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Post by Tristan Dunn on Dec 24, 2019 17:45:04 GMT -5
Tristan was nervous. Very nervous, actually, about Christmas. He'd moved in with Alex and his family literally the day of his 18th birthday and his life had been a bit of a strange state since. Leaving his family was the right thing to do and everyone was happy for him for doing so, but it hadn't made it feel right. It hadn't gotten rid of the complex emotions that came from making such a choice.
Both the Mitts and the Aldridges had extended invitations for him to partake in their holidays and he knew that either would be a vast improvement over the holidays that he was used to spending with his own family. However, he also knew that he was going to feel like he was intruding on either celebration. Also, he woefully aware of his lack of money. Leaving his parents had meant leaving his own financial security behind. Even if he'd rarely gotten money to use for himself it was there when he needed it. Now he had nothing.
That wasn't true, he knew. He had everything that he needed and he was very lucky to have it. He didn't have to worry about food or shelter or anything that he might have had to figure out if he'd lived a different life. What he didn't have was spare money, which meant that he didn't have gifts to give. Especially not to people like Alex and Leslie who had money enough to buy whatever they wanted.
He felt more inadequate than ever as the holidays drew closer and closer. Worse, the people that he would turn to in order to talk about his problems usually were the people that he couldn't turn to. They wouldn't understand. In fact, there was really only one person that he thought might be able to understand but although he'd spent a couple of weeks in the same place with Skylar this summer he didn't think he knew his girlfriend's brother's girlfriend well enough to start asking her questions about how she dealt with things like buying gifts when you knew that the person you were buying for could buy anything that they wanted and you had almost nothing to put forward toward a gift anyway. So, he'd just been keeping it to himself.
Alex could tell that he was being weird, he'd said as much. Leslie had noticed too, but he'd told both that he was just adjusting to not living with his parents. Which, he certainly was. The sheer amount of freedom that he had was overwhelming at points and he found himself slipping into habits that had Alex's parents looking at him in a bit of pity.
Like when Mrs. Mitts had asked about his day and as he'd answered he'd automatically held out his phone, unlocked, for her to go through.
She'd stared at him for a moment in confusion. "Tristan, did you have something you were trying to show me?" she'd asked, glancing down toward the home screen that was a picture of Leslie.
It wasn't until that moment that he'd realized what he was doing and he'd colored slightly, taking the phone back. "No, sorry," he'd answered, looking down and away.
Or when, after receiving back his first essay after living with them he'd taken it to the Mitts after dinner. Then, given that it was only a 95, he'd handed it over grimly and dived into an explanation. "I know I should have fixed the grammatical errors that lost me the marks. It was stupid of me not to miss something so obvious. I promise that I'll do better next time," he'd said, taking his phone out and giving it to the very confused adults.
"Tristan, son, that's a great mark. It looks like you did a very thorough job," Mr Mitts told him. "You don't have anything to apologize over. You should be proud." Gently he pushed the phone back toward him.
'I'm so-" He had started, automatically and then looked at them with wide eyes, the surprise that he wasn't being berated rattling him. For a moment he'd just started at them. Being told that he should be proud of his work wasn't something that he'd heard before, not from any semblance of a parental figure. Swallowing hard he gave a nod and managed a quiet, "Thank you."
Then Tristan had gone up to the room that was his now and sat down hard on the bed, wondering at the urge that he had to cry.
He still deleted texts after they were sent. Still snapchatted images and deleted them afterward. His door was always open, only closing when he was changing or when Leslie had come over and shut it after them. When he'd started cleaning the bathroom that he was sharing with Alex the other guy had informed him that he didn't have to do that, that there was someone whose job it was.
For a long time Alex's house had been a place where he'd been able to relax more, but now that he was living here full time it turned out that he felt like he didn't really belong. There was a guilt in him that he couldn't reconcile, that he was taking up space and costing them money and he just wanted to make himself as small as possible. Even more so than when he had just visited in the past.
He'd tried to explain what he was feeling to Leslie and to Alex, but they didn't really understand it. They'd tried and he loved them for it, but he could tell that they felt as out of depth with what he was feeling as he did. Of course, them trying only made him feel more that he had to show some sort of appreciation for them and it wound him back to the fact that he had nothing to give.
Christmas kept drawing closer and he kept feeling the increasing panic of not having a proper gift to give. And then, there was all the talk and imagery of happy families being shown, the reinforcing message that family had to come first and the overwhelming guilt that he felt as a result for having left his own. A spiral that seemed to grow deeper and deeper every time he allowed himself to think of it.
Everyone continued to tell him that he didn't need to give a gift even, they'd assured him that they understood and weren't expecting anything. It didn't do anything to ease the guilt that seemed to eat him alive on not doing enough, or being enough for the people around him.
He wasn't artistic, he couldn't make a gift that would be anything special or memorable. Christmas Eve came too quickly and when he woke up that morning, he realized he still hadn't solved his gift problem. Everything that he'd come up with he'd ended up shooting down and he found himself giftless.
The idea of showing up empty handed made his stomach roll and his breathing pick up. Quicker and quicker. He was sweating. His head was pounding and he couldn't breathe. The room was too hot. Everything was stifling and his chest hurt. It hurt so much and he couldn't stop it. Hastily, he stumbled toward the bathroom, hitting the door frame as he went in and going straight for the toilet because he was certain that he was going to be sick. Despite the nausea it wasn't coming, he stayed close in case that changed but he couldn't do anything more.
It just went on and on. All he could do was try to calm his racing breath, try to get his heart rate under control but he couldn't. It seemed to last forever until, sometime later it started to work. His breathing slowed and his heart rate did too. The nausea subsided. Shakily, he stood and looked at himself in the mirror. A layer of sweat seemed to cover him everywhere and he stared at his reflection. The flushed face and the disheveled appearance wondering what had just happened. It was lucky that Alex was a heavy sleeper because he didn't want to talk to anyone right now.
Instead, he ran the water and splashed it on his face. "You'll be okay," he told his reflection, but he wasn't sure he knew that was true. What he did know was that he had to get himself together before he saw anyone in Alex's family. No matter how difficult today was going to be, he was going to get through it. Even showing up empty handed, he'd have to get through today and just find a way to make it up to Leslie at some point.
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