F***in' Arizona

Straight from the Horse's Mouth Pt. 13 (Chapter 43)

*Author's Note: This chapter corresponds to a couple of chapters in my other book, One Foot In & One Foot Out (a fantasy romance)!
The stories are NOT in the same universe, but I thought it would be cute to connect the two stories. Read that book (or chapters 25 and 26, although you may get slightly confused at some things,) if you want to read the entire account.

Ari's P.O.V

New Year's Eve 2017

I was very thankful to have such a caring and forgiving friend like Remi. I was so glad that he wasn't mad at me for liking his former girlfriend and for becoming intimate with her. But he was totally right in saying that I screwed things up and needed to fix myself and the problems I caused.

Nova and I didn't really speak to one another after our last encounter. The only interaction we had was to say something during the holidays.
We still were friends on our social medias because it was an easy way to nonverbally keep up with each other, however, I was rarely on social media because I was in the process of trying to better myself and social media was not the way to help that.

Because I wasn't really involved with social media as much, sometimes I would ask Maya how Nova was doing whenever she would come to visit Dakota (which, I'm living with him now), and she would inform me that, "she's continuing to excel at her job and in her life". But she did admit to me that every once in a while, she'll mention me or some memory we shared.

Damn, I missed her. Not just romantically, but also as a best friend.

A few things about me have changed since then. I have a stud nose piercing that I got about a month ago.
It was kind of becoming a trend where everyone and their second grandmother went out and got one, and I guess I wanted to be a part of that trend. My mom thinks I should get rid of it because she believes boys shouldn't have piercings, but I like mine, so I'm keeping it.

I've started back exercising more so I've lost a little weight, but gained a little muscle, and with that muscle brings a little more true confidence in myself. I think it's also making my mood a little better as well. It also has made me just the slightest bit less depressed.

I wear thick framed black prescription glasses occasionally that I will admit, also boosted my confidence a little because they look pretty damn good on my face.
In regards to education, I'm continuing my studies. Not necessarily to go back to university, but just to gain more knowledge in general.
You could say I'm a bit of a "nerd" now, but in all honesty, I'm finding different positive ways to occupy my mind.

I've also started therapy, which, for some reason has made me a little more timid than I used to be.
The therapy started out to simply be for my anger and finding healthy ways to deal with it, the rejection I received from my father, my former drug and alcohol use, and for me to find ways to be freer and more accepting with my sexuality, but it is now a way for me to just learn to love myself and become a better person.

I've been out on a few dates here and there. Nothing too serious. I think I mostly just wanted to feel the rush and excitement of dating again and now having the possibility of dating women, so I joined Tinder and Grindr. However, I deleted Grindr when I realized it was basically just a place to find random hook ups and not strictly dates. I wasn't interested in random hook ups.

Tinder wasn't too terrible. That one had a lot of people just wanting hook ups too, but I found a few gems out of there as well that were interested in just dates or making new friends. I was surprised by the amount of people who were ok with me being flexible/bisexual considering most are not which results in a lot of closeted bi men. I guess I got lucky.