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There was a deep-seated hypocrisy in freedom.
Many people spent their whole life looking for it—freedom in finding themselves, in being themselves, in breaking the shackles of their thoughts, their past. Freedom was a sweet memory of a fever dream that couldn’t be recalled without being fragmented. Wasn’t it hilarious that something that was supposed to be freeing, to be relieving, could only be achieved with such tremendous price?
The world was a big plaza of trade; of truths and lies, of kindness and ignorance, of struggle and freedom.
Here Jake was, driving his taxi, that was acquired through an actual job application; wearing clothes that he bought from his meager salary; waiting for the time for his shift to be done so he could go back and rest—not going anywhere he didn’t want to, not doing something that he had no choice in. He was a man cleansed of sins, starting anew with freedom on his back.
It felt like shackles, still, sometimes.
He swallowed, and put on his earphones. It was a new habit. Half of it was because he could block out the chatters of the passengers and the streets around him, half of it was because of Steven.
When Jake had his own form, no longer chained to the contract as Khonshu’s avatar, Steven had brutally pointed out about his anger management issues and his inclination towards violence. It was inherent, born from Marc’s fear and resentment. Jake had been indignant, ready to argue. But Steven just sighed and closed his palms over Jake’s hand, rubbing callused fingers on his skin gently.
“But you don’t have to be,” Steven had told him, leaning their foreheads together. “Not anymore.”
So, Jake learned how to be not so angry, not so quick on lashing out with physical altercations, not to be so cynical about the world. It couldn’t be so bad if the world had given him Steven. But Jake was thirty-six, and he had spent decades knowing only violence as the foremost option in everything he faced. It was hard to uproot a tree that had grown so tall and strong; hack it down and you’d risk your safety and the environment around, look for the roots and you’d find that it had spread too far to be tracked.
It was futile, he had told Steven, and felt like his heart was torn apart when Steven cried silently, holding Jake close in a warm embrace. Jake could only close his eyes and wrap his arms around the man, careful and gentle, trying, trying so hard not to be a monster. Steven’s tears were salty when they fell down to Jake’s face, trailing down to the side of his lips. He pressed a fleeting kiss on Steven’s collarbones, trying to sooth him without ever learning how.
He had never learned how to cradle a fragile heart on a palm full of thorns.
“The roots might still be there, but it doesn’t mean that something else couldn’t grow anew,” Steven had said another time. “Something different. Something you choose on your own. Would you like that?”
He didn’t know. Did he want to go through a painful struggle of letting go of who he had thought he was, and then walk on an endless road just to piece himself back together with something gentler, something kinder?
He didn’t. But he would, for Steven.
“Everything that you are, I cherish them,” Steven told him, a smile pulling on his lips. Jake leaned up to kiss them without thinking, and Steven sighed softly into his mouth. “But those things you’re made of, they aren’t kind to you. I just want you to be kinder to yourself, Jake.”
The only kindness he knew was painless death. But was it not kindness to wake up thinking that he wouldn’t bring his gun, that he could just go about without tarnishing his hands with blood? Was it not kindness to hold Steven in arms so stiff because they weren’t used to touching gently, instead of breaking something apart? Was it not kindness to let himself be loved?
It felt like walking on shards of sharp glass. Every step hurt; every step was terrifying for he wouldn’t know whether he’d fall off the cliff he couldn’t see. The road was misty and he was blind. He could only follow Steven’s voice, trying, trying so hard because the voices in his head were much louder. They crooned and promised him of sweet, sweet relief—if only he would turn back to the road he had known like the back of his hand.
But Steven wouldn’t be there. Steven wouldn’t be there either if he were to walk forward. Because this was something that only Jake could tread on. Steven would only be there in the agonizing steps, in every will he had to wake up and live as someone kinder to himself, in the touch of fingers that were used to be stained with blood of another’s. Steven would only exist in a heart willing to mend itself.
“Love is painful,” Steven had said, lying between Jake’s legs, leaning against his chest. He looked up and reached to touch Jake’s lips. “Loving you is painful. But it’s impossible to ever stop, because I don’t want you to ever feel unloved. Even mine won’t be enough, unless you learn how to forgive yourself; learn how to love every part you never wanted to acknowledge. Every part that you’re afraid of.”
