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Aspirin would be best if he has any, but I’d settle for any pain reliever in this moment.
I open the mirrored medicine cabinet door that hangs on the wall next to the double vanity. My eyes squint at the shelf of orange pill bottles with white lids. Enzo has a lot of prescriptions. Not that it’s any of my business, and this is a total overstep, but why does he have so many?
I turn the bottles to see what they are. Every label reads the same thing: Adderall. All written by different doctors with recent fill dates from different pharmacies and varying refills remaining. I’ve taken Adderall for years, and it helps my brain function and stay calm, but it’s never made me one hundred percent. Still, my prescription never neared this amount. It’s a year’s supply for any normal adult.
“They help me focus,” Enzo says. I gasp, nearly jump out of my skin, and slam the medicine cabinet shut. He’s standing in the bathroom doorway, and we make eye contact through the mirror.
“I was just looking for aspirin,” I say. He walks past me and opens the cabinet. “Um, I take it, too. I have for years,” I add to fill the silence. “But not that much,” I whisper.
“I’m bigger than you,” he says with a simple shrug. He hands me the aspirin bottle. “I made breakfast.”
“Okay, thanks. I’ll be down in a minute.”
He gives my butt a squeeze. “I like my shirt on you.”
How many times has he used charm to cover something up?
The late nights, early mornings. How he doesn’t always finish his plate. The intensity.
It’s chemically induced.
I should have seen the signs. My ex in college ‘borrowed’ my Adderall whenever he had deadlines or finals. He would get wired and pull all-nighters, then crash the next day. Sometimes, he’d get agitated easily and snap at me during the hangover phase. My ex never hit me, but he called me selfish and would stay annoyed with me until I helped him again. But sharing my prescription left me out of pills until my next refill. I’d skip a day here and there to make up for the shortage in what should last me a month.
I put my face in my hands, and suddenly, my head doesn’t hurt as much.
No, no, no. It’s not supposed to be like this with Enzo.
He’s mature and has his shit together. Or so I thought.
As I wash my hands, my eyes drift to the medicine cabinet. I glance over my shoulder to make sure he isn’t creeping up on me again, and when I’m sure it’s clear, I open the cabinet just a hair to see if I really saw what I thought I did.
“Enzo, why?” I whisper to myself and close the cabinet door.
I step downstairs with more caution than normal, avoiding the railing we broke earlier this week when he fucked me against it. The scent of bacon fills the house, but the air feels heavier now. I didn’t think I was intruding by trying to find aspirin. Although it was an overstep on my part to look at the prescription labels. He didn’t seem mad. He was steady with an answer for anything I could ever ask. Always one step ahead of me—at least.
Enzo has toasted English muffins, fried eggs, and bacon laid out across the kitchen island. My stomach grumbles, and I need to eat to balance out the aspirin I took.
“I made you an iced latte,” Enzo says, handing me a glass.
“Oh, thank you.”
Enzo would have an expensive espresso machine, but he probably hardly uses it. The pills keep him wired. Just like they did to my ex. He only took one at a time, but Enzo could take them by the handful.
“I thought a breakfast sandwich bar would be a nice surprise,” he adds.
“Yeah, it’s cool,” I reply.
We build our sandwiches and sit across from each other at the round table in the breakfast nook. I take a sip of my iced latte when I notice he doesn’t have any coffee. My stomach knows shit isn’t right, and my appetite refuses anything heavier than small sips of coffee.
“How’s the latte?” he asks, likely making conversation. He must know there’s an elephant in the room now. I might be scatterbrained, but I know what I saw.
“Good. Did you already have coffee?”
He shifts his jaw. “No, just water so far. You’re not the only one who woke up hungover.”
“Right.” I shift my focus to my glass.
“What do you want to do today?” Enzo asks.
