Why Not With Me? 

Chapter Fifty-Four: Let It Take You

----------------------------------------

There was a town in north Ontario, 

With dream, comfort, memory to spare

And in my mind I still need a place to go

All my changes were there. 

Blue, blue windows behind the stars, 

Yellow moon on the rise, 

Big birds flying across the sky, 

Throwing shadows on our eyes.

Leave us 

Helpless, helpless, helpless

Baby, can you hear me now? 

The chains are locked 

And tied across the door 

Baby, sing with me somehow

- from Helpless, by Neil Young

--------------------------------------------------

-----------Justin’s Point of View------------

Brian is a mask, a shell, an actor.

We go home and he makes the following comments in the car: 

“It’s sure getting cold out.” 

“Let’s order Thai for dinner.”  

“It’s supposed to rain tomorrow.”  And: 

“I think we should have the cleaning woman come on Wednesdays, too.” 

Then we get home and he takes out the newspaper, pulls out the business section. He makes coffee, sits at the table in the sunlight and reads. 

Or appears to read. 

The pages aren’t turning. I’m watching him closely and I don’t see his eyes moving. He’s staring straight ahead. 

I try to engage him somehow. I set my hand on his shoulder while he is reading the paper and he looks up at me. 

“The art section’s on the table,” he says with a half smile. 

“Brian,” I say softly a little while later, sitting close to him while he drank coffee. 

“Uh huh?” he asked, his tone one of calculated casualness.  

“Stop,” I said, my voice very, very soft.  Brian looked up at me and blinked a few times. He bit his cheek and pressed his lips together as he turned back to the paper.

--------Brian’s Point of View--------

“Stop,” he says again, more sternly this time. I bite my tongue trying to keep in tears. My whole body feels like it’s filled with tears. I feel like it this cracks, I might dissolve and be washed away by the feelings I have inside.

I try really hard to read the paper, to focus my eyes on the headlines about bank mergers.

Then I feel Justin’s fingertips on my jaw, his touch gentle but undeniable.

“Stop, Beautiful.” 

-------Justin’s Point of View-------

He looks up at me again and now his eyes are so bright, shining. He looks terrified. He sets down the paper and keeps his lips pressed together. 

The terror and the desperation in his eyes was palpable. 

My hand slides along his cheek and his eyes never leave mine. I reach and take his hand in mine.

“Come,” I say simply. He shakes his head and blinks.  I pull him to his feet. He stands tall and gorgeous and so afraid. I lean in, my body brushing against his while I whisper into his ear.

“Your safeword is sparrow.” 

He nods slightly.

-------Brian’s Point of View--------

All the feelings are boiling up, burning, threatening me. Threatening to overrun me, to drown me, and my defenses were crumbling. 

I don’t think I can save myself, but I know Sunshine can. 

“Come,” he repeats, squeezing my hand a little. This time I follow him. With every stop I try to push back the feelings I have now. I try to save myself, I try to run and hide.  

“It’s okay to hurt now,” he says gently. I blink furiously as the tears swell up in my eyes.  

-------Justin’s Point of View---------

He shakes his head quickly and does not meet my eyes. 

“Look at me, Beautiful,” I say, putting my fingers under his chin, guiding him. Finally he does. His eyes are at once alight with green and infused with a deep brown. 

“It’s okay to hurt now. You’ll be okay.”  He shakes his head vehemently and I can see his chin quivering slightly.

I step closer to him and pull him closer to me; I wrap him in my arms.  His body is tense from trying to keep himself composed. I pull him down with me in the chair and hold him closer. I hold him tight; I anticipate a struggle. 

“Beautiful, you’re hurt… you’re hurt now, and it’s safe to show that.”

I swear he was so close I could feel him set his jaw and grind his teeth in defiance. I ran my fingers soothingly through his hair for several minutes. He could not look at me. He kept his head against my shoulder, stiff. 

-----------Brian’s Point of View---------

“I want to see how you feel now,” Sunshine says.  I can feel the emotions all the way up to my throat. They could drown me soon; they could stop my breath. 

“No please,” I manage to say, my face buried in his neck. He continues to hold me, making slight calming noises into the silence. 

“I want to see,” he repeats and I bury myself further, my heart pounding wildly, my throat constricted. My whole body is filled with something venomous… I shake my head desperately, feeling now that I’ll explode if I speak. That I’ll die.

“Get up.” 

His words stun me and it takes me a few moments to reply, to respond. Then I get up and he does, and he takes me to the bed.

I lie down nervously, my head pounding. My eyes are shut, warding off this dread that is suffocating me. 

Then I feel the cuffs on my ankles. They snap shut and locked. Moments later the same has happened to my wrists. I’m chained prostate to the bed. I open my eyes and am facing the ceiling. 

-----------Justin’s Point of View----------

There are no blindfolds this time. He needs to see things as they are now, and to see me here with him.  I sit over him, my eyes looking into his, my skin touching his.

“Feel it, Beautiful… This is the way she can hurt you… Feel it now for all those times you couldn’t feel it,” I say. His eyes open wide with alarm and are brimming now with tears. They do not fall. He is silent. 

“You’re safe here,” I say, my voice as quiet as it can be.  “Safe to feel.” 

He shakes his head and I can see him practically biting a hole in his lip, trying so hard to keep from making a noise. 

That’s when I realize that the slightest noise, the first tear, will be his undoing tonight. 

-------Brian’s Point of View---------

“You did it, Beautiful. She hurt you tonight but you stood up to her with the truth.” 

---------Justin's Point of View------------

His wrists pull down and in against the cuffs; he’s blinking furiously, his eyelashes wet with tears. 

------------Brian's Point of View----------

“Let it go, Beautiful… Just let it go,” he murmurs.  “Let it take you for a while.”

That’s when I feel it. I can’t keep it in any more.

I’m drowning. 

-----------Justin’s Point of View-----------

The tears fall quickly down his face; his breath comes out choked as the wet streams become rivers on his cheeks. His body jerks in the chains, in the cuffs, as he sobs.  

He cries and he cries and he cries. 

The sound fills up the loft. 

It’s hard for him to breathe through it; he gulps and gasps sometimes through the tears. 

  I feel his hair so soft but wet with sweat as I cradle his head in my lap and stroke his forehead with my fingertips.