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He's been in the hotel room for months when David wakes up one morning and feels like, while he was sleeping, someone came in and left a heavy stone on his chest. He stares at the ceiling, not sure why he can't get up.
He's not in pain. He can feel his fingers and toes, but the thought of getting up feels impossible. The feeling is nothing he recognises, but is a little like grief.
David thinks he should be afraid, but everything feels so heavy that the fear is muffled.
He needs the bathroom and he can't get up. And when he realises he's in danger of pissing himself it seems to be enough motivation to do… something.
He should call someone.
Sebastien?
But what would he say? And anyway Sebastien is all the way in New York, in David's old life. David's trapped in bed and he's trapped in this hellhole town and he can't get up and his soulmate can't help. Or won't help, maybe.
And then finally David is angry. It breaks into him, or breaks out of him, and then it is everywhere and David is so angry. Has he been angry the whole time? He can't remember not feeling like this.
David isn't sure he even wants Sebastien to call. He thinks about who he wants to hear, who he wants to see, and it's Alexis.
The thought of what would happen if she came in and found him like this, that's what makes him pick up the phone and call her.
She sends their dad to get him, and then he has to spend an hour sitting in Cafe Tropical while his dad attempts to say something helpful. This is followed by a stint with his mom, where she tries to encourage him to channel his misery into a one-man theatre show.
The heaviness stays a long time. His dad comes in every morning and wakes David up, since David will sleep all day now if no one stops him, and sometimes gets him to shower and brush his teeth, but most days it's impossible. And then David has to spend hours at the hotel desk or in Cafe Tropical where someone can keep an eye on him.
It's a few weeks of that and then a doctor comes to visit them and David answers a lot of questions that would have been fine to answer a year ago but now make him feel like shit. He also feels like shit because of how much it must be costing to have this guy come in at all when David doesn't have any insurance.
"Have you had any thoughts of suicide, or thought about hurting yourself in some way?" the doctor asks.
For a moment, David can't breathe, the air can barely get out of his throat. He swallows. His mouth is so dry that his tongue feels clumsy and painful in his mouth.
"No," he croaks out, which is true. Thank god. But that's not the whole truth, and he manages to say, "Maybe if I was stuck like this forever?"
"You're not stuck, David," the doctor says, "there's a lot of treatments for depression."
That's the first time someone's called it that to David's face, though he knows they've been thinking it all along.
But things do actually get a bit better after that. The doctor writes him a prescription right away, and then he gets a referral for therapy.
The first medication doesn't help him, really. But he starts therapy and then they refer him to a psychologist who prescribes a different medication that works at least.
The problem with the new medication is that David can't get hard any more. And that sucks, but they talk about it and decide he's willing to put up with it for a bit longer, rather than changing medications again so fast just after finding one that helps.
The therapy itself is like pulling teeth. But in David's case every tooth is rotten, and it turns out it's better that they're gone.
It takes maybe a year out of his life just getting to a point where he can get out of bed more days than not. Sebastien doesn't call in all that time and David's glad, actually, because then when he meets Patrick and Patrick asks on their first date if David has a soulmate he can say "yes, but I haven't heard from him for more than a year".
Which is weirdly relief to say, and Patrick's soulmate is a woman so he's free at least to be like this with David.
Patrick is the most gentle person David has ever met. His voice is soft, and he is always so careful of others' feelings when he speaks.
David's therapist warns him against trying to make anyone else responsible for his recovery, and David does his best, but it's hard not to see how much better he is around Patrick. Things feel so much easier, so much lighter.
It feels safer working through his tougher problems in therapy knowing that he can go to his boyfriend's place after and Patrick will make coffee and they'll binge watch a TV show and make out for a while. It's like the life David's making for himself is worth all the effort.
Then Patrick's actual soulmate, Rachel, does show up and everything is horrible again. David wishes he'd really listened to his therapist, and not leaned so much on Patrick.
