Chapter Twenty-Nine

CAMERON

 

Cameron’s head snapped up when he heard the familiar voice call, “Cami?” Impossible.

“Did you fall in? We need to go. The sun’s almost up, and it’s a two-hour drive.”

Confusion enshrouded him and then shock when he stood in Frank’s bathroom in his old apartment, in a shirt he remembered wearing a long time ago, in a picture he had burned. It was the one with Frank—his favorite memory of them together in Napa Valley.

He stumbled out of the bathroom hesitantly, his heart sinking as he saw the man he had once considered his blessing and curse standing in the well-appointed living room. Six foot even, with thinning mousy brown hair, Frank had always been average, though he worked out several times a week and had a fit body. That day, he wore chino-style pants and a short-sleeved, plaid button-down.

Cameron stared with a mix of relief and dread. “Frank?”

“Cami? Are you okay? We need to go. I don’t want to miss the sunrise.” Frank wrapped his arm around Cameron’s torso, pulled him in, and gave him a quick peck, before guiding him toward the door. “De Loach Vineyards awaits, Your Majesty.” He laughed at his own wit, as he continued to tug Cameron down the hall toward the elevator. While inside, riding down, Frank added, “The sunrises are supposed to be killer. All my friends, the ones with sense anyway, highly recommend this place. Owned by a retired couple, I think you’ll like it. Heh, and if not, you can punish me later.” He winked and playfully slapped at his groin before running out of the elevator into the parking garage.

Cameron swallowed hard as he followed Frank to his vintage cherry-red luxury sports car and helped him fold back the top and secure it in the compartment. Frank had been talking up this wine tour for months, and there was finally a break in their school schedule that allowed for the outing. Cameron had been looking forward to it too. Over the last few months of their relationship, Frank had taught him so much about various types of wine, food, and culture. At almost a decade older, Cameron looked up to Frank who always seemed to know so much.

He slipped into the passenger seat and leaned over to kiss Frank, not even minding when the small peck he went in for turned into a wrestling match with Frank’s tongue dominating his mouth.

“That’s my boy toy,” Frank said, patting Cameron’s leg.

Cameron chuckled and pulled his seat belt across his chest. It would be a great day.

As they drove, Frank went on and on about the various histories of the vineyards and some of the early Spanish missions that established them. Lost in euphoria, Cameron’s mind swam with memories. This was a simpler time, before the—

He stared out the window, focusing on wine country and dismissing the thought.

There was a wooden fence overgrown with red roses behind which were hundreds of rows of grapevines stretching out toward the sun, which had not yet fully crested the horizon. Though the sky had started to turn red, purple, and yellow as the few morning rays illuminated the mountains on either side of them, shadows still cradled the vines and their car.

The rushing air filled him with a sense of clarity that mirrored the crispness of the morning. Frank’s hand on his upper thigh crept inward and shook him out of his reverie. “You know you’re cute when you’re pensive.”

How could he have forgotten, when Frank was so attentive. Complimentary. When had he stopped being affectionate? Cameron couldn’t remember. Didn’t want to. He grinned at the attention of his older, brilliant paramour who could speak on everything from politics to travel, from Hollywood to food. Anything really. Established in his career as a marriage and family therapist with his master’s degree, Frank had started the doctoral program with Cameron. It was their second semester, and Cameron had been immediately drawn to the man’s charisma and openness.

Cameron knew this day was the most romantic day he had ever spent. And Frank was in a really good mood, which Cameron fed on, bathing in the shared joy.

The day unfolded as Cameron had remembered it. Frank treated him like royalty, highly attuned, he hung on every word, genuinely interested in Cameron’s feedback on the wine. He put on short demonstrations for Cameron, from teaching him how to spin the wine in the glass, to showing how to swish it around the inside his mouth to get to the secret notes of flavors hidden in it. He told stories of the hints of spices, woods, and fruits that he could taste in each sip, incorporating it into tales of the land they were surrounded by.

Even the owners of the vineyards seemed genuinely impressed by Frank’s acumen and larger-than-life personality. They were a middle-aged couple, Tom and his wife, Wendy. Attentive, they even gave a short tour showing them around their land. Tom mentioned it was a retirement present from him to his wife, who had always wanted to have a bed and breakfast catering to any couple looking for a romantic getaway.

