“God, I’m such an idiot.”
“You’re a believer, bro, that’s all.”
“The fuck’s that mean?” Rhys grumbled.
“I dunno . . . you have a kind of faith that things’ll work out if you just do your best. It’s sweet, man. But also, ya know, deeply entitled. Like you think you should have the power to do anything.”
“I wish I did.” Rhys’s voice was a twist of frustration and grief.
“Well, what would you do if you actually were all-powerful. Would you erase Matt’s past? Change his feelings? What?”
“I’d . . . I . . . No, I guess not. Because it’d change who he is, and he’s perfect.”
I laid my head down on my knees.
“Guess I’d just make him know—like deep-down know—that he can tell me anything. I— He . . . he thinks I’m weak, man.”
“Weak how?”
“He said he didn’t tell me stuff sometimes because I couldn’t handle it.”
“Hmm. What else did he say.”
“That it . . . that he didn’t wanna ruin the way I saw the world. Like I’m a little kid or something. Like I’m too weak.”
“Aw, man, let it go.”
“What go?”
“This . . . this fuckin’ thing you do where you’re not satisfied unless you shoulder everyone else’s burdens and fix everything and like rescue cats from trees while doing it.”
“I don’t—”
“You do. You know you do. Because you tried to do it with me a hundred times. You can’t fucking save people, Nyland.” Caleb’s voice was steel. “You can only be there for them when they save themselves. You couldn’t have made me be sober, bud. You know this. You could have wrestled the needle outta my hand, flushed the shit down the toilet, driven me to every meeting, driven me home after, made me drink water, and threatened every dealer from Brighton Beach to the Bronx and it still woulda made fuck-all difference because none of it touched what was going on inside. You know that.”
“I know that.”
“You didn’t fail me, Rhys. You didn’t fail me because I wasn’t your responsibility and it wasn’t about you. Do you hear me? It had nothing to do with you.”
“I know, I just—”
“Shut up. This is the dark side of a fuckin’ savior complex, man. It’s an ego trip and it’s not real. I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but Matt had a whole life before he met you and a metric ton of shit went down before he ever knew your name. And I get that you feel like crap right now, and I’m sorry. I’m truly sorry, bro. But none of that is about you.”
“But—”
“Nope. It’s not. It’s affecting you because Matt’s your partner and because you love him. It’s affecting your relationship right now. You have to deal with it, sure. But the rest of it? That’s on Matt. God, your face right now. I don’t mean it’s Matt’s fault. I mean it’s Matt’s business to deal with his shit.”
“But I want to help him deal with it.” Rhys’s voice was small and afraid. Caleb sighed.
“I’m sure you do help, man. That guy is over the damn moon for you. The fact that he married you, that he moved out here to be with you . . . Look no disrespect to Matty, I love the kid, but when I first met him I thought he’d be gone in a month. He was skittish as fuck, always looking at the door. Or he’d look at you like he just wanted you to fuck him so you wouldn’t notice how freaked he was.”
“Shut up,” Rhys growled, but I think we both knew Caleb was right.
I couldn’t even find it in me to be embarrassed that Caleb had seen it. I’d been a mess. You’re still a mess, a voice said. But . . . I was a different mess, wasn’t I? I was a mess because I had someone I loved so desperately I was terrified of hurting him or losing him. Terrified that the sheer intensity of my feeling would crack me wide open. I was a mess because I had so much now, not because I had nothing.
“Sorry,” Caleb said. “I was trying to say that he’s chosen you at every point. He wants to be with you. He adores you. That’s not in question. The only question is what do you guys need to make it work for both of you?”
“I need Matt to trust me,” Rhys said immediately.
“Okay, but I mean . . . what tools do you need—what resources? Like, I needed to go to rehab. Uh, yeah, okay, it didn’t work the first, um, three times. But I needed the space. The dedicated time to pay attention only to the fact that I was an addict. Without the distraction of all the other things I was. Nothing to hide it behind. I needed that and then I needed to go to meetings. I needed to quit music. I needed to move out of the city. I needed Huey. Hell, I needed you. I needed you to take my truck away and hold my hand and just be there some nights when I was crawling out of my skin. So you gotta figure out what you guys need.”