“I’d love that! It would be so much fun to work together and come up with ideas.”
Gabriel smiled at me and said, “It makes me happy to see you like this. I always hoped you’d come out of rehab with a new lease on life, and it’s so great that you found something you’re passionate about.”
“It’s all because of you.”
He shook his head. “All I did was put you on a bus.”
“You did a hell of a lot more than that.”
“But you had to do the hard work of getting through rehab and then keeping yourself on track, which you’ve obviously done.”
I told him, “You’ve done the same thing.”
He glanced at me, and then he turned his gaze to the bedspread and asked, “How many times did you have to go through rehab?”
“Just that one time. How about you?”
“It took three attempts at rehab, an overdose that landed me in the hospital, and years of counseling and support groups to finally get to this point. I haven’t used for almost two years now, but I don’t fully trust myself. I don’t know if I ever will.”
I said, “You’re doing great, and I’m proud of you.”
“Thank you. I need to hear that sometimes.” He still wasn’t looking at me.
“Anytime you need someone to talk to, I want you to know I’m here for you. It’s not like I have profound words of wisdom or anything, but I understand what you’ve been through and I’m a pretty good listener.”
“I appreciate that.” Gabriel hesitated for a few moments, and then he moved around to my side of the bed and leaned against me. When I put my arm around him, he rested his head on my shoulder.
I said quietly, “I’m also here whenever you need this.”
After a pause, he murmured, “It’s funny, you look so different, but your voice is exactly the same as it was all those years ago.”
“Is it?”
He nodded. “It’s also amazing how familiar this feels. We must have held each other like this a hundred times back then.”
“Except our positions were reversed. You were always the one holding me.” It was different too because it used to happen through a haze of drugs. This time, I got to experience all of it, from the softness of his hair against my cheek to the clean scent of his skin and the warmth of his body. It felt unbelievably good.
“You’re right. I didn’t think of that.”
“You tried so hard to take care of me.” After another pause, I said, “That entire year, when I was so sad and miserable with that sadist who called himself a Dom, do you remember how you’d cheer me up?”
He whispered, “I’d do your makeup, or I’d let you do mine. It seems dumb now, but it was all I had with me, just a bag with a few cosmetics. I didn’t know what else to do to take your mind off things.”
“Those times with you were a light in the darkness, and they meant everything. It’s no wonder I have such a positive association with makeup, and why I gravitated to it as a career. It always reminded me of you.”
His voice broke. “I’m so fucking sorry, Riley.”
“For what?”
“For not getting you out of there sooner. It was a terrible situation, and that man was a psychopath.”
“You tried,” I said, as I held him more securely. “Don’t you remember? You spent months trying to convince me to leave, but I wouldn’t do it. That’s how lost I was to my addiction. As long as Mason Simeck kept supplying me with drugs, I stayed and let him do whatever he wanted to me. I wouldn’t let you help me until I terrified myself by nearly overdosing.”
“I always wondered if you stayed because you had a relationship with Simeck and he meant something to you.”
“That wasn’t it at all,” I said. “It was a business arrangement. One of his flunkies would bring me food or drugs or alcohol, whatever I needed, and I almost always stayed in that upstairs bedroom. The only time I saw Simeck was when he summoned me to his basement dungeon. He didn’t even provide aftercare. I think the reason he started sending you up to my room was because he didn’t want the responsibility of actually taking care of me.”
Gabriel sounded heartbroken when he whispered, “It’s even worse than I thought. I should have tried harder to get you out of there.”
“Like I said, you really tried, but you couldn’t force me to go until I was ready. I shouldn’t have left San Francisco without you, though. I was so scared I’d never find you again, but here you are. It feels like a miracle.”
“It does.”
I told him, “I went back and tried to find you a few months after I finished rehab, but you’d totally disappeared.”