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body trembled as I felt his hard chest against mine and his strong arms carefully wrap around me. He smelled even better than I remembered and I sighed happily as I felt a familiar erection growing under my thigh.
    ‘O God Mia,’ he groaned as his arms tightened, very gently, around me, anchoring me to him. He nosed into my hair and lay a trail of kisses on my head. ‘I’ve missed you, so much .’
    ‘Me too,’ I whispered as I nuzzled his neck. ‘Of course I still love you Gabe, I don’t think there’s anything you could ever do that would stop me loving you, but it doesn’t mean that we don’t have problems.’
    ‘So if we still love each other, where do we go from here?’ he asked and I had to remind myself that this was a serious conversation, and not to sing the rest of that song from the musical episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer back to him.
    ‘I think we need to talk, honestly, without arguing.’
    ‘Why did you run away yesterday?’
    ‘I couldn’t face you, it was too soon.’
    ‘How long would you have waited?’
    ‘I don’t know. I seem to make you stressed and mad, all the time, and you don’t need that at the moment, especially not in your state.’ I felt him stiffen underneath me.
    ‘What do you mean by that?’
    ‘You’re not well Gabe, why didn’t you tell me?’ I asked as I raised my face to look at him.
    ‘Lexi?’ he sighed as he reached up and ran a hand through his hair with one hand and gently held the nape of my neck to keep me looking at him.
    ‘No, Doug.’
    ‘He’s bloody hopeless at keeping secrets,’ he said with a frown. ‘I didn’t want you feeling like you had to come back to me because you felt sorry for me Mia. If you weren’t ready to come and see me yet, then I don’t think you should be here now, it’s too much to expect you to deal with me in this state and I don’t want to make excuses for myself. This bloody condition hasn’t made me like this, it’s just amplified the worst sides of my personality.’ He stayed looking at me, holding me in his grasp.
    ‘That all involve me?’
    ‘Yes, because I love you Mia and I’m so scared of losing you or something happening to you,’ he said softly and very slowly moved his hand, hovering over my cheek without touching, as if he expected me to flinch from him. I quickly leaned into it and sighed.
    ‘I want to help you get better Gabe. I want to understand what you’re going through and to try to work with you, but you have to talk to me, not shut me out.’
    ‘I hadn’t realised that I had a problem Mia, not until this weekend. When I’m with you I’m fine, it’s the thought of you being away from me that sets me off. I can’t protect you if I’m not with you. It was Doug and Dad that pointed out that I was out of order barging in on your night out on Sunday, then when Doug starting pointing out everything I’d been doing lately that was out of character … I just knew I’d fucked up, badly. Then when I nearly hit you …’ he broke off and hung his head, dropping his hand from my face. I grabbed it, lifted it to my lips and kissed it and he looked back up at me, his eyes full of hurt and remorse.
    ‘You didn’t hit me Gabe, you told me to leave and I refused to go, so you got angry to scare me into leaving. You hit your car instead of hitting me.’
    ‘But I still hurt you, look at your arms. Fuck Mia .’
    ‘Gabe I slapped you, really hard, three times last weekend, but you’re not holding a grudge over those. You held me too tightly but the minute I said our safe word you let me go, even when you seemed out of your mind crazy, you let me go.’ I reached up and held his face and ran my thumbs over his eyebrows and he closed his eyes and sighed. ‘Please don’t make it to be more than it was Gabe. Yes they’re a bit sore, but I’m actually more upset about the things we said to each other.’ I kissed his forehead and he opened his eyes again.
    ‘I was so out of order Mia. I