Jake had thought, all his life, that he knew himself, and thus he was fearless. He was only a fragment of a mind torn apart from anguish, but he had stood on the destiny he was served with. He had never known fear until he knew how to love Steven. There were parts of him that he rejected, both the good and the bad; there were parts of him he murdered in cold blood, because they weren’t needed for his purpose.
But it wasn’t a purpose of his own. It wasn’t out of his own volition. When everything was said and done, Jake was a man lost in a world he had thought he understood.
“If you can’t find yourself yet,” Steven whispered against his lips, his touch bespoke of reverence on Jake’s skin. “Then find me.”
When time didn’t wait, didn’t care for his struggles, Jake cradled Steven’s face, at loss from the brewing emotions in his chest. It hurt, it hurt, it hurt. His ears were ringing and the world was deafening in its silence. Steven held him, arms closing around Jake as if he wanted nothing but to keep him there for a small eternity they could have.
“Cry, Jake,” he had said. “Allow yourself to cry, to feel the pain, to understand that you’re allowed to buckle under the burden. You’re not perfect, God, no. But you’re trying, and it’s one of the most painful things to do. So, cry, darling.”
He might have hurt Steven that time, holding him with immense fear clouding his head, the anguish tearing him apart, the deep-seated sadness that seemed unending. So, he cried, and he cried, and he cried until he could feel every single one of his pains, could discern them from one another, could accept that he had them, that they were his and they would stay as a part of him.
He felt weak and vulnerable, but he felt humane.
“Isn’t it great?” Steven asked, profound pride and affection for Jake in his eyes. “You did something. You could have just not. But you did it. It’s something amazing, your willingness.”
It was the day when Jake put on a new suit, and went out to put his application on a taxi company. They had a walk-in interview, and he went back feeling a bit bewildered. It felt so different, the first and the second time. It made all the difference in the world, knowing the comparison of the intent. It should have been something so mundane, but Steven had looked so proud of him.
“Nothing is mundane enough to be proud of, if it’s something you put your thoughts into,” Steven told him kindly. He fixed Jake’s tie, and tucked in his shirt neatly. “Even wanting to live tomorrow is hard. But we live regardless, when something else could have happened. A choice could mean a universe apart.”
A universe apart could mean that Steven wouldn’t be there. Jake didn’t think he would ever make a choice to see tomorrow if it came to that.
“Why wouldn’t you?” Steven asked, but his hands were cradling Jake’s face and there had never been reprimand on his face. “To live for someone else isn’t a wrong thing. For some people, it could be their only reason to hang onto. But, at one point, you will have to learn how to be free—of making choices, of decisions in reasoning, of dreams and hopes, of a heart and mind. Of a life: yours.”
Freedom could be found anywhere, but to teach himself to properly hold it was another rough trail he had to walk on. Attachment was of human’s nature, but to disregard oneself for that would just bring Jake back to square one. It wasn’t said, but he heard it loud and clear: to learn to be free also meant learning how to let go.
“I love you, with everything I can give, in any way I’m capable of,” Steven said, kissing Jake’s forehead, each of his eyelids, his nose, his lips. “Whoever you found yourself to be, I’ll love you. Even if it’s not the one you wanted, I’d still love you. With each step and each day your heart beats, I’ll love you. In every mistake and tears, I’ll love you. In pain and in warmth, I will love you the way you deserve to be loved.”
Jake worked and complained. He ate and watched soccer matches. He learned how to properly manage his salary. He went to the grocery store and divided his money wisely. He stayed in the bathtub for forty minutes on tiring days. He punched the wall and screamed. He sang and laughed when his voice broke. He hoped there will be a cheap house to buy. He cried, and held Steven, and learned slowly how to forgive himself.
It was hard to love himself when he had no love left to spare.
But he tried, because Steven loved him. It felt enough on some days, when he didn’t have the strength to be kind to himself. Because Steven would hold him gently when he felt like he didn’t deserve it, would love him when he couldn’t.
Freedom meant differently, then. Freedom could mean being a human with blood on a long history of violence; it could mean having his own body and mind, separated from the fractured world he had dwelled in; it could mean a mundane life filled with working hours and taxes and laughing at television show; it could mean hacking the tree off and planting a new seed despite not finding all the roots; it could mean being held in gentle arms with heart aching deeply; it could mean forgiveness and resentment and love and hatred.
It could mean a life he lived for himself.
