Just Friends

by Tina T. Kove

  ‘I’m not sure I believe you.’ He dragged both hands through his hair.

  ‘What more can I do to convince you?’ I scowled at him, annoyed.

  ‘I don’t know, Ben.’ He sat back on the rug, looking everywhere but at me. ‘We still only have sex. Earlier tonight, when we went out as a couple, you wouldn’t even get near me. And then you were pissed off and stormed home. I don’t know what to make of that.’

  ‘I wasn’t pissed off at you.’ Not much. ‘Kristina and Jo annoyed me.’

  ‘Why take it out on me then?’

  ‘I told you I wouldn’t be good at this boyfriend thing.’ I blew out a frustrated breath. ‘I’m hardly good with people on my best days.’

  That made him chuckle. ‘You can be quite charming when you want to.’

  ‘Am I charming enough now?’ I didn’t want him to throw me out. Didn’t want him to drive me home. I wanted to stay right here, with him.

  ‘Hardly.’ But he smiled as he said it and scooted in closer.

  I closed the gap between us and plastered myself to him, straddling his lap. Our lips met, all soft and teasing.

  ‘Still want me to leave?’ I asked.

  ‘No.’ He wrapped his arms around my waist. ‘I don’t ever want you to leave.’

  I’d never thought I wanted to hear something like that from him—but now he said it I found I did. So much.

  To show it, I kissed him deeply.

  Of course we ended up in bed, there was never any doubt about that. We didn’t shag, though, but we did get naked. We continued to kiss, and we rubbed against each other.

  It was hot, intimate, nothing like what we usually did. When we had sex, there was always penetration. Not so much now. And it was fine. I didn’t mind this at all, because it made me feel good. Just our skin together and our bare, hard dicks rubbing sensuously.

  What I wasn’t so happy about, however, was that once again I was unable to come.

  ‘Bloody hell,’ I groaned in frustration.

  Tarjei’s semen was smeared over my stomach, but my dick lay there, all hard and ready, but fucking unable to get to the finish line.

  ‘You’ve had too much to drink.’ Tarjei patted my chest and rolled over onto his back.

  ‘I’ve been drinking since I was fifteen. Had sex since I was sixteen. Usually both of them together. I’ve never had trouble like this before.’ I wrapped my hand around my cock, hoping if I had a wank I’d be able to reach climax.

  ‘You’re getting older, Ben. And you’ve been drinking a lot lately.’

  ‘I’m not a fucking alcoholic if that’s what you’re implying,’ I snapped.

  ‘I’m not implying anything,’ he said patiently. ‘It’s just an observation. Cut back on the alcohol, and I bet you’ll be able to get off again.’

  Cut back on the alcohol… He might have a point. Because even with my hand tugging on my dick, nothing happened. It was still hard, but no orgasm in sight.

  But I didn’t want to cut out alcohol. It made me feel good. Though not always. Earlier it made me feel dizzy. It made me feel sick, too.

  I hated that voice of reason. I hardly ever listened to it. Except I had about Tarjei. And that had turned out fine. So far, anyway. We were only two days in, so that wasn’t really something I could base anything on. Not really. Still…

  ‘I hate this.’ I gave up. My dick slapped against my stomach as I let go of it. I blew out an annoyed breath.

  ‘Go to sleep. Maybe your dick’ll be more cooperative in the morning.’ Tarjei was laughing at me. ‘You know, when you’re sober again.’

  ‘You’re no fucking help.’ I turned my back to him.

  Tarjei didn’t reply, which instantly made me feel guilty. Did I hurt him? Had I been a total git right now?

  I bit my lip, indecisive, but then I rolled over and fitted myself to his side.

  ‘Sorry,’ I mumbled against his skin.

  ‘Go to sleep, Ben.’ His arm draped over my shoulder.

  Here I said sorry and he didn’t care.

  But I couldn’t find it in me to get properly annoyed. I was too tired. And my dick was still hard and pressed against his warm thigh.

  So I only said ‘good night’ and went the fuck to sleep.

  Monday, April 29th

  If I didn’t come soon I was going to suffer some serious blue-balls.

