Shame
I wake up to the feeling of something cold and wet on my forehead. It takes my eyes a second to focus, but when they do, I see Taylor kneeling in front of me, concern written all over his face. Nothing about this makes sense – not the washcloth on my face, the bathroom floor underneath me or Taylor’s face.
“What… what?” I manage to croak out, my throat aching with each word. That, combined with the whole bathroom floor thing is adding up in my mind and I don’t like the sum of it. I didn’t think I was that drunk, but… well, it’s a distinct possibility.
Taylor gives me the tiniest smile in the world, and I get the feeling it’s more from relief than actual happiness. “You just passed out on me for a second there. Been knocking ’em back tonight, huh?”
I nod, and my head feels too heavy for my shoulders, so I let it fall back against the tiled wall of the bathroom. I remember now. I wanted a nap. And now I want another one.
“Hey, no. Don’t do that,” Taylor says, his hand firm on the back of my head, pulling me back from the wall.
I attempt to pout at him for interrupting my nap, but my stomach does this really awful twisty-turny thing. “Tay… how much would Natalie kill me if I barfed all over this suit?”
His jaw twitches a little at her name, but he runs his fingers through my hair softly as he nudges me toward to toilet. Yeah, those shrimp thingies I ate earlier are definitely about to make another appearance – if they didn’t already while I was, apparently, blacked out. I really, really hate it when I get that drunk.
Within seconds, I’m praising the porcelain gods. Taylor makes a hasty escape; he’s always had a pretty weak stomach like that. Sometimes I wonder how he can even handle the amount of puke and general grossness that four – soon to be five – kids can generate. In the same vein, I wonder how he’s managed to take care of my drunk ass so far.
Before too long, my stomach is empty – possibly everything I’ve eaten in the entire last week – and I’m just clinging to the toilet bowl, heaving uselessly. The bathroom door is open just a crack and I can hear voices from the other side of it, but I can’t place them. They’re talking in hushed tones, but I think one of them is probably Taylor. I must still be pretty drunk even now, though, because the two voices just sound like the teachers on Charlie Brown.
I flush the toilet and then muster all of my strength to pull myself up to my feet. They feel like lead, but at least they’ve seen fit to let me stand. But when I try to walk, I still get that swimming upstream through jello sort of feeling. It feels like it takes me ages to reach the door, pull it open and take the first few steps back into the bedroom. I don’t even bother looking for the source of those voices; instead, I just stumble headfirst onto the bed.
“Zac, hey,” a voice says, and it doesn’t sound like Taylor’s, but I still can’t place it. The hand on my shoulder feels more familiar, though.
“C-Carrick?” I turn my head slowly to look at him, another wave of nausea coursing through me as I do.
He wraps his arms around my waist and pulls me up. My body still feels totally boneless, and Carrick’s stronger than he looks, so I’m pretty much a ragdoll in his arms. How in the hell did I get this drunk, anyway? I know I drank a lot on a pretty empty stomach, but I can’t remember the last time I drank to the point of blacking out. I’m not exactly surprised that it happened tonight, though. If there ceremony itself wasn’t enough, there was the news Taylor unloaded on me beforehand. Then, of course, there was the blow job, too.
Wait, what?
That brand new memory comes flooding back into my mind all at once. I slump in Carrick’s arms, falling back onto the bed, but he’s all too quick to lift me back up to a sitting position. I can’t even bear to look him in the eyes. I wonder if he knows what I did, if Taylor told him. If he knew, I can’t imagine he would be here, holding me up like he is.
“You still with us?” Carrick asks, concern and a hint of amusement in his voice. Yeah, he definitely doesn’t know about what I did to Taylor.
And I know it’s awful of me, but I’d really like to keep it that way. I lift my head slowly and give him the smallest nod ever. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m here. I’m alright.”
“Sure you are. Let’s get you home, okay?”
Taylor’s been standing at the foot of the bed with his arms crossed the whole time. He doesn’t even meet my eyes when Carrick helps me to my feet and I shoot him a glance. I feel like he’s judging me and I don’t even know why; it’s not like I did anything he hasn’t done. I glance away from him, not even bothering to say goodbye, as Carrick and I walk out of the room.
