The Muse's Undoing

“Did she say that?” He’s using a towel to dry his dark wavy hair that looks black when it’s wet.

“Is it odd that we sleep in the same bed?”

He freezes mid head rub and gives me a puzzled look. “Are you asking because I’m queer?”

“No,” I say. If anyone can understand the spectrum of sexuality, it’s me. “But do you think that’s why she was asking?”

“What did she say?” he asks.

“It was more of an implication about two grown men sharing a bed.”

He rolls his eyes and returns to the bathroom to hang up the towel. “She needs to not worry about where I lay my head down. If she knew what I know about me, she wouldn’t be so quick to ask questions she won’t like the answers to.”

I laugh. I kinda love Matty’s attitude about Donna. As much as I let her meddle in my personal business these days, he’s like a wall with her. Whenever I’ve listened in on his end of their conversations, it’s a bunch of sounds of agreement and one word answers. Like he’s barely listening to her. I wish I could shut her out like that. It’s my guilt that trips me up.

I owe a lot to her, especially since I turned on her when Matty and Maggie were born. But my near death experience and all those nights I spent in the hospital waking up to see her or my dad worrying at my bedside had me determined to do better by them. At least give them a better chance at being involved with me than I have in the past.

“You don’t have to stay here every night, you know,” I tell him, in case he thinks I’m trapping him here inappropriately, too.

He waves this off and kneels at the foot of the bed, ready to put me through my paces. “Once I get my legal ID, maybe I’ll go out more.”

“What difference does that make?” I ask as he picks up my left foot and rotates my ankle in circles. I can, of course, do this part of the exercise myself, but he makes me lazy. Or maybe it’s the drugs kicking in.

“Makes me feel weird. Lying to people about my age when they want to go to a bar. It’d be amazing if you and I didn’t have to talk about this.”

I grin. “Fine.” It’s not like I want him sleeping somewhere else. I’d worry. He’s so young, and as a former young person myself, I know I made some dumb mistakes—trusted some questionable people. I’ve been lucky mostly, but there were a couple of guys I hooked up with back in the day that were not at all as easy-going as their online profiles indicated they’d be. Women, too, but women are better in general about taking no for an answer.

“Pills kicking in?” he asks.

With effort, I refocus my gaze from his hands on my leg to his face. His hands feel so good, though. “How can you tell?”

“Your eyelids.”

“Stretch me, baby,” I say.

He snorts. “Okay, that’s odd.”

I laugh with him. “It was too good. I had to.” Letting my eyes close, I relax into the pillows and savor the warmth of his touch.

In the hospital, all the hands-on interactions I had with nurses and therapists put me on edge and left me drenched in sweat. It wasn’t just the pain—it was the constant touching—strangers with their hands on me without permission. The beginnings of PTSD kicking in, probably. I was told by a psychiatrist to expect some extreme reactions to relatively normal stimuli.

But the truth is I’ve been repelling touch and affection since the twins were born, deliberately making a teenage island of myself. I stopped hugging my parents entirely and developed a sort of touch me and prepare to have your throat punched vibe.

I have to assume I spent the first few months of my life not being held much—like one of those monkeys they used to do experiments on. God only knows what I was like when the Cannons adopted me. I can’t imagine I was an easy baby, but I’ve never asked.

And yet, I’d do this three times a day with Matty if he made me.

It’s always been all or nothing with me. You’re either allowed in, like Matthew, or please get the fuck away from me and take two more steps back. It’s why I almost always fuck strangers from behind. Eye contact makes them feel too close. It’s not an aversion. I just like to have a choice in the matter. Most often, my choice is a handshake or a head nod.

Matthew bends my knee, as gently as he can, aiming it at my abs. It’s a dull ache as the muscles around my thighbone strain and reject the movement. I groan, and he stops. “We have a safe word for a reason.”

“I know, Matty. I can’t help if I make noise.”

He pushes further until I finally blurt, “Pulitzer.”

Then he backs off.

We go through the same stretch the prescribed five times before moving on to a lateral hip stretch, which isn’t nearly as awful. “You’re getting way more flexible,” he notes, some pride creeping into his tone.