Call Me Sir - Part 7

All characters are 18+ 

Liam drifted in an out of an uncomfortable sleep, his body felt like it had been set on fire, and sweat pumped from him as he writhed in agony.

Gideon sat on the bed next to him, occasionally changing the cold wash cloth over his head. The boy was burning up, but shaking uncontrollably. If he knew no better, he’d probably call an ambulance, but he did know better.

Liam leaned over the edge of the bed and vomited, but Gideon had already left a basin there in preparation.

“Please” Liam cried, spitting up again, “I’ll find a way to pay you back, I swear I will”.

The man rubbed the boy’s bare back as he retched and trembled. Getting into an argument with him was the wrong thing to do at the moment, but he’d set the lad straight tomorrow, if the withdrawals stopped for long enough to do so.

Between bouts of intense crying, begging, vomiting and growling, Liam survived through the night, and by the time the room filled with light, he was sleeping like a baby.

Gideon hardly slept, and was nursing a coffee next to the naked young man who had kicked the sheets and his underwear off himself during the night. As much as he felt like he was invading Liam’s privacy, his legs were spread apart and his erection was poking from him very visibly.

Despite everything he put himself through, he had a very nice body. Gideon enjoyed it visually for quite a while, but he had some phone calls to make, so he covered the young man up, boner and all, and strolled out onto the balcony.

“Hello? Yes, Samantha, I need you to tell Carter to take the reigns for a while, I have um… I have business to attend to here, and I’ll be quite a while. Yes, weeks perhaps, months, I don’t know yet, but I trust him with it”

His receptionist agreed and the conversation ended. Gideon couldn’t remember the last time he had taken a day off, let alone an extended period of time. It felt wrong, as though he had failed himself, yet the young man in the bed was making him feel things that he hadn’t felt in an extraordinarily long time. Whether those things were good or bad, he was yet to know, but that was for another time. He had one more phone call to make.

Liam swallowed another two painkillers, but the pain had subsided only briefly. It had happened once before in the park after a particularly brutal assault from Ben and Crank left him unable to find a fix for nearly two days, and he knew from experience that it got a whole lot worse before it got better. That was, of course, if better meant that he found some meth, but the rich guy didn’t seem too happy to oblige.

“I’ll suck your dick” he groaned as Gideon walked back into the room, “give me twenty dollars and I’ll suck your dick, man”.

Gideon walked to the door and retrieved a tray from the waiter outside. Liam hadn’t even heard the knock.

“I appreciate the offer” the man said, setting it down on the desk, “but this is all I want you to suck on, for now”.

He handed Liam a plate of fresh fruit and vegetables, and the young man gagged.

“And this” he added, chucking two bottles of coconut water onto the bed.

“Are you trying to kill me?” Liam groaned, picking up a grape between two fingers and grimacing at it.

“I’m trying to stop you from killing yourself” Gideon told him, “now eat, you’ll need the energy today”.

“What’s happening today?”

Liam lay slumped in the back of the cab wearing the white shirt and a pair of black pants that Gideon had purchased. He looked like death warmed up, but he was too weak to care, so he remained there as Gideon spoke to a young woman outside.

“It’s only available long term, I’m afraid” she told him, “the minimum lease is a year”.

“Fine, fine” he replied, “I’ll pay for the year, but I won’t need it for that long”.

The realtor looked perplexed, but they weren’t the type to turn down money, and within the hour, Gideon held the keys to a two bedroom apartment on the outskirts of the city.

Liam clung to him as he walked him inside. It certainly wasn’t as glamorous as the hotel they’d just left, but it would do for now. There was only so much abuse a hotel room could take, and Gideon knew that the kid’s withdrawals would only get worse.

He lugged him into the bedroom which had thankfully come furnished, and lay him down on the bed. Liam was already asleep by the time his head hit the pillow.

He needed the wine more than he cared to admit. He’d held back for the last two days in an attempt to keep an eye on Liam, but the memories of his own experiences had taken their toll on his brain.

Gideon gulped down the first glass and sat alone with his thoughts in the dark living room of the new apartment. New was a push. It was certainly the cheapest place he’d stayed in for a long time, but it wasn’t about the comfort of the place.

He remembered his sister, and the damage she had caused as the meth left her system. He’d tried everything, but he was only fourteen at the time, and when she decided that she’d had enough of the pain, she left and the next time he saw her, she was being lowered into the ground.

He didn’t know the boy. He didn’t particularly care about the boy, but he wasn’t going to watch someone else die from that fucking drug. He swallowed another mouthful.

Tough love was what he needed. A firm hand, a stern voice, cruelty in the form of kindness. When the withdrawals were over, Liam was going to learn, and Gideon was going to be the one to teach him.

The boy would be ripped down by the end of these few weeks from the agony of the drug, and when he lay crumbling at rock bottom, covered in his own sweat, vomit and piss, Gideon would build him back up, piece by piece, and Liam would thank him for it.

