Cuff Me

Leo looked over at both of us. “I might be old, but I can hear. You two are disgusting. But if you feel well enough to talk to a girl like that, then you don’t need a babysitter. I’m going down to the gym to check on things. I’ll be back in an hour.” He stood up and walked around the bed towards the door. He stopped with his hand on the handle. “And don’t you dare tell your mother. That woman might be small, but she scares the hell out of me.”

We both laughed as Dillon agreed, “We won’t, I promise. I’m not trying to get in trouble with her either. She’s mad enough.”

“You’re damn right she is. We all are, even Berkley, although she won’t tell you.” He sighed before opening the door. “We just care about you son, nobody wants you to get hurt like that again.”

I saw worry etch around Dillon’s eyes. “I won’t Leo, I promise.”

Leo simply nodded and walked out, shutting the door softly behind him.

As much as I knew that I shouldn’t, I believed him. I could tell in the short time that I had been around his mother that Dillon really respected her. He cared about her so much. He knew that by getting hurt he’d practically broken her heart, and I didn’t think he would do that again.

He patted the empty space next to him. “Lay with me.”

I lay down next to him and as he put his arm around me, I snuggled into the soft space between his shoulder and jawbone. I didn’t want to hurt him, so I tried to be as gentle as possible, but he just pulled me closer. He took in a deep breath and I felt him wince underneath me. “I can move.”

“But that would defeat the purpose.”

“The purpose of what?”

“Of you being close to me. I don’t want you to move. I want you next to me.”

I sucked in a deep breath. “Okay.”

He turned looking at me with sad eyes. “You saved my life, Berkley. You got into a cage when everybody fled. That was bad ass. So I figure as long as you’re next me, I’ll be okay.”

I tried to contain my smile. “I think I can do that.” I paused for a moment, but the silence felt awkward to me. “I like your mom, and Leo. Your family’s nice. They really love you.”

“Yeah, I’m lucky. My dad split when I was just a baby, and Leo’s always been there for me. I know how hurt he is that I did this fight. But I’m going to figure out a way to make it up to him. To all of you.”

I set my lips into a thin line. “I just don’t understand why you did it. You didn’t have to.”

He let his fingertips gently graze my temple before speaking. “I know that now. But sometimes I just get these urges, this need to prove myself. It’s more to prove myself to me, if that makes sense. It has nothing to do with anyone else. I told you that I was dangerous.”

I turned to look at him, his fierce blue eyes shining in the fading sunlight of his apartment window. “No, you told me that you are dangerous for me, but you’re not. The only person that was in any danger was you. You have a freaking death wish.”

He laughed again but stopped short, flinching under the pain.

“You should take some of these pain meds. You need them. And the anti-inflammatory; you heard what the doctor said—if you swell up again you’re going to have to go back to the hospital.”

He nodded slowly closing his eyes. “Yeah, give me the anti-inflammatory and I’ll take three of the Oxy.”

“Three?” Clearly he didn’t know what he was saying. The pain must have been worse than he was admitting. The prescription had been very explicit: one every twelve hours. If he took three, he would be lucky if he didn’t fall into a coma. “I think you’re only supposed to take one.” I sat up and started to unscrew the cap off the pills when he started arguing with me.

“Three is the only way it will do anything. Trust me; I’ve been on enough of those.”

I looked at him, confused. “You mean when you hurt your shoulder? That was a long time ago. These are probably much more serious medications. You’re not taking three.”

“I thought we agreed that you weren’t going to try to control me anymore.”

“I’m not trying to control you. I’m looking out for your health. I didn’t just get you out of the hospital for you to go back.”

I looked at the bottle to be sure that I was right. And that’s exactly what it said. One pill every twelve hours, but then I noticed something. The doctor on the bottle for this Oxycodone was not the same doctor on the anti-inflammatory pills. And the date was all wrong; this had been filled three months ago. “Dillon are you still on pain medication from your shoulder?”

He put his hand over his eyes. “I really don’t want to get into this right now with you.”

“What the hell does that mean? Are you still taking these medications or not?”

He sighed and looked at me with an anger in his eyes I had only seen one other time. When he had kicked me out of the locker room and we’d ended things the first time. “Sometimes I use them to take the edge off. My shoulder still hurts, especially when the weather is bad or if I’ve had a fight two days in a row. It’s no big deal.”