Cameron forgot himself, forgot being self-conscious, and enjoyed the attention and the beauty surrounding them. As the day wound down, they cuddled next to a platter of cheese, cold meat, and fruit, enjoying the sun slowly hiding behind a mountain in the distance; its dying light splashed purples, deep reds, and oranges into the sky. It had been the perfect day. Dusk brought with it stars in the sky, and as it got darker the stretch of the starry road branched out to the Milky Way. They were getting ready to drive back, walking along a dirt path to return to their car, enjoying each other’s company and the serenity of the evening. Frank had his arm looped around Cameron’s waist. He let go only to kiss him, uncharacteristically gentle before he opened the front passenger door. Cameron got in and Frank softly shut it.

A jarring pop as if his ears had just pressurized at a high altitude, caused Cameron to blink in confusion. The silence was broken by the reverberating sound of a drop of water hitting the sink. He stood alone in the seedy motel bathroom he had tried to forget. He studied his tear-stained reflection and barely recognized the young man in the mirror. He teared his gaze away to stare at blood drops on the cold, off-white tiles of the poorly washed floor. This was the first place Cameron had found after he had fled Frank’s house. It had been two years since the trip to Napa. Two years of a deteriorating relationship that had ended in Frank taking the one thing from Cameron he had not been willing to give.

Cameron stepped into the shower again and tried not to pay attention to the small rivulet of blood snaking down his leg. He had scrubbed himself raw in Frank’s house once he had been able to move. Once the roofies had worn off. He had used rubbing alcohol to wash himself, ignoring the searing burn. Believing that he somehow deserved it. Unable to go home, unable to face Syn.

He sat under the scalding water, having used up the crumbling bar of cheap soap. The water wouldn’t wash it away or bring it back. He had lost something, though he hadn’t seen it taken. His tears intermingled with the water, the steam rose like fog, which slowly obscured his vision, and the world faded to white.

The scene shifted and he stepped through the mist into Frank’s stairwell, determination clenched in his jaw. He was no longer inconsolable, just confused and numb. He had no choice but to confront Frank. To find out why.

“Cami! Where’d you go?” The reek of the previous night’s sexual escapades permeated the room, and Frank’s odor hit Cameron like a fist.

“Where do you think? I had to go to the clinic to be tested…” He looked away in shame, stepping into the room but staying just to the side of the door. “And get PrEP,” he added, his face burning with shame at the admission.

“What the hell? You think I have HIV?” Frank staggered to the couch and plopped down, picking up a bottle of water and taking a greedy slurp.

“I don’t know, Frank,” Cameron said quietly. “I don’t understand why you… Why…” He couldn’t bring himself to say it out loud.

“Ah come on, Cami! You were going to give it up to someone sometime anyway. It was my birthday. The “Special K” was to help loosen you up. You’re not going to stand there like a prude and say you didn’t enjoy it.”

Cameron reeled at what he was hearing. “You raped me,” he spat out, the incredulity giving way to fury.

Frank sprang to his feet. “Rape? What the fuck are you talking about? You think I need to resort to raping some wannabe twink with a porn-star dick? You think I can’t get any guy I want? I did you a favor!”

Cameron fell against the wall as if he had been physically assaulted again. “I wish you would just go kill yourself,” he said, defeated, before turning away.

Another shift, and Cameron stood in the hallway of his first job, an office, working with patients on psychological evaluations. He was disorientated and confused, his mental reserves drained and close to the breaking point.

Marc, a mutual friend of his and Frank’s, exited an office, closing the door behind him.

He spotted him. “Cameron,” he called.

In a dazed state, he replied, “Hey, Marc…”

Marc got nearer and put his hand on Cameron’s shoulder. “I don’t know if you’ve heard, but Frank…is dead…last night. It looks like he jumped.”

Cameron’s heart sank. He remembered this moment, and now he was reliving it. “No. I… I’m sorry. I have to go to the bathroom.”

He ran to the men’s room and dry heaved into the nearest sink. The room was large: three sinks, three wide stalls, and two urinals, and thankfully it was empty. He waved his hands to turn on the faucet and splashed water on his face, looked at himself in the mirror, and then collapsed to the floor.

He braced against the wall near the sink and a large mirror before crumbling onto his knees and hugging himself, trying to regain control over his emotions and thoughts which were running wild. Why am I here? His sense of guilt, his anger and pain chased themselves into a never-ending race of self-loathing. He had tried to forget this day. Frank’s was the only life he regretted taking. It was not something he knew he could do, and as much as he hated Frank, he had not really wanted him dead. Not like this. Not because of him.

