how to fall in love - jercy

7 - jason grace

p.j.

touch.

skin.

i hate it when people touch me with their hands. teachers pat me on the back. adults shake my hands. poking at me. pulling my cheeks.

i only feel okay with annabeth or my mom touching me. i've known them for so long.

but then how would i explain the countless people i met on grindr? i was okay with touching them. really intimately too. there's something about sex that i don't fear.

it's affection, intimacy and pain that i do fear. one always leads to the next. or it just hurts.

why is he my exception? i had only met him once, but i want to feel him close again. there is something the world wanted to tell me about him. i'm not scared of his touch. i'm scared of how much i crave it.

bzzt.

my phone vibrated in my pocket, jolting me out of my thoughts.

jason: good morning. :)

he sends me a good morning text every morning. i send a good night text every night.

so many changes have happened to me in the span of the last month. my mind hasn't left him since we've met. i deleted grindr. my heart feels full every morning when i hear my phone buzz and every night when i say goodbye, my mind actually falls asleep. i haven't had a single nightmare in weeks. i haven't felt empty after waking up next to a stranger in weeks.

i bite my cheek before typing a response.

i don't fully remember how to love someone. everyday, i feel like i'm doing something wrong. i know jason deserves so much better than me. i'm not sure if i could ever give him the love he deserves.

i don't know if i could ever say i love you again to anyone but my mom.

it's been so long.

butterflies still buzzing in my stomach, i head out for work.

his name buzzes in my head. i don't think about how boring work is going to be. i don't worry about the traffic. i don't even care when i have to listen to that dumb love song on the radio again.

when he said "please," that night, a shiver ran through my body. i've had sex before but the look in his face and the color of his cheeks were something else. ungodly. i hadn't realised i'd become so indifferent and numb to sex until that night. it was as if i had rediscovered what sex was and felt that first-time-magic in my chest the way i was always supposed to.

i wonder if that's what he felt too.

jason grace.

jason grace.

jason grace.