  I left Tarjei’s place the next morning because even though I was now mostly sober, I still couldn’t reach orgasm. So I headed home in total, utter embarrassment.

  He hadn’t wanted me to leave—but I’d had to.

  He also had work and I technically had school, so I’d have to leave eventually anyway.

  Now I was home and staring at my new packet of antidepressants. This one was a smaller dosage than the ones I’d taken yesterday. The lowest dose I could take on them.

  The one time before I’d tried to go off these pills, I’d become so sick when I’d gone down to this dose that I’d started up on my regular dosage again. Now I had to take the lower dose, because the higher doses didn’t work. I needed to try new antidepressants, but I had to get off the old ones first.

  I squeezed one pill out into my palm, then stood there staring at it. There was a war going on in my mind. One part was telling me to just take the damn pill. The other was reminding me of how sick I got last time. I had to take it though. I had no choice. I had to deal with feeling sick in hopes that I would feel better on new pills.

  I had no idea what antidepressant they wanted to start me up on once I’d weaned off these. I reckoned I’d find out once I got my assessment with the psychiatrist I was scheduled to see. Maybe my GP would dump all the responsibility off on whoever that was.

  I swallowed the damn pill with water from the tap, then braced my hands against the sink and stared at myself in the mirror.

  My eyeliner was smudged around my eyes and I should wash it off. It was just that I couldn’t be arsed.

  Instead, I changed into joggers and a T-shirt—Tarjei’s clothes that I still hung on to—and crawled into bed. As I was still tired and felt like shit, it didn’t take long at all for me to doze off.

  I wasn’t sure how long I slept. It was fitful, and I woke to nausea. And to Thomas walking into my room.

  ‘Hey, Ben.’ He smiled at me. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Sick.’ I turned onto my back and stretched, looking around my room for any sign of what time it was.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ He frowned.

  ‘Weaning off my meds, remember?’ I rubbed my eyes, ruining my eyeliner further. ‘I started on a lower dose today. Soon I’ll finally be off them.’

  ‘That’s good.’ He sat down on the edge of my bed. ‘But you’re feeling better mentally now even with a lower dosage, aren’t you? You don’t seem quite as depressed as you were.’

  ‘I’m not as bad as I was at Easter, no, but I’m not good. I’m making a mess out of everything.’ Did he have no idea I’d skipped school today? Or was he okay with me skipping school because the meds made me sick?

  ‘Like what?’ Thomas asked, brows knitting.

  ‘Just everything.’ I attempted a shrug. ‘I fly off the handle at every single little thing.’

  ‘Might just be because you’re weaning off the meds.’ His gaze scanned my face. ‘When you start new ones, we’ll see what happens. If it gets better, we know it was the old meds, and if it doesn’t…’ He sighed. ‘Then we’ll figure something out. We always do.’

  He’d been there for me through everything. Always. I didn’t know how to thank him for that.

  ‘Dinner’s ready upstairs.’ Thomas patted my knee and stood.

  Dinner… The thought made my stomach roll.

  Also, if I’d slept all the way to dinner, maybe he’d totally missed me sleeping all day and not being in school.

  ‘I don’t think I’m up for that.’ I reached under my duvet to press my hand against my stomach. I hated being nauseous. There was nothing I hated more in the world than vomit
ing. Still, I was pretty used to it.

  ‘I’ll save some for you, in case you want to eat later.’ He reached out and stroked my hair as if I was a kid. Then he left and I dozed off again.

  Next time I woke up I wasn’t feeling as nauseous, but rather heavy. And still tired.

  ‘Ben?’ A knock sounded on my bedroom door.

  ‘Kristina?’ What was she doing here?

  ‘Thomas said you’re not feeling well.’ She came inside, giving me a small smile in greeting.

  I thought back to the last time she’d been in my room. When I’d been so depressed I couldn’t stop crying. She’d been there for me, as had Maria. And Jo, too. She’d sat on my bed, stroked my hair, and been such good support.

  Now I felt guilty I’d been so angry with her yesterday.

  ‘Side-effects from weaning off my meds.’ I pushed myself up into a sitting position, leaning back against the wall for support.

  ‘I wanted to apologise.’ She sat down where Thomas had sat earlier. ‘We didn’t mean to push you.’

