Author's Note - Hi! This is fully written but it is LONG. I'm going to break it into roughly 20k word chunks to make it easier to manage. So expect four total once it all gets approved.
This includes both f/m and m/m scenes. There isn't a bi category on Literotica, and there are more straight scenes than gay ones, so it's here in the Romance category. It also features some light BDSM later on - no dubcon or noncon, though. So be aware but don't worry ;).
Trigger warnings - discussions of domestic violence (not perpetrated by any main character), self harm, substance abuse, suicidal ideation, negative self talk, and mental illness. I try to handle these topics with care, but please remember that these are characters talking about themselves. They are not always going to be as careful with their language as I would be talking about mental illness in any other context. If you find any of it too hard to read, please click off and know I have no hard feelings <3
If you are or someone you know is struggling call or text 988 for the Suicide Lifeline in the US. For other countries, dial your local emergency number for local resources. Take care of yourselves!
1
Kit
Objectively speaking, the music was too loud. It was past the point of comfort, edging into pain, but I left it on. The words became incomprehensible. The familiar riff of an old song was lost in the volume. Only the beat remained, vibrating through my chest until it felt like the sound came from my own lungs.
The windows were down and, again objectively speaking, it was far too cold and wet for the breeze to be enjoyable. The damp air carried with it the oily, caustic smell of a wet road. I breathed it in, anyway, looking for something intangible in whipping winds.
The blue lights behind me were enough to shake me from my attempt at a self-induced trance. I flicked the radio off and tapped the hazards on. My ears rang almost as loudly as the music, but now my lungs felt empty without the pound of the drums and bass to fill them. I didn't take the time to wonder if I should be feeling anything other than empty as I pulled off to the side of the highway.
The officer took his time. In my experience, they always did. I wonder, sometimes, if it was a power play or if there really was some kind of pre-confrontation paperwork they had to do before ruining someone's day. I rummaged through oil change receipts and parking garage claim tickets for my registration. I was still digging in the glove box when the officer tapped on the roof of the car for my attention.
"Hi, um, sorry, I'm looking for the..." I trailed off uncertainly. The reflection of my own face in the man's mirrored sunglasses was warped, all rounded edges and bulging eyes. The face in his lenses sported a strained, polite smile and suspiciously damp cheeks. I wiped at my face in irritation.
"Your registration?" The officer prompted.
"Yeah," I tried to shake myself back into action. That emptiness in my chest was creeping to my brain. I felt another tear leak down my cheek as I forced my hands to start sorting through the papers again.
"Ma'am? Do you know how fast you were driving?"
I finally found the green bit of paper that proved I paid the car loan on the car that was actually owned by some sketchy online loan mill. I held it out to the officer along with my license and noted with growing frustration that my hands were shaking.
"How... fast?" I looked at the speedometer. It sat on zero, of course, and offered no help. "I don't know."
"85. Do you know the speed limit here?"
"75?" I chanced. I drove this road every day. That should not have been a guess.
The officer raised a disapproving eyebrow above his mirrored glasses, "No. It's 70." He finally took the documents from my shaking fingers. "Wait here. I'll be back in a moment."
I rested my forehead against my steering wheel while the officer went back to his car. I felt a lump in her throat and dug my fingernails into my wrist hard enough to bring more tears to my eyes until the lump faded.
...
"Kit," the voice I wanted to hear the least called my name as I tried to sneak into the office. Connie, the branch manager of this little slice of hell, had once had a prestigious job as the director of HR of one of the major factories in Monroe before the recession committed its quiet assassination of our small city. She now managed our branch of a struggling staffing company with all the bitterness of a woman who had lost her 401K, her job, and any shreds of human decency remaining in her black soul in one foul swipe.
"You're late. Again," she said.
"Yes, I'm sorry. I had some, um, car trouble. It won't happen again," I lied both about the reason I was late and the very obvious fact that I would surely be late again, very likely later that same week. For as much as I would like to pretend to be the unfairly maligned hero of this story, I knew even then that I was well into my prolonged freefall into failure.
"Hm," Connie pursed her lips, looking like a woman about to demand to speak to my manager. I bit the inside of my cheek to keep the unhinged giggle in my heart and out of the audible range of the office. "I need you to go to Tech tonight and recruit some graduating mechanics."
I smiled and nodded, trying to project an air of enthusiasm that was beyond me even in my happiest moments. Connie arched an eyebrow at me, but graciously let my bad acting go.
...
I carried an armload of applications through the meager lobby of the local tech campus. It had seen much better days. It was once hard to get in, or so I was told. There was a wait list you had to get on well before your senior year in high school if you hoped to go into vocational training right after. That was when Monroe as a town was still a booming industrial gem.
But that was a long time ago.
I waited outside of a class barely one-third full of hopeful mechanics in hopes of convincing a few to at least take an application home.
It was late. I had stayed late in the office trying fruitlessly to fill a last minute order for some minimum wage laborers to work a one-off overnight shift. No one wanted that bullshit work but it was my ass that would be chewed tomorrow over it. My feet ached in my cheap high heels. I shifted my weight back and forth, hoping for some relief but finding none. I sat on the repurposed church pew that served as a bench on the wall. It wasn't any more comfortable than my Wal-Mart heels but at least I could close my eyes against the buzzing fluorescent bulbs overhead.
"Excuse me?"
Oh, no.
"Hi, are you waiting for someone?"
The concerned face of a handsome man came into focus. He was tall and athletically built, with stained but clean jeans, and a baseball hat with a Titans logo on it choking on a mop of dark curls. He was tanned and muscular in a way I would likely have paid more attention to if I wasn't on the verge of a full panic attack. He and I looked about the same age, so a bit older than the age of most students in this class.
I checked my watch. It was two hours later than when I sat on the bench.
