Ecstasy

“I think I like that idea a lot,” I admit.

“Really?” He sounds surprised, and I guess I can’t blame him.

“You really want me?” I counter. “After everything I did? Everything you know about me?”

He still has his thumb over my mouth, and he doesn’t move away from me. He doesn’t run, even though bringing up all the ways I’ve wronged him gives him every reason to.

He’s not like Eli. He admitted as much to me before. He doesn’t like to watch me with other guys. He doesn’t want to share me. But he’s seen all of that, seen me at my worst, and he still wants me? It’s almost hard to fathom.

“Yeah,” he says, his voice kind of hoarse. “I do.” I hear him swallow, and he pushes his hand back, through my hair.

“Why are you so good to me after all the shit I’ve done?”

I hear him swallow. “I could ask the same of you.” This time, he clears this throat. “I’m sorry too, you know. For how I always get so angry, and not sticking up for you with my dad. But fuck him, Zara.” His eyes are shining in the dark. “I mean it. Fuck him, and fuck me, too. I promise I’m going to work on my own shit, too. I promise you, princess. I’m sorry for all of it.” He takes a deep breath. “We’ve all made mistakes, Zara. It’s called being human.”

I laugh, shaking my head as he strokes my hair. “I think I’ve done a little more than make mistakes.”

“Yeah, maybe.” He smiles at me, his white teeth visible even in the dark. “But I see everything you could be. Everything you already are, even if you don’t know it yet. I see more than what you want people to see, Zara. I see past your bullshit, and that’s what I want. What you really are.”

“What if you’re wrong?” My mouth is dry, my stomach fluttering as I meet his gaze. “What if I’m not any of the good things you think you see? What if I’m just as wrong as I look?”

He smiles. “You don’t look wrong. In fact,” he bites his lip, eyes dipping down to my chest even though he can barely see me in the dark, under the covers, “you look really fucking right.”

I roll my eyes, smiling despite myself. “You know what I mean. What if I’m just a druggie whore? What if I’m not going anywhere with my life? You know I’m a philosophy major. Like, what the—”

“Yeah,” he interrupts me, “I never fucking asked. What is it you intended to do with that degree?” There’s a teasing edge to his voice that makes me laugh.

The fact we never talked about these things, it’s almost fu

I shrug, and his hand goes from my hair to my back and he pulls me closer, rolling onto his back so my head is against his chest. I curl up around him, arm stretched over his torso as he keeps stroking my hair, gripping my arm with one hand.

“I just liked the idea of Stoicism,” I admit. “A teacher touched on it in history class, back in high school. I liked the idea of focusing only on what we can control. Mainly, how we react to shit. And how life is short, how we can’t count on a long one or even a good one.” I shrug against him. “Obviously, I suck at applying any tenets of Stoicism to my own life, but I like the concept.”

Alex laughs, his chest rumbling against me. “Okay, so, if you could do anything in the world, what would you do?”

“Drugs,” I deadpan.

He tenses beneath me, his hand on my arm tightening.

I laugh, flicking his chest playfully. “I’m joking.”

He exhales, like a lover putting up with my bullshit solely because he loves me.

“I’d like to help people, I guess. When I’m done helping myself. I’d like to help people who feel uncomfortable in their own skin feel a little better. Without drugs,” I add quickly, in case he has any ideas on exactly what it is I want to do. I do not want to be a dealer like Jax. “I’d like to write a book about Stoicism one day, maybe even how addicts could apply the teachings to their own life. Obviously, I’ve got no idea how to do that because here I am with you right now but…” I trail off, drumming my fingers against his skin. “I don’t know. I never gave much thought to my future, beyond the next party.” It feels cathartic, like a release, having this conversation with him, like I did with Jax.

It feels good confiding in Alex, I realize.

He plays with my hair and breathes evenly beneath my arm. I wonder if he’s going to fall asleep, or if he just doesn’t know what to say. I start to wonder if I’ve shared too much. If this bonding we’ve done today is more than we should have. If I’ve fucked this up all the more.

“What do you want to do?” I ask him softly, not quite wanting to be alone yet. “I mean, I know you want to go to law school. But what is it you really want?” If he falls asleep and I don’t, it’ll feel that way. Like I’m alone. And as exhausted as my body feels, my mind is still wired.

“Yeah, well. I never told you but I don’t actually want to go to law school.”

I should be surprised, I guess, but I’m not. Alex flies off the handle too easily. He’d make a horrible lawyer.

“I want to open up a gym,” he admits, his voice a whisper. “I’ve never told anyone that, but I want to open up a gym and I wouldn’t mind ru

We’re both quiet a moment. I could picture Alex doing that. He knows he has anger issues, knows he needs to work on them, and if he could help other people do the same, I think he’d be good at that. If he gets his shit under control like he said he will.

“Maybe we could open up a business together,” he tells me, and my stomach drops. “We could have the gym, and you could counsel people in the wisdom of Stoicism, and I could run a camp in our backyard, because it’ll be fucking huge. I like the outdoors far better than anything inside, and you’d learn to like it, too, if you don’t already.” He kisses me again, apparently unaware that I’m having a mini heart attack.

My limbs are all tingly and I kind of feel like I’m floating. The idea of him being with me past college, past this week even, is unfathomable. And I don’t like it. People always leave.

“Too soon?” he asks me. His tone is light, but I hear the worry in it, too.

“No, it’s just…” It’s just you’re going to leave me. No one ever stays. Good marriages and never-ending romance don’t exist. “I don’t think you mean it.”

He pauses his gentle strokes of my hair, just for a beat. “Why?”

People always leave. My dad. My mom, to all of her husbands. I can’t recall a single friendship I’ve had that’s lasted the test of time, or a move, or a major life event. Usually, it’s my fault. I don’t keep in touch. I’m not a victim in that regard, but still, that’s life. That’s how it happens for me.

“Your parents are not doing well,” I point out. “Mine are divorced. My mom is on her fourth marriage.”

His hand trails down over the nape of my neck, and again, he turns over, unsettling my comfortable position against his chest. Then we’re lying on our sides, facing one another again, and he grabs my hand between us, his fingers threading through mine.

“We’re not them.” His voice is almost stern. “We don’t have to repeat our parents’ mistakes. I sure as shit will be nothing like my father. Or your father.”