I wake up shivering. It’s dark as the grave, something my grandmother used to say, back when we still saw each other. The wind is blowing something fierce, some part of the cabin whistling in it. After a few moments I realize the curtains are open and there’s just enough dim moonlight to see the outline of things. I curl up into myself, double-check that all my blankets and limbs are still there, but it doesn’t help. There’s a loud pop from the living room as the wood stove burns lower, and I exhale, chewing my lip.
A gust of wind rattles the window, and I decide: fuck it, and fuck Gideon and his puritanical ideas about rooms.
Outside the blankets is, obviously, even worse. In about thirty seconds I swear my hands are shaking and my teeth are chattering as I rummage through my frame pack as quietly as I can, trying to yank out my sleeping pad without waking Gideon.
I’ve barely dropped the pad and all my blankets on the floor in the living room—where it’s at least forty degrees warmer, thanks to the wood stove—when he stirs on the couch, then pops up suddenly on one elbow.
“Andi?” he says, voice scratchy.
“I’m Bigfoot. Go back to sleep,” I whisper, like it matters.
In the orange glow of the wood stove I can see him run a hand through his dark hair, as if it’ll get his brain online.
“You’re cold.”
“It’s, like, negative thirty in there,” I explain, and he sighs.
“It’s not negative thirty,” he says, rubbing both hands over his face. “I doubt it’s even below zero.”
Gideon gives me a long, indecipherable look, and I can’t tell if he’s thinking or just half-asleep. I glare back, bracing myself to argue about where we’re sleeping.
Then he gets up and walks into the bedroom, which, fine, he can sleep the Antarctic ice cave if he’d rather be in there than share a room—
There’s an ominous creak, followed by a bang and Gideon muttering ow, fuck.
“What are you—oh,” I say, still on the floor next to my camping pad, surrounded by my pile of blankets, as he sidesteps through the door with a twin mattress in his arms.
Oh.
It’s unwieldy, being a mattress, and he keeps swearing every time it hits something, so I get up and help him. I get a muttered thanks before we plop it on the floor, and then we’re standing on opposite sides of this twin mattress, looking at each other. I’ve got on several layers of sleep gear, and all Gideon’s got on is that same thin, tight base layer and a pair of thermal pants that don’t leave a lot to the imagination, even in this low light. Thighs. God.
He runs a hand through his hair again, highlighted in the orange glow.
“Floor’s not very warm,” he offers. “If you’re cold, you need more insulation.”
“You’re not cold?” I ask, and he just shrugs thick shoulders, folding his arms over his chest. The light catches on every single muscle in them, outlining his body in dramatic shadows.
“I run hot when I sleep.”
I swallow and maintain eye contact, but I can’t think of anything worth saying. It’s some ungodly, timeless hour of the morning. It’s black beyond the windows. My brain is half-awake at best, thoughts swirling lazily past like snowflakes, melting when I try to grab them. I feel unmoored, unanchored, like this cabin might be a child’s diorama and at any moment the roof will come off and faces will appear.
“Thanks,” I finally say. “For the mattress.”
“You okay?”
I shove the heels of my hands against my eyes, trying to trick my brain into waking up because I know I’m not dreaming, but this doesn’t feel real.
“Are you okay?” I finally ask, copying his stance: feet wide, arms folded. “Or are you going to go sleep in the freezing room so we don’t have to breathe the same air tonight?”
He glances at the door to the bedroom like he’s considering it.
“No,” he finally says. “Do you need help with the blankets?”
God forbid I get any kind of real answer from him.
“I’m fine,” I tell him, and he nods, then heads back to the couch. I rearrange my sleeping bag and all seventeen thousand blankets, and I’m not quiet about it.
I need sleep, is all; I’ll wake up tomorrow and all this weirdness will be sorted. I tell myself that as I blink up at the ceiling.
Sometime between five and five hundred minutes later, Gideon clears his throat softly, and I roll over to look at him. He’s lying on his back, staring up at the ceiling, legs slightly akimbo because the couch is a couple inches too short.
“I saw you naked,” he says, his voice flat and controlled, like he’s confessing sins.
“I haven’t been naked,” I say, after a moment. It’s too cold to be naked. Any required clothing removal I’ve been doing piecemeal, top and bottom separately, staying as dressed as possible.
“Topless, then,” he goes on. He’s still not looking at me. “I was outside, and you were in the bedroom, with the lights on, and the curtains were open.”
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
I start laughing. I don’t know what else to do. I stop when he gives me a look so horrified and betrayed that I feel bad.
“Is that why you went outside?” I tease, but it’s the wrong thing to say because even in the firelight, he turns beet red.
“Of course not,” he says. “It was an accident, at first, and I should have turned back.”
“But you didn’t,” I supply.
“No.”
“Did you watch me get stuck in a sports bra? Without my knowledge?”
Gideon puts his hands over his face and takes a deep breath, his sleeping bag heaving over his chest.
“Yes,” he admits.
I push myself up on one elbow and watch him for a moment. It’s a fairly low couch, so he’s only a few inches further off the ground than me, and he’s shadowed and disheveled and tortured-looking, and I think: someone’s really done a number on Gideon.
For the record, it doesn’t bother me that I forgot to close the curtains and Gideon got a peep show that was maybe twenty seconds longer than it could have been. I lived in Brooklyn for ten years and I’ve never been great at closing curtains; presumably worse people than Gideon have gotten an eyeful. If the reverse had happened, I probably would’ve watched too.
I think of earlier, trying to wriggle out of my stupid sports bra, Gideon watching from outside the window. I think of what I’d do if it happened again and I knew it, and my pulse picks up, my stomach suddenly fluttering.
“Did you like it?” I ask, my voice soft because I don’t dare to be louder.
Gideon freezes, then rolls to match my position, up on one elbow, facing me.
“What?” he asks, and I swallow.
“Did you like it?” I ask again.
There’s a hitch in his breathing: quiet, subtle, unmistakable.
“I did,” he finally says, and I sit up on the mattress, pushing the blanket pile off myself. Gideon’s watching me, his green eyes nearly black in the dark, his lips parted.
“For the record, you could’ve just asked,” I say, and tug on one sleeve.
It’s not particularly easy to take off a sweater in a sexy way, and it’s not any easier to remove two sweaters, a long-sleeve t-shirt, and a tank top. I get the three top layers off at the same time, the only sound in the room the snap of static and Gideon’s soft breathing. The tank top is thin and tight and the way Gideon’s staring at me makes me bold enough to take it off in one final flourish.