Page 280 of Disarm
The night before we leave,there’s a half-packed duffel bag on the bed and approximately twelve piles of “maybe” on the floor.
“Caleb,” I say, staring at the chaos. “We’re going for four days, baby. Not moving to the woods permanently. You do not need… all of this.”
He looks up from where he’s kneeling by the open drawer, holding two nearly identical hoodies. “I don’t know what temperature trees are,” he says. “What if it’s hot during the day and freezing at night? What if it rains? What if I sweat through everything because my anxiety is like, ‘Surprise, pit stains’?”
I lean against the doorframe. “Babe, it’s the central coast,” I say. “So the answer is yes. To all of that. Layers. That’s the move.”
He tosses the hoodies on the bed and sits back on his heels, rubbing his hands over his face. The motion is familiar. I’ve watched him do it before games, before exams, and before therapy.
“Is this… stupid?” he asks, voice muffled. “The trip, I mean. I keep thinking about how much we’ve already leaned on our parents this year. On you. On… everyone. And now I’m like, ‘Let’s go sleep in a fancy fucking tree.’”
I cross the room and sit on the edge of the bed. “Look at me,” I say.
He drops his hands and does.
“Do you want to go?” I ask. “No guilt. No shoulds. Just… yes or no?”
His throat works. “Yes,” he says immediately. “I really do. And I hate that I do. Like I’m not allowed.”
“You almost died,” I say bluntly. “You left school to better yourself. You go to group three times a week and talk about raisins. You got on meds. You let people help you. You haven’t hurt yourself since. You’ve been doing the work. That doesn’t earn you a prize because life isn’t a points system, but it does mean you are absolutely allowed to enjoy four days in the woods with your boyfriend.”
A laugh snorts out of him. “You sound like a therapist,” he says.
“They’re rubbing off on me,” I say. “Luis would love to know I said that and also be mildly disturbed.”
Caleb’s smile fades around the edges. “What if it’s too much?” he asks quietly. “Being away from routine. From the condo. From… all my little safety props.”
“Then it’s too much,” I say. “And we adjust. We come home early. Or we take more breaks. Or we spend the whole time playing Mario Kart and reading instead of doing whateverInstagram thinks we should be doing in Big Sur. This isn’t a test.”
He chews his lip. “I don’t want it to be… another crisis,” he says. “For you. Or for me.”
“It won’t be,” I say, and then catch myself. “Okay, I can’t promise that, like I control the universe. But we’re not going in blind. We’ve got your plan. We’ve got my plan. We’ve got like five therapists on retainer who know where we’re going. We have Mom’s tortas. Frankly, I think the tortas alone could ward off an episode.”
He snorts. “Food as a protective factor.”
“Always,” I say. “Now come here.”
Caleb crawls up onto the bed and sits facing me, cross-legged, hands in his lap. I take a breath.
“Okay,” I say. “Trip expectations. Let’s talk.”
His eyebrows go up. “We’re doing pre-vacation negotiations now?”
“Yes,” I say. “Because I love you, and also because I don’t want either of us having secret Pinterest boards in our brains and then getting resentful when reality doesn’t match.”
He winces. “Ouch… feeling a little called out.”
“First,” I say, ticking it off on my fingers. “This trip is not primarily about sex.”
“Wow, coming in hot,” he says.
I roll my eyes. “We’ve been scaling back,” I remind him. “On purpose. Less ‘use each other to dissociate,’ more ‘actually notice we have bodies and feelings.’ I want the treehouse to be more about rest and…us. If sex happens, cool. If it doesn’t, also cool. I am not measuring the success of this trip in orgasms.”
He makes a face but then relaxes. “I hate that that’s… kind of a relief,” he admits.
“Yeah,” I say softly. “Me too.”
“Okay,” he says. “What is it about, then?”
