“Not really.”
I nudged him. “Tough. I’m not taking you home till you’ve eaten.”
Kim took a little persuasion, but eventually relented and ate a small breakfast that turned into a big one as his appetite returned. I watched him, still drinking my cauldron of oversweet tea, and wondered when he’d last eaten. Perhaps sensing that I was fretting, Kim pinched my cheek. “Stop worrying. I’m sorry I fucked up, but you can’t let it be all you see when you look at me. It wins that way.”
“It’s hard not to worry, mate. I didn’t see this coming.”
“And you never will. I don’t, and I know it better than anyone.”
“There’s nothing I could’ve done to help you?”
“Probably not. I just need to keep fighting. Plenty of addicts win. There’s no reason I can’t too.”
Hope stirred in my battered heart. The change in Kim after the meeting was clear to see—the fading lines of stress in his face, the upright set of his shoulders. The weight of what he’d been through in the last few days was still there, but he had a tangible grasp on it, like he was emerging from the other side of a recurring bad dream. Was it too much to wish that the nightmare would weaken with each pass? “I believe in you.”
“I know. I think that’s why I didn’t dig up the whiskey I buried in the strawberry patch last year.”
I couldn’t gauge if he was joking or not, but the sentiment wasn’t lost. “I do believe in you, Kim, and I want to be there for you—herefor you—if you’ll let me.”
“I couldn’t push you away, even if I wanted to. I love you, Jas.”
“What?”
Kim looked away. “I was kinda hoping that you already knew.”
I caught his chin and forced him to meet my gaze again. “Knew what?”
“That I love you.”
I grinned like a fucking maniac, couldn’t help it. “You love me?”
“Course I do. And I really do, Jas. This ain’t the addiction bullshit messing with my head. You have to know that . . . I’m still me, with or without it.”
“Oh God, Idoknow that, I promise. The only reason I’ve been too messed up to say so is because I bloody love you too.”
“Really?”
“Yes. Dude, how couldyounot know?”
Kim laughed, and it was the first real humour I’d seen in him since the weekend. “Erm, perhaps because we’ve been too busy working and fucking to get around to saying so?”
“Actually, you did say so, when you called me in Bristol, but I was half-asleep, so I thought I’d dreamed it.” I laughed with him, and leaned in to loll my head on his shoulder. He was warm and strong beneath me, and the faith I had in him seemed all the more real. “You’re going to be okay, Kim. We both are, together. I can feel it.”
“Me too, Jas, me too. I’ve just gotta remember what it means.”
Six months later . . .
The night owl in me had always dreaded spring. My camera craved the light, but my soul preferred the gloomy dark of the colder months, the clouds, and the shadows, the wind and the rain. It suited my mood, it suited me—at least I’d thought so until my first Christmas with Kim passed and spring crept up on us, and I realised what I’d been missing. I’d seen the early morning sun in his face, captured it, with first my eyes, and then my lens, and had known for sure that life had never been better.
Corny?
Maybe, but it was true. Being with Kim challenged me in ways I’d never imagined, but it had been, and continued to be, the making of me. I loved him, and never more so than when I woke in the morning to find him still sleeping. It was a damn shame I rarely woke before him, and this morning was no exception. Gentle, stroking fingers on my cheek roused me, and I opened my eyes to Kim’s sleepy grin; his rumpled hair and hooded lids told me that he hadn’t been up long.
Still, I was disappointed. I was kind of addicted to watching him sleep, and I craved it when I went without it.
But addiction was a tainted word in our house, and the reason Kim was awake so early didn’t escape me. He kissed me deeply, the sweep of his tongue and the scrape of his teeth a promise of what would come later, and then he slid from the bed—his bed, this morning—and padded, naked, to the bathroom.
I watched him go, admiring, as usual, the sensual sway of his slender hips, but I caught my imagination before it could call him back to bed. This morning wasn’t about me, or even about us.