  ‘It’s okay.’ As long as she didn’t push me towards a stupid hobby again.

  ‘We just figured it would be good for you to have something to do, you know?’ Her gaze searched my face exactly like Thomas’s had done. ‘You are in choir in school. You like that, don’t you?’

  ‘We have to be in choir in school. Everyone who graduates in music has to be.’ That wasn’t to say it wasn’t fun. At least I hadn’t had to stand on stage alone. The thought of that made my stomach clench.

  It clenched, even more, when I remembered I’d been singing karaoke alone in front of a whole club full of people. At least most of them had been drunk.

  ‘You are a stubborn twat, you know that?’ Kristina’s eyes narrowed. ‘You love music. You can’t give up on it. You can’t keep drinking like this. It’s all you do lately. And whatever it is you do with Tarjei—’

  ‘What do you mean whatever I do with him?’ My brain latched onto that, not anything else she said.

  ‘You don’t really seem like you’re together,’ she said, shrugging.

  ‘Just because I don’t cling to him all the time?’ We were together. But public displays of affection wasn’t a bloody rule everyone who was in a relationship had to go with.

  ‘All I’m saying is, don’t lead him on.’ She chewed on her lower lip now. ‘He really likes you.’

  ‘I like him too.’ I wouldn’t be with him if I didn’t.

  ‘But do you like him enough?’ She stared at me.

  ‘I wish people would stop butting into my life.’ I got annoyed all over again. It felt like my blood was boiling.

  ‘Sorry.’ She held her hands up, palm out. ‘But he’s my friend. After four years of not getting what he wants, he now thinks he has it, but I’m not so sure you’re as invested in it as he is. And I don’t want to see him hurt. Again.’

  ‘You’re giving me a headache.’ I rubbed my temples. I didn’t want to talk about this.

  My stomach started acting up again too.

  ‘At least think about the choir, will you?’ Kristina asked, voice soft. ‘School’s over in two months and you want to continue with music, right?’

  I didn’t answer. Mostly because something wanted to get up my throat.

  ‘Shit.’ I jumped out of bed, startling her, and ran for the bathroom.

  I made it, just barely, and vomited into the toilet. As I hadn’t eaten anything today, and hardly anything yesterday, not much came up. That didn’t stop me from retching and it didn’t stop the stomach acid from coming up instead.

  ‘Oh, Ben.’ Kristina rubbed my back and thumped forcefully when I thought I was going to choke. ‘You’re a mess.’

  Could she tell me something I didn’t know?

  But I was grateful she was there.

  Friday, May 3rd

  I stayed in bed for the rest of the week. Well, not the entire week. I had to drag my sorry arse out of bed for school, but as soon as that was over, it was back home under the duvet again.

  I couldn’t be arsed with anything but sleep, watch TV and try to get some food in me. I’d turned my phone off because I couldn’t stand to think about it or deal with it.

  Friday was so bad I wanted to skip school completely again, but I had an appointment with my GP. And as I couldn’t afford to pay for missing the bloody appointment, I went. I also needed sick leave if I were to miss more days at school.

  Thomas drove me, and he even went in with me when I couldn’t face it alone.

  My doctor, a woman, checked my face and my ribs. My face was mostly healed, and my ribs didn’t ache quite as much as they had—probably because they’d had so much rest the last few days.

  I still wasn’t feeling well, though, so she gave me a few days of excused absence for next week. On account of weaning off my meds, but also because they made me sick and the black hole was about to swallow me whole again.

  I was to come back next Wednesday for a new evaluation. Yay. Lucky me.

  ‘You’re not crawling back into bed,’ Thomas said when we got home.

  ‘Why the hell not?’ That had been my plan. Why’d he have to ruin it?

  ‘You’re going to eat a proper meal.’ Thomas grabbed my shoulders and steered me into the kitchen, where he forced me down on a chair.

  ‘I don’t have the stomach for food,’ I whined because I really didn’t.

  ‘You’ll feel better after you get something in you.’ And so he set to work.

  I put my head on my arms, not bothering to watch him. I had no idea what he planned on cooking for me, and I couldn’t be arsed to find out. My bed was all I wanted. I wanted to curl up, go to sleep, and never fucking wake up again.