But he gets it, a little. If he hadn't had to leave, David could never have let go of Sebastien. Even now, when he knows that what they had wasn't healthy, some part of him can't help but want Sebastien around.
He understands the need to start over, to put the past behind you - good and bad. So it's inevitable, really, that he forgives Patrick. Although the gifts also go a long way.
And months later, when David has changed meds a second time because erections are relevant again, when he and Patrick are sitting in David's back yard drinking beer and sprawled out on sun loungers, David tells him the whole thing with Sebastien. Patrick waits until the end before he gets up and crouches in front of David's chair.
Patrick is crying, David realises, and is still confused when Patrick reaches out and strokes a hand over David's cheek before pulling him up into a tight hug. The hug is perfect, because they are holding each other as tight as they need to and they both let go at the same time.
David rests his head on Patrick's shoulder for a while and breathes him in. He smells like shampoo, and a bit like sweat, and like their shared laundry detergent. A perfect, comforting, familiar smell and David just wants this.
He can have someone he wants, someone he loves. He doesn't need to wait to be good enough for Sebastien because Patrick loves him already. Patrick cried, for David, even though David hasn't managed to cry at all about any of it.
"I love you," David says. And it's not the first time he's said it, but it's the first time the thought marry me pops into his head straight after.
He doesn't ask, but he does want to ask. And then Patrick beats him to it and it's beautiful, better for not being the picture perfect thing Sebasien would have arranged.
David isn't sure what to do about Sebastien and the wedding. On the one hand, David hasn't heard from him in more than three years so it's not really Sebastien's business. On the other hand, he doesn't want Sebastien to find out from someone else.
He gets the number from a former manager. It was easier than he thought it would be; all David had to do was ask.
Sebastien picks up surprisingly fast, like maybe he was expecting the call.
"Hi Sebastien," David says, "just calling to tell you I'm getting married. I thought you should find out from me, since we're - well, you know."
There's silence on the other end and David feels like an idiot for calling in the first place.
"What?" Sebastien says.
"I'm getting married. I thought you should know."
"To who?"
"It's…" David tries to think through what he's feeling. He's still kind of angry at Sebastien, for being such a shitty soulmate. He can be angry at Sebastien and still grateful for the life he has now.
Honestly, this was as far as David had planned the conversation. He'd say he was engaged and Sebastien would say "congratulations, hope you have a good life" or "please don't ever contact me again". Something final, and then the conversation would end and David would move on.
David guesses it's him that needs to put an end to it instead.
"His name is Patrick. He's a great guy. Anyway, I thought I'd better tell you, for old time's sake or whatever. Good luck with, uh, whatever you've been doing, and I should probably go."
"Wait!" Sebastien kind of yells it, and David has to hold the phone away from his ear.
"Um, okay?"
"When did this happen?"
"Sebastien it's been… it's been three years since you last contacted me. What did you think would happen?"
And then Patrick comes into the room while David is on the phone, and David wants to kiss him so much more than he wants to continue this train wreck of a conversation with Sebastien. To the point that David isn't actually paying attention to whatever Sebastien says next.
"I have to go," David says, cutting Sebastien off.
"But-"
"I know you were probably waiting for me to come back to New York, but at some point I kind of had to get my own life? I wish you luck with yours. That's… well that's all I really wanted to say, actually."
And then David hangs up the phone, and turns it off, and Patrick is beaming at him so there's that. David feels about a thousand foot fall with how proud Patrick looks.
***
"If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy, don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty of lives and whole towns destroyed or about to be. We are not wise, and not very often kind. And much can never be redeemed. Still life has some possibility left. Perhaps this is its way of fighting back, that sometimes something happened better than all the riches or power in the world. It could be anything, but very likely you notice it in the instant when love begins. Anyway, that’s often the case. Anyway, whatever it is, don’t be afraid of its plenty. Joy is not made to be a crumb." - Mary Oliver, Don't Hesitate