of this without you.” Soft as can be, AJ moved his hand to lace his fingers with Brian’s. Love welled up inside of Brian, practically overflowing from him. He knew how important a step it was for AJ to allow someone to hold his hand. His baby was beginning to heal.