Heatwave in England this week so am sitting outside with the cats, I love summer

I hope you're enjoying this so far, it's about to get REAL :)

Trigger Warning: Emotional/physical abuse, depression, anxiety, injury description, alcohol abuse

Listen, I could apologise, but you asked for this, so.... 

* * * 

When he was twenty, Andy decided to give up the alcohol and the cigarettes and become a healthy man. Through his teens, specially his late teens, he had lived off packaged, microwaved food and cheap wine and whiskey that left him on the edge of being underweight. His band's fast-growing fanbase urged him to mature and to become the idol that so many kids were searching for. 

It worked; he was sober until he was twenty-two. In that time he gained the reputation of an intelligent, polite, talented young musician. 

Then, he met Holden. (We all know Holly, now meet her male counterpart.) He was a broadly built American who had moved to England (Yes Andy and Remington are English in this) when the company he worked for relocated, ten years ago. Less that a year into his British citizenship, he and Andy engaged in a series of one night stands that developed into a relationship. 

Andy had stopped protesting against Holden's demands a long time ago, which was a good thing, because in their house, arguments turned messy almost before they had even begun. Just ask Andy to lift his shirt. 

It was quite late on in the evening when they returned from the tattoo studio. The roads were quiet and the journey took barely ten minutes, which was just as well, because any longer in that car would have driven Holden mad. 

That's what he said, at least, as he drove: "Any longer in this car, boy, and I'm going to go fucking mad." 'Boy' was a common name for Andy as of lately - by lately, of course, that means the past six years - and Holden liked to use it whenever he felt his boyfriend was acting like a toddler. 'Act like a baby and I'll treat you like one.'

Andy, who had had his eyes in his lap for the entirety of the short journey, restrained from speaking a response, but he was already feeling the need to shed tears. His new tattoo wasn't where he wanted it. He had planned it to go on his chest, just above his left ribs, had made sure to pick a design that would fit exactly as he desired it to. But then Holden had insisted on going with him to the shop, and his plans were trampled on. 

Now, he realised, he should have expected Holden to come. He was hardly allowed anywhere by himself. The only exception was when he was with his band, for then 'your band mates can keep an eye on you.' Music was the only thing that truly belonged to him. Everything else had been infiltrated at some point or another, and now, it was only a matter of time before he lost this small luxury.

Holden parked the car in the driveway and took the key from the ignition, opened his door. "I told you once," he said, sharply, though sounded equally as exhausted, as though he had been taking care of a wailing child all day. "Get rid of that expression." 

The best he could, Andy smoothed his features out, didn't want to follow his boyfriend out of the vehicle. Still, he undid his seatbelt and pushed open the door, stood from the passenger seat, and let the door slam behind him. 

"Oi!" Holden exclaimed. "Close it nicely, boy. It's not that difficult." 

And so Andy pulled the door open again, and as softly as he could, closed it. "Sorry," he then said. "I'm sorry." 

"Yeah, whatever. Hurry up, now. God, being with you is painful." 

Holden slammed the front door as soon as Andy had stepped inside, and in some other universe, where he was permitted to do so, Andy would have laughed at the utter irony if it, the hypocrisy of the situation. But he didn't, and bending down to untie his laces, he knew better than to let even half a tear free. There were many things about Holden that confused him, but one thing he knew for certain was that he hated crying. 

His stomach was sore, still tender from those six hours ago, when they were preparing to leave for the tattoo studio. He had acted out by speaking when he wasn't spoken to, and had received a heavy fist to the abdomen that made him double over and yelp. This 'overreaction' earned him two more hits, this time to his left ribs - the area he wanted the tattoo to be. 

While he was being tattooed, he thought about how deliberate those hits had been, tried to convince himself that Holden didn't mean anything by it, that it had no correlation with his tattoo. And even though he himself knew that it was false, that Holden did mean something by it, there was a slither of chilly comfort in letting himself believe otherwise. 

He place his shoes neatly on the rack and straightened up. Holden was looking at him with a slight smile, and he smiled back. The act was to him what a knife through the heart was to others. There was no joy in it, but the aftermath was almost sweet. Like those with broken hearts, he was left - for only a few moments, mind - a feeling of numbness. 

Holden turned away and headed for the living room. Bottles and glasses of various sizes were already set out, and it was a horribly familiar scene. He picked up a bottle of whiskey and poured it into a thick-rimmed, chipped glass, slid it across the coffee table, and said in that demanding tone that could make anybody oblige with a fit of submission, "Drink, boy." 

Andy did.