Naturally of course, that was a long way away and the boy would do everything he could to fight that. As Gideon watched him tip toe across the dark room, unaware that he was sitting right there, he smiled to himself. He was up for a fight.

“Going somewhere?” He asked, holding the keys in his hand, and Liam almost jumped out of his skin.

“You can’t lock me up” he growled, his voice shaky, “I’ll call the police and tell them you’ve kidnapped me”.

“Call them” Gideon replied, holding up his phone, “and tell them whatever you please. In fact, maybe I’ll call them, and explain that you were nearly shot in the head only a few days ago!”

“Snitch” Liam spat, but Gideon smiled.

“You’ve got a lot to learn, young man” he said, but Liam didn’t look as though he was in the mood to learn anything.

He limped across the room and pulled a chair out next to the man before slumping into it and wincing.

“Can I have some of that?” He asked, pointing toward the wine, but Gideon shook his head.

“Water” he replied, and pushed a bottle of it across the table, “and lots of it”.

“Why are you doing this?” Liam asked seriously, “what do you care if I get high or not?”

The question had been plaguing him just as much as it had, Liam. He took a sip from his glass as the boy unscrewed the cap with shaky hands and glugged from it.

“Maybe I’ll tell you some day” Gideon told him, “but that’s only if you survive”.

The water dribbled down the young man’s chin as he gulped it down his throat. The pain was returning, and he knew that there was only one thing that would stop it, yet this rich asshole was preventing him from getting it. A disturbing thought crossed his mind, but that was the reality of the hideous drug.

“Don’t you have enough to worry about with all your money and shit?” He pressed, wiping his mouth on his arm, “it makes no difference to you if I live or die”.

A flash of anger lit Gideon’s eyes as he glared at the foolish boy. He had no idea.

“Money” he scoffed, “do you think money would fix your problem?”

Liam nodded eagerly.

“If I had money, I wouldn’t be sitting here with you”.

Gideon grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and dragged him forward. Their faces met in the middle, and the stench of sweat from Liam filled his nostrils.

“Do you want to die, kid?” He asked, “do you want your family to watch you being buried?”

Liam yanked himself away from the man. He may have been sick, but he wasn’t weak.

“I don’t have family” he hissed, and stormed back toward the bedroom.

Gideon leapt from the chair and rushed after him. How many times had he let his sister leave in a drug fuelled fury? The last time he’d spoken to her, it had ended just like this.

“Don’t you walk away from me, boy!” He snapped, and yanked the young man back around by his arm.

The two of them faced each other. The differences between them were stark. Gideon was tall, healthy and solid. Liam was hunched, scruffy and ill.

“Hit me then” he spat, “go on! You want to, so do it, it’s not like I haven’t been hit before!”

His voice was raised and filled with rage, but Gideon saw the moment it all changed, and his expression became one of pain as he threw up down his shirt.

The man quickly led him into the bathroom and held him over the toilet bowl as he continued to bring up the water he’d just drank. Although he’d never been the paternal type, he couldn’t help but feel his heart shatter for the lad.

He rubbed Liam’s back as he emptied his stomach, and when the young man went limp in his arms, he ran the bath.

When Liam woke, he was naked. He’d never been particularly modest, so his nudity wasn’t the issue. His stinging eyes found Gideon next to him, holding him upright in the bathtub as warm, soapy water swayed across his body.

For a moment he just lay there, enjoying the relief from the pain and the feeling of being cared for. He didn’t have the energy to argue, but even if he had, there was no point. For whatever reason, the wealthy man seemed to have taken it as a personal fucking challenge to keep him from the one thing that would help him.

Gideon soaked the wash cloth in the bathwater and washed Liam’s face. The tough guy look held no weight when he lay naked and clean in Gideon’s arms, and the idea of it made the man smile.

“Funny, is it?” Liam groaned, still unable to move a muscle as his body was cleaned.

“Very” Gideon nodded, “you’ll see the humour in it some day”.

A short while later, Gideon picked Liam up with apparent ease and dried him off with a towel before returning to the bedroom.

“I’ll pick you up more clothes tomorrow” he told him, “but maybe we’ll keep you like this for a while until you stop puking on yourself”.

Liam was hardly listening to him, he was already drifting off to sleep.

When Gideon finished covering him up with the light sheet, he checked the lock on the window and nodded to himself. Maybe it was cruel to keep him here, but the alternative was almost certainly fatal.

Back in the kitchen, he picked up the wine glass and brought it to his lips before stopping himself. Liam was in no state to look after himself should Gideon get too drunk. He poured the glass down the sink, then the bottle a moment later, and when he finally got into his own bed, he looked up at the dark ceiling and smiled.

Perhaps this wasn’t just good for Liam, after all.