Page 48 of Party of Three

“That’s not all you did.” Buckley’s sharp-edged accusation was softened by the fact that he was curving an arm gently around Jeff’s lower back.

“And you better never do it again.” Mateo’s nose was inches from his, his breath tickling Jeff’s lips. “Don’t ever take away another chance for us to love you.”

His eyes drifted shut as Mateo’s lips met his. Then they were guiding him into the bedroom. They undressed him gently, unhurriedly, and when the three of them sank down to the comforter together he felt like his bones might meld with the mattress. He felt as if his body were coming to a kind of rest it had never known. Deluding himself into believing fear was actually good sense required a lot of energy, and when it left his body, it seemed to take every ounce of tension with it, a swift departure that made clear how punishing the effort had been to his muscles, his skin, his beating heart.

He gave himself to them, to their stroking hands and their searching, hungry mouths. To their tenacity and their courage and their belief that their wild weekend could become everything he hoped it could be. He felt like a cross between a fallen warrior whose wounds were being expertly tended to and a bitter old man infused with the confidence and spirit of youth. He wanted to cry with relief, with joy, but he kept his tears at bay until later that night.

He was giving them a little tour of his place. When Buckley saw his meticulously organized storage room, his jaw fell open and his blue eyes widened. “Babe, I think we should come clean and admit we’re only using Jeff for his ten thousand micro screws arranged by thread diameter.”

He managed to wipe away the tear before either man saw it.

Such a tiny, fleeting moment, but it did him in. A few hours earlier he’d been mourning the fact that Buckley might never rib him about his storage room, and here they were. A small miraclethat reminded him of the much bigger one that had just changed his life for the better.

17

During the three months he and Mateo spent officially dating their new boyfriend, Buckley had been delighted to learn that he and Jeff had far more in common than their love for the man who’d brought them together. For one, they were equally superstitious.

Jeff always wore the exact same Luis Arráez jersey whenever the three of them went to a Padres game, and on busy holiday weekends, when the calls his ambulance crews received were usually more extreme thanks to hard partying and fireworks, Buckley always donned the same sterling-silver wheat chain necklace, his first, of what he hoped would be many, birthday gifts from Mateo.

Buckley figured this was why he and Jeff had worn nearly matching outfits every time they showed up to support Mateo during one of his test rides in the elevator at his therapist’s office building. A long-sleeved collared shirt and blue jeans with dress shoes.

“You guys here to keep me from throwing up or to sell me some real estate?” Mateo had asked the first time they’d all gathered in the building’s glossy lobby. It turned out he usually attended his sessions in shorts and a T-shirt, depending on the weather.

Dr. Pete saw his patients in a glass-and-steel office building not far from San Diego International Airport and the Marine Corps Recruit Depot. It was six stories tall, which meant its elevators rose to a height three stories above the longest elevatorride Mateo had endured on his own since starting treatment for his PTSD. On that first day, Dr. Pete had reserved them an elevator with building management, and, clutching Buckley’s hand in his right and Jeff’s hand in his left, Mateo had made it all the way to the top without asking them to stop at one of the floors in between.

Because it had been such a success, Buckley and Jeff had dressed pretty much the same for every visit since.

Now, four months after their life-changing weekend at Sapphire Cove and one month after they’d officially become a throuple, it was time for Mateo to try the ride alone.

“You sure you guys don’t want to head up to the top floor now and wait for me there?” Mateo said as he eyed the elevator doors.

“No worries. We’re in pretty good shape.” Jeff winked at him.

Mateo raised one eyebrow and gave them both an arch look, clearly doubting their belief that they could race up six flights of stairs in enough time to beat his elevator. Taking one of the unreserved cars meant they might get stopped before they reached the top.

Buckley sensed a different tension right under the surface.

If he and Jeff raced Mateo to the top, that assumed Mateo would make it there himself. If Mateo didn’t, would it be less stressful for him to know his boyfriends were waiting for him down in the lobby or at the destination he’d failed to reach on his own?

These thoughts buzzed in Buckley’s brain, but he didn’t give voice to them. In their support sessions, he was learning to step back and allow Mateo his process. Jeff was too. Both men wanted to come up with the magical to-do list that would make Mateo’s fears vanish like smoke. Dr. Pete had convinced them no such list existed, and if it did, Mateo had to be its sole author. Another perk of their throuple was that Buckley and Jeff could share their frustrations over this medical guidance with eachother, rather than drowning Mateo with them as he tried to find his own way forward.

A silence fell, interrupted by a gaggle of scrubs-clad nurses returning from lunch who gave them curious looks as they waited for one of the other elevators.

Dr. Pete stepped forward. “Want to run through our coping strategies?”

Mateo nodded. “Box breathing.”

Buckley watched the two men like a hawk. He was getting glimpses into an important process he’d been asked to step back from when Mateo started treatment.

Dr. Pete nodded. “Four counts in through the nose, hold four, out through the mouth four. And if you’re not feeling it, expand the count from four to six.”

When he nodded again, the tense set to Mateo’s mouth made Buckley want to reach out and take his hand. He didn’t. In moments like this, he needed to trust the process. When Jeff tightened his grip on Buckley’s hand, it was clear he was fighting the same urge.

“Time, date, feet,” Mateo said.

Dr. Pete nodded. “Ground yourself in the moment you’re actually in by repeating the time, the calendar date, and telling yourself exactly where your feet are in the present moment. Get super specific if you need to. City, street, building address, elevator floor, cheap shitty carpet, that kind of thing. Whatever gets you back here, today. In the moment you’re actually in.”

And not in that goddamn Osprey,Buckley thought.

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