“It’s alright to fall apart,” Steven whispered to him, holding his hands as the sky was dark and the clock ticked by on the wall. “And it’s alright to be vulnerable. Because there is pain in being okay. But, even if it is all the more painful still, allowing yourself to be okay is one of the kindest things you could do for yourself.”
Jake fell apart, and he heaved himself up with broken legs and a rough sob dragged from the bottom of his lungs. It was hard to wake up and think about walking the endless road with its mist and shards of glass. It was agonizing to think that he wanted to stop feeling this way. But he learned, he learned slowly, and he learned still. He wanted to be alright. He thought that he could allow himself to be alright.
“It’s not going to be easy,” Steven said, and he smiled so fondly at the atrocious flower crown Jake had made out of the blue. “But I hope you’ll keep walking forward. One day, I hope you’ll be proud of yourself, as much as I am proud of you.”
He put the flower crown on his head, and Jake kissed him slowly as they danced to a tune inside their heads in the small kitchen. Warm laughter and howl of pain as they stubbed their toes, not enough space for him to twirl Steven properly. Happiness, he learned, was scatter of freedom that could be found in the smallest of things that he often forgot about.
“I love you,” Steven said, earnest and sincere, as Jake presented him with a burnt toast and a bowl of salad that tasted like nothing but raw grass. “For everything that you are, and everything you have done. That is always going to be enough for me.”
Jake played chess with his colleagues and fellow drivers, cheering when he won. He saved up and bought Steven an expensive pen fountain. He danced and jested. He sang ballad songs in the shower. He brushed the tip of his fingers on Steven’s lashes as they lay side by side. He broke down and wailed until he couldn’t breathe. He punched the mirror until he saw a million fractures on the reflecting surface. He kissed Steven’s hands and told him that it was hard loving himself, that freedom seemed to be always out of reach, that he couldn’t find himself yet, but that was alright. He wanted to try, still.
“Keep this heart, and keep mine, too,” Steven said, smiling through his tears, lips marred with blood. “Keep my memories and yours, keep my wishes and your dreams. I will love you for whoever you are, whoever you will be. I’ll wait, always, for the time when you can be gentle to yourself, when you are someone you can love. For I love you without reserve, and loving you is the freedom I have chosen.”
A god lay on their feet, broken down and dead. A mortal had defeated him, and with it, his clutch perished. The moon would not have its master, and Jake’s heart broke apart for Steven’s gentle arms that had been holding it all this time were going cold.
Freedom could mean the choice in loving someone and oneself, despite the sharp shards and the long road ahead. And in the freedom of loving, there was willingness to be parted.
Love could mean sacrifices. Love could mean letting go.
Jake closed his eyes and played a long list of voice recordings, leaning back against the seat of the car. He needed to drop by the grocery store and buy some cheese. He also wanted to play some rounds of chess with his friends. This week, he learned how to make flower crowns that weren’t so wonky.
[I love you, dearly, wholeheartedly, unconditionally.]
The plumbing in the apartment had been fixed; Jake planned on wasting all the hot water in the tub while singing to some old songs he didn’t completely remember the lyrics of. He was invited to a family dinner of one of his colleagues, because it was also the eighth birthday of the daughter.
[In your pain, my heart will break apart. My apologies are the only ones I can offer.]
He had a bonus from his boss, for working so diligently. He could buy those shoes he’d been eyeing for the past four months. He also finally managed to get the tomato soup to taste right, instead of bland or too salty. The lady on the fifth floor said that he should drop by after work, because she baked some cookies, and she wanted to thank him for always helping her with groceries.
[There is no one I’m prouder of but you. In your mistakes and mishaps. In your trials and success.]
It was only two hours before he was finished with the shift. Perhaps, he should call his friends to remind them of the chess match. The vegetable smoothie he tried the other day tasted like shit, but the shop owner told him he should try other variants before giving up on it entirely. He agreed to come back again by the end of this week.
[Thank you for choosing to live as someone you can forgive.]
He rolled up his windows and let the tears fall. His heart ached still, but he learned to let it fall apart with each memory of Steven, because he had learned how to pick up the pieces and let himself be alright, allow himself to mend his heart. Two hours, he reminded himself.
[In this eternity, I will wait for you. I will always do.]
Just two more hours, after a long day, until he could—
[And when you’re here, after everything you’ve been through, after you've tried time and time again, I’ll open my arms at last, and say—]
—come home.
[Welcome home, Jake.]