The bathroom was silent but for his labored breathing. Staggering to his feet, he froze upon seeing the mirror flicker and morph into segregated movie screens: each held a different scene of Frank’s apartment: a window, the living room, and Frank on his knees, his hands to his face, crying. The sobs echoed, and Cameron sensed something shift beside him, moving in the darkened room. The temperature dropped as whatever it was moved behind him. Too scared to turn, his breath became shallow, and when he let it out, it was a cloud.

“We intervened here,” a deep voice whispered behind him.

Cameron held his breath and then snapped out of it when he heard Frank scream, “Stop it! Stop!” and saw him manically race toward the window in his apartment, from one mirror to the next. The last mirror depicted the view from outside. Shattering glass. Wood snapping. The wailing body of his lover failing through the air. Silence.

The scene rewound. Frank was kneeling once again in his apartment.

The voice behind him spoke again. “A moment and punishment he has been reliving for what seems like an eternity. For not even death may stop the curse you imparted on him.”

What?!

Cameron’s heart pounded so hard he could hear it.

Frank’s scream once again pierced the quiet. Breaking glass. Abrupt silence.

“Will you end his and your suffering, or do you delight in the screams of the damned?”

Except for Frank’s sobbing, an otherwise dead silence filled the room. Frost formed on the stalls and tile floor, slowly creeping toward him and the mirrors. Ice crystals brightened the room with a cold light.

The sounds of Frank’s screams jolted through him again, and Cameron stood transfixed, unable to look away.

“This is the choice we offer you.” The voice was closer, cool exhalation tickling across his ear.

The only words Cameron could speak were a pleading, whispered, “Stop it.” He didn’t know if he was repeating what Frank had been saying, or if he meant it. He had started crying, but the cold froze his tears to his skin. His eyelashes caked with ice crystals, and a thin sheen of ice started growing over his exposed flesh. Though he shivered, the ice and frost somehow felt natural. It reminded him of the cold and numbing pleasure he had experienced in taking the lives of people he thought deserved it.

“As you will it; the curse is yours to take back.”

A hooded figure in a white robe glided toward the mirror with Frank kneeling in it. The crackling of frost could be heard as his robes swept the tile floor. The figure touched the mirror with his exposed humanlike hand, and as it made contact with the glass, a white frost covered it at the edges.

Frank startled and abruptly stopped his sobbing. “Hello?” he croaked.

Cameron’s perception shifted, and he was standing in Frank’s apartment. He was struck by the stench of body odor and rotting food, the once orderly space strewn with open boxes and clothes.

Frank turned to him, his normally well-manicured handsome face was twisted with pain. Unshaven, red, swollen, bloodshot eyes met his.

“Cami!” Cameron was enveloped by Frank’s sorrow, fear, and disorientation. Frank took a hesitant step forward, but drew up, eyes searching for something in Cameron. Waiting…

Cameron choked back nausea that threatened and stumbled forward. “Frank,” his hoarse whisper sounded like it came from someone else. “Frank, I’m so sorry… I take it back. I take it back!” He collapsed to his knees, begging. “Please, let it be me instead. Please! I didn’t know…”

The hooded man’s voice boomed through the shadows, though Frank didn’t acknowledge it. “What do the damned seek in purgatory?”

Cameron was numb with horror and grief. He couldn’t think straight but a memory popped into his mind, the only light he could hold onto. It was his mother praying with rosaries. She had her eyes closed, whispering something to herself. He remembered her talking about her faith and the comfort it brought her. Comfort in what? What do the damned seek in purgatory? He didn’t know. But she did…

He took a quick breath and opened his eyes, the realization on the tip of his tongue, mind, and heart. “Absolution,” he said more to himself than an answer.

He moved to Frank slowly, picking him up in his arms and holding his hands, trembling and mouthing, “I forgive you.”

The room brightened, and the weight he had carried with him for so long lifted his shoulders.

Frank, still on his knees, embraced him and, into his ear, whispered, “I’m sorry.” As the words left Frank’s mouth, Frank’s weight evaporated, collapsing into a snow pile as his ex-boyfriend’s body turned into frost, cascading all around.

He was back in the public bathroom on the floor. It was fully frosted over and the mirrors now had a bright, cold, white light illuminating him and his frigid surroundings.

The figure stood in front of him, and though the room was now brightly lit, he couldn’t see into his dark hood, the light not daring to enter it. His hands were pressed together, palms touching in prayer. “You want most from others what you don’t offer to yourself. Forgiveness, acceptance, absolution.” He reached down and touched Cameron’s forehead, and he instinctually closed his eyes.

Vertigo slammed into him when the soundscape suddenly changed. “We thank you.” Cameron opened his eyes, confused. He was back in Sanctuary on the disc with August and Nathen beside him.