Carrick keeps his arm wrapped securely around my waist all the way to the bottom of the stairs, then lets it fall away casually. I swear I can still feel it there, the warmth of it burned into my skin, and it might be the only reason I’m even still standing.
The party seems to be winding down, though, so no one is really even around to see us making our way through the rooms. How long was I out anyway? Apparently a long damn time. The dance floor is practically empty and Ike’s holding up the bar, as usual, but otherwise there’s really not a lot happening. I don’t see Natalie or Kate at all, and that suits me just fine.
Once we’re out of the mansion and in the even more empty parking lot, Carrick slips his arm around my waist again. His other hand reaches into his pocket, and he pulls out a set of keys that look suspiciously like mine. I wonder when and how he got those. Oh well. It’s clearly best for him to do the driving right now, so it doesn’t really matter.
We drive around for way too long; Carrick hasn’t quite learned his way around Tulsa yet and I’m apparently still too drunk to give remotely accurate directions. It’s like the blind leading the blind, except it’s the shitfaced leading the new-in-town, and I’m frankly shocked when we finally roll up to the curb in front of his house.
I stumble out of my truck and trip on the curb like the fucking sloppy drunk I am, but somehow Carrick is already there, pulling me back to my feet. How the hell did he get there so fast? Maybe I was just moving in slow motion. Anything seems possible right now. Maybe he’s a superhero.
“Hey, Carrick,” I say as he guides me up the walk. “If you were a superhero, what would your superpower be?”
He shakes his head and laughs as he struggles to hold me up and get his key in the door. “I don’t know. Never thought about it.”
“Really? Never?” I ask as he guides me through the house. “I think about it all the time. I mean, I kinda look like Thor, but being a demi-god is pretty boring. Blah, blah super strength, giant hammer, whatever…”
Carrick chuckles. “Just because you’re drunk, I’m not going to make the ‘giant hammer’ joke.”
I laugh a little harder at that than I should, especially considering he didn’t actually make the joke. Between my drunken feet of lead and the laughter, I don’t even know how the two of us make it to the top of the stairs at all.
As soon as we’re through the door to Carrick’s room, I dive straight into the bed. I’ll let him worry about taking my clothes off. If I weren’t in this condition, that would sound like a pretty exciting prospect. But I can’t imagine Carrick’s in the mood to fool around with my pathetic, drunk ass, and I’m definitely not in the mood.
I don’t even want to meet Carrick’s eyes as he tugs my dress shirt and pants off and tosses me a t-shirt and sweatpants to sleep in. I wonder what he must think of me right now. There’s no way in hell I’m asking him if he knows about me and Taylor. I’m sure I don’t even need to say a word for him to see the shame written all over my face, though.
Carrick is unusually quiet, which is definitely not a good sign. He barely even glances my way before walking out of the room. The sound of the bathroom faucet running hits my ears a few seconds later, and I curl up under the covers. Even though it’s summer and we’re on the second floor, this bed feels awfully cold without him next to me. I don’t like it.
He’s only gone for a few minutes, though. I’m facing the wall but I still feel the bed sink slightly under his weight. He doesn’t get too close to me, his body warmth still near enough that I can feel it, but a few very noticeable inches between our bodies.
“Carrick,” I whisper, not even sure what I want to say to him.
“Just get some sleep, okay?” There’s an edge to his voice, like his patience is running out. Why did he even volunteer – or did he? – to take care of me if he didn’t want to?
I don’t dwell on that for very long, though. There’s just enough alcohol still humming in my veins that I’m lulled to sleep in mere minutes. The only times I ever sleep well are when I’m drunk and when I’m next to Carrick, so the night passes by quickly.
I don’t wake rested, though. I wake with a raging headache – scratch that, full body ache – and awful nausea. My stomach feels horribly empty, though, so I know there’s no need to even run to the bathroom. I roll over and find the bed empty, but I’m not greeted by the smell of breakfast the way I was the first night I stayed here.
A tiny part of me is curious to know where Carrick is, but an even larger part of me is too full of shame to even care about seeing him. I scoop up my suit from the floor and make myself a promise that I’ll return the tee and sweatpants to him whenever I feel like less of a jackass.
For now, though, I feel like a huge jackass. Sneaking out of his house only makes me feel worse, but I never claimed not to be a coward.
A jackass and a coward. Yeah, that’s me.