  ‘Don’t fall asleep on me, Ben,’ Thomas said, jerking me out of a doze. ‘Talk to me instead.’

  ‘Talk to you about what?’ I had nothing to talk about.

  ‘Whatever you want. Just stay with me.’

  ‘Why are people babysitting me lately?’ I sighed, annoyed and irritated. Kristina had stayed with me after I’d first gotten sick, and it seemed everyone had been around since. During the times I was awake, anyway.

  ‘We worry about you.’ Thomas sighed too, but his was more resigned. ‘You’re not yourself lately. I’m afraid you’re going to go back to how you were when you were sixteen.’

  That was when he’d found me tangled up in bed with Tarjei after my sixteenth birthday. Or the morning after my party, anyway. But that wasn’t what had bothered him. Me being gay hadn’t even made it on his list of things to worry about that day. Because that was the day he found out about my extensive self-harm. That day he’d seen my bare arms—and they’d been horrible.

  ‘I’m afraid you’re going to fall too far. That we’ll lose you.’

  ‘You won’t,’ I muttered, but I wasn’t sure if it was a lie or not. Sometimes I thought about suicide, how much easier it would be to not have to deal with all the shit. To not exist anymore at all. And it was tempting.

  But I hadn’t cut to try and kill myself—I’d cut to live. To lessen the pain I felt inside.

  After Thomas got me into therapy, I’d stopped cutting, because now the pills helped instead. And while I’d thought about self-harm since, and wanted to do it, I hadn’t. I hadn’t wanted to mess up the art on my arms. They were a masterpiece of art, which I’d had a lot of say in. The tattoo artist who’d done them had been brilliant.

  He wasn’t around anymore in our little shit town anymore. He’d been too talented and had buggered off to bigger and greater adventures. But he’d done both my arms—and the art truly was stunning.

  I could never ruin it by putting a blade to my skin again. I had a lot of skin that wasn’t tattooed—the rest of my body—but I hadn’t put a razor to it either. Every time I had wanted to, I’d look at my tattooed arms and know I couldn’t mess up my skin like that again.

  So I hadn’t cut in years. But I’d exchanged it with pills and alcohol. Two things that didn’t go so well
together.

  ‘I’m not sure I can trust you on that, Ben.’ He sat down next to me and put a hand on my shoulder. ‘Depressed people don’t always think about their actions.’

  ‘I’ve never wanted to die, not really,’ I mumbled. ‘I want to live. I want to be happy. I want to make music. But I don’t know how to do any of it.’

  ‘You can start with getting out of bed.’ He rubbed slow circles over my back. ‘You’re with Tarjei now. Let him help you.’

  ‘I’ve ignored him for days.’ I wasn’t sure if I had ignored him, because my phone had been shut off so I couldn’t know for sure he’d tried to get in contact with me.

  He probably had though. And I hadn’t so much as let him know I had been sick. He must be sick of me. I couldn’t understand why he wasn’t already.

  Four years of shagging was okay, we’d only had amazing sex together. But a relationship was something else. I wasn’t good at it. I’d never had one. And did I really want one with him?

  I couldn’t have one with Nik. I did like Tarjei. I did. But how much of that was the sex? I loved the sex. We had such amazing sex.

  But other than that?

  I didn’t really know him all that well. I had no idea what he liked to do. I’d known he was just as interested in parties and drinking and shagging as me—but he’d apparently stopped doing all that. What did he do instead?

  ‘You know how to fix that?’ Thomas said, entirely too brightly for my taste. ‘You stop ignoring him.’

  ‘I don’t know what he sees in me.’

  I’d told Tarjei this too, but he hadn’t taken it to heart. He’d said some bullshit I couldn’t even remember. That he wanted to be with me. But why?

  ‘Because you’re a great guy.’

  ‘What’s so great about me?’ Nothing, that was what. ‘That’s basically what he said too. But there is absolutely nothing about me that’s great.’

  ‘That’s the depression talking.’ He got back up. Judging by the sounds, he stirred something on the cooker. ‘Where’s the confident guy of last year?’