A Season of Firsts

Chapter 21

Bang, bang, bang

I'm woken to an incessant pounding coming from outside my room. I push the covers off my pyjama-clad body and open the door to the hallway. It takes my eyes a second to adjust to the hall light that must have been left on when me, Hallie and Chase went to bed around 2 hours ago.

Hallie and Chase stumble out of her door on the opposite side of the hallway, both half-naked and looking just as bleary-eyed as I feel. "What is that noise?" Hallie groans, rubbing her eyes.

"Wait here, I'll get it," Chase says gruffly and strides over to the apartment door, ripping it open just as another round of aggressive knocks start up.

"Rory?" Chase exclaims in surprise, "What the fuck, man?" I look past his broad shoulders to see Rory leaning against the door frame, looking barely conscious. I rush over to the door immediately, ignoring Hallie trying to grab my arm to hold me back.

"I need to speak to Dela," Rory slurs, his words barely comprehensible. As I get closer to him, it becomes glaringly obvious that he is drunk out of his mind. He can barely lift his head up and the smell of alcohol exuding from him wafts into the entryway.

"You mean Addy? Yeah, not gonna happen, not when you're in this state." I've never seen this side of Chase - the aggressive, protective side - but I guess it's bound to come out when you're rudely awoken at 2 in the morning.

"It's fine Chase, he can come in," I object, wanting to figure out what the hell is going on.

Rory looks up then, responding to the sound of my voice, and revealing his fresh black eye and busted lip. There is no stopping me then as I close the gap between us, asking, "What happened?"

He leans into my touch as I run my fingers along his injured lip, then seems to remember why he came, and says, "We need to talk. In private." The moment I see the hurt and anger in his glazed-over eyes, a feeling of dread starts churning in my stomach.

Chase tries to intervene, sandwiching himself between us, as if Rory would ever try to hurt me. "No. You need to go. You two can talk in the morning when you're sober."

But I can't let him walk away without knowing what has caused the pain that's radiating off him in waves. "Chase, it's okay, I promise. He would never hurt me."

Hallie seems to understand that there's not a chance I'm going to let Chase turn Rory away, so she comes over and puts her hand on Chase's arm. "Babe, let them talk for a bit. We'll be right in my room," she says, directing the last statement at me. I give her a silent nod of thanks.

"Don't do anything stupid," Chase directs to Rory in warning as Hallie drags him away.

As soon as the door to Hallie's room shuts, I put Rory's muscled arm over my shoulder and support most of his weight as we struggle towards the sofa. He is absolutely wasted.

"Stay there, I'm going to get something to clean up your lip," I say, and dart to the bathroom to grab the first aid kit from the cabinet above the sink.

I sit down on the sofa next to him and open the kit up onto my knees, retrieving the antiseptic wipes. I take his chin in my hand and don't give him a warning before I press the stinging wipe to his lip, making sure there's no dirt left that could cause an infection. He winces, trying to whip his head to the side, but I keep a firm hold of him until I'm done.

"Done. Are you going to tell me what happened now?" I try again, desperate for answers.

"Now you're the one taking care of me," he slurs, completely avoiding the question. He tries to smile, but it's lopsided and doesn't reach his eyes. The anger I saw in the doorway is waring off into pure sadness.

"Rory, please tell me what's wrong," I plead with him.

"I need to go to bed," he says wearily.

"If we go to bed will you tell me what happened?"

I get a non-committal "Mm-hmm", but I'll take anything at this point. "Okay, up we go," I grunt as I hoist him to his feet. We slowly but surely make it across the room, up the couple of stairs, into my room and onto my bed. He's never been in here before, and I would be nervous if he didn't currently have the spatial awareness of a new-born baby. He wasn't going to notice the posters on my walls or the books on my dresser.

I'm worried he's going to crash as soon as his head hits the pillow, so I make him sit up against the wall while I run to get him a glass of water and a couple of pain killers to help with his impending hangover. On my way back to my room, I check in with Hallie and Chase to let them know that he's calmed down and that they can go back to sleep. They want to know what happened just as much as I do, but the answers to their questions will have to wait until the morning.

"Swallow these," I say as I shove the pills into his hand. He reluctantly obeys, then I get to work stripping his clothes off, because I can't imagine that jeans would be comfortable to sleep in. I try not to focus on all the parts of his body I can't touch right now, although that's easier said than done. His abdominal muscles are even defined when he's bloated from the copious amounts of alcohol he must have consumed tonight.

"Is this how you undress Felix?" he mumbles as I'm fumbling with his belt loop, and both my hands and heart stop. I pray that I misheard him as I ask, "What?" But his head has already hit the pillow and he's out like a light.

It looks like my answers will have to wait until the morning too.