Page 89 of The Story of You

He knows what I’m thinking. His hand goes to his collar. “Raja. What’s going on?

“Come here, Lakshan.”

He doesn’t move. “Oliver?”

“We’re Silas and Oliver fighting,” Oliver explains.

Is that a thing? Okay, yeah that’s a thing. “We are not,” I say. “I believe I gave you an order, Lakshan.”

“You’re not taking my collar, sir.”

“Excuse me? When did you become disobedient?”

“Whenever you don’t deserve my submission.” He walks over to the fridge, taking the book from the top.

“You’re wearingmycollar.”

“Because one day a very long time ago, I chose to do so.” He tucks the book under his arm. “I can choose not to do so.”

“I’m going to spank you.”

“Try.”

I glare. I could try. But some of his fancy knives are in one of the lower kitchen drawers and I don’t feel like risking blood on Oliver’s cake. I distract myself by adding a layer of strawberries atop the banana custard.

“Oh God, Lak. Please don’t. I can’t take whatever you’re doing on top of him always thinking he’s the cause of all my issues,” Oliver says.

“That’s what I’m doing,” he says. “Showing him he’s not the cause of everyone’s issues.”

“God fucking damn it,” I say, slapping whipped cream onto the strawberry layer. I’m trying to do a good job despite all the nonsense around me. “MaybeI’llgo stay the night at a hotel.”

“Okay, but you’re taking me with you, right?” Oliver says.

“I’m hanging onto this until everything is settled,” Lakshan says.

“I guess I’m never getting it back then,” Oliver says. “Apparently this is unsolvable.”

“That’s not what I said. Sometimes wounds leave scars. Scars are seen and felt. But you learn to live with them,” Lakshan explains.

People think I control Lakshan, but he controls me. The loss of his submission—however fleeting—frays my insides. I’m underwater and I need to get to the surface before I run out of air. I close my eyes briefly to gather my thoughts. It comes to me.

“Oliver and I do live with it,” I say. Over the years, it’s a silent agreement we’ve come to. He may not have been aware of the story behind it or the extent that the feeling is there, but he knows it is. There are lines neither of us cross. I don’t go away for business trips without bringing Oliver and Lakshan if I can help it. Oliver doesn’t stay out anywhere and when he has stayed at Simon and Shane’s, I get my own duckling close by the moment he’s home.

“We do and we’re fine with it.”

“You’re fine with it and he’s fine with it,” Lakshan says.

“If it were that simple, don’t you think therapy would have been a lot cheaper?” I say.

“Everything is that simple. Humans complicate things with their stories. All you need is the right story to move on from anything. What’s your new story going to be?”

I look to Oliver. His ice-blue eyes shine, searching for guidance from me like he always does. That pang of guilt I had shut the door on—until that damn book opened it—surfaces. I don’t have all the answers. Allowing him to rely on me for everything is going to cripple him.

“He’s an eight, Lak,” Oliver says.

Something about that strikes me differently than it did before. Oliver may depend on me, but I depend on him. The look we share isn’t just him asking for guidance, it’s me looking for direction.

A compass. He’s my compass.