I swallowed, rounded the car, and sat on the driver’s seat. “Eighteen minutes. You should probably start baltering.”
Her disappointment filled the space between us.
She exhaled. It was loud and long and made me uncomfortable in a place that had laid dormant for a while now. When I thought she’d return to the car, she skipped across the mud and twisted to a pattern only she knew.
“Thirty seconds,” I called out after her twenty minutes had been up ten minutes ago.
She ambled over and rested her forearms on the door. “Thanks for letting me balter.”
I nodded, wrung out her wet sweats, and handed them to her. “You’ll get sick.”
They made flapping noises when she slid them on. “This is why I like you.”
“Why?” I humored her.
“I don’t want someone who holds an umbrella over my head when it rains. I want someone who doesn't even own an umbrella. Someone who watches me balter in the rain when they don’t know the word exists. Someone who stares at me instead of the stars in the sky.”
“Sounds like a fantasy.”
Fuck, I need Gideon’s location, especially if she’s gonna keep talking like we’re already together.
“Think what you want.”
After she shut the door, I blasted the heater. I tore through the road, hoping we’d find someplace to stop soon. The heat gave us seconds of relief before it escaped into the air. I shut it off to save gas and ripped off my shirt instead.
“Put this on.”
Her hungry eyes ate up my scars. One of her fingers reached out and traced one. “I liked you today.” She slipped the Henley over her head and dipped her nose down to inhale it. “You are phosphenes, Nash. You are the stars and colors I see when I rub my eyes. You feel real in the moment, but you fade away. Don't fade away this time.”
What does that even mean?
“And you speak like you’re a walking, talking dictionary twenty-four seven, and especially when you're drunk.”
“I’m not drunk.”
I rolled my eyes and pulled over when I realized I’d missed an exit with a motel. Emery unbuckled her seatbelt.
“Put on your seatbelt. We’re not stopping. I’m making sure there are no cars here before I drive the opposite direction on a one-way road.”
She ignored me, wearing a content smile on her face. I considered that maybe I hadn’t been watching her break tonight. I’d been watching her heal herself.
“I know your secret,” she whispered, climbing onto my lap. “You’re my Ben.”
And then she kissed me. Hard. On the mouth. And I realized I wanted to own all her kisses. But she’d been drinking, and I was reeling. Spiraling into disbelief.
Ben.
As in, Benkinersophobia.
As in, Emery Winthrop was my Durga.
What were the odds?
Fucking tell me Fate didn’t exist.
A battering ram hit my head.
Either I had the worst hangover or I'd gotten a cold. It felt like both.
I watched Chantilly snatch all the yogurt from the fridge. Hannah staked her claim on the sodas. Cayden scarfed down the cold cuts. Ida Marie ate string cheese without peeling it like a psychopath.
I’d grown past refusing Nash’s food, but part of me wondered if he'd stop making me lunches if I caved and grabbed snacks with witnesses in the room.
I hid a sniffle in my tissue, tempted to curl into my bed in the penthouse’s spare room. An actual mattress and silky sheets with a thread count higher than my bank balance.
This morning, I'd walked into my closet and found it cleared. The panic came first. Fury came second. The return of my vision came last.
A note on the floor read:
I’d give you a key, but we both know you already have one.
Nash
It wasn’t Nash’s handwriting, which made sense since he'd been with me the entire time. It looked like Delilah’s.
I was still staring at the fridge when Nash entered.
“I thought we were over this. Take what you want.” He reached into the fridge, somehow grabbed me exactly what I would have chosen, and tossed it on the empty couch cushion. “I'll still make the damn lunches, Tiger. Eat. Whatever. You. Want. Fuck.”
I reached for the juice pouch and pepperoni pizza Lunchables. My hip bumped the Jana Sport. A cascade of tissues fell to the floor
Nash spotted them, taking in the sheer quantity. “Are you sick?” A litany of curses sailed out of him. “I told you you’d get sick in the rain.”
“I told you so? Really?” I tore open the Lunchables and ate a pepperoni, smiling at him despite the congestion. “Are we five? You can do better than that.”
Nash collected my Jana Sport. “Come on.”
I tore into another pepperoni slice. “I already opened this.” The tray rattled in my frozen palms. “Can’t waste food.”
He nicked the meal and slammed it beside Chantilly’s yogurt. “Eat this.”
She jolted from the desk. “But—”
“Eat it.” His back ended her response. A thick brow arched at me. “Problem solved. We’re going.”
“I’m hungry,” I protested, but I followed him into the elevator.
He pressed the G button for the garage. “I’ll pick up McDonald’s on the way.”
I exited the elevator first. “I hate McDonald’s.”
“Virginia hates McDonald’s. You love it.” Nash unlocked his car, swung the door open for me, and waited for me to settle into the seat’s leather. “You’re obsessed with peeling the breading off their McNuggets and shoving them into a McDouble with fries, which by the way is fucking disgusting.”
“My McMasterpiece. Yum.” A sneeze swallowed my moan. The tissue filled my palm. Being sick sucked. “Don’t knock it ‘till you try it.”
I ate my McMasterpiece on the way to the doctor’s office. The final bite spoke of regret. I considered vomiting, but Nash’s car still smelled of petrichor and mud. Plus, he no longer had a roof. Maybe I'd done enough damage to the car.
“This is pointless. It's just a cold. It’ll go away on its own. One week max, but probably less.” Without a heater in my Alabama studio, I’d gotten so many colds, I was a pro at this point.
“We’re still going to the hospital.”
“You’re ridiculous.”
I hid my smile, because I read between the Nash-colored lines. He cared. It was cute. Warm, even. Like watching Ben and Nash merge into one being. The affection of Ben, mixed with the brash exterior of Nash.
“Can you finish this?” I held out a little cardboard box. The naked McNuggets filled it, white without the breading.
He wore a scowl, but he ate them all, since neither of us believed in wasting food. A question filled my mouth the entire drive.
Do you think it’s lust?
He’d told me to ask when I was sober, but every time it crawled toward my lips, I dug my nails into the leather.
This poor car. So abused by me.
At the hospital, Nash parked in a slot reserved for staff and guided me to a private entrance. We weaved through plain halls, stained by the stale scent of chemicals and death.