Consistency didn’t announce itself.

It arrived disguised as repetition.

Gary woke up, took his medication, went about his day, and went to bed without anything particularly notable happening. That alone would once have felt like failure. Now, he recognised it as progress.

The tooth continued to settle. Not miraculously. Not overnight. Just steadily enough that he stopped thinking about it every few minutes. That absence of pain created space — and space made room for thoughts Gary had previously drowned out.

He noticed how often he wanted to rush things. How quickly impatience followed comfort. Feeling better tempted him to test limits, to see if the rules still applied. Every time that urge surfaced, Gary paused long enough to let it pass.

That pause was new.

Emotionally, things moved slowly as well. Conversations deepened a fraction at a time. Nothing was forced. Gary resisted the urge to frame every interaction as progress or setback. Some days were better. Some weren’t. He let that be acceptable.

The boredom of responsibility surprised him. It wasn’t unpleasant, just unfamiliar. He filled it with small, sensible decisions: leaving a pub earlier than planned, cooking instead of ordering, listening instead of filling silence with jokes.

This version of himself didn’t feel impressive.

But it felt real.

Eventually, complacency crept in, subtle and persuasive. You’ve been good. You’ve earned flexibility. You know what you’re doing now. Gary recognised that voice. He’d heard it before, usually right before things went wrong.

He stood at another quiet fork in the road. Maintain discipline and let progress continue unremarkably. Or relax his standards, just a little, and see what happened.

Gary stared at his phone, alarm set for his next dose, and made a decision.

Maintain discipline and keep going → Page 84

Get complacent and test the limits again → Page 76