Chapter Thirteen
W ill you teach me how to fight?” I asked Anders the next day. Nightmares plagued me all night, and in every one of them, I was helpless, at the mercy of whoever wanted to harm me.
I had spent the morning making that list Anders had asked for while he slipped down to the lobby and got the breakfast that he ordered. We were going to have to leave the apartment at some point and stock it with food. We couldn’t keep eating out for every meal.
I could worry about that later, though. I reminded myself. I needed to know how to defend myself, or at the very least know something was coming and not be surprised. I didn’t like being helpless. I had worked so hard to become independent, and I liked it way too much it give it up now.
“Of course,” he replied. He perked up from his position on the couch.
He had been on his phone all day, likely researching the names I had given him.
He didn’t seem pleased by the list. It was long and included anyone I knew.
It had been too many years since I had contact with my grandma, though.
My gut told me this list was incomplete, that I was missing something.
Of course, my gut didn’t lead me away from a decade long bad marriage, so, really, how trustworthy was it?
I swear I heard him mutter to himself, “why didn’t I think of that” as he moved to the bedroom.
“Give me a minute to change into sweats and clear away a space in the living room,” he called as he closed the door.
“Oh, right now?” I called back, loud enough to be heard through the door. I wasn’t sure I meant this minute, but I guess there was no time to waste. Maybe I expected him to say no or delay.
He walked out a moment later. Grey sweat pants hung low over his hips and a white t-shirt stretched over his chest and arms. My mouth went dry at the image.
Maybe I wasn’t ready for self-defense. I stared for only a moment longer.
Anders had that smug look on his face I already craved that meant he had caught me staring. The jerk.
“You gonna fight in that?” He asked. I wore a flowing blue dress dotted with white daisies. I hadn’t paid enough attention to what I packed, and I didn’t have many options for outfits.
“Oh. Uh…” I couldn’t finish my sentence. My mouth was too dry.
“If you need to borrow something, we keep the place stocked with changes of clothing and clean socks. Can never have too many clean socks.” He smiled at his private joke.
I didn’t get it, but I loved the smile. “I’m sure there’s something that you can wear.
” He had moved now from his pose against the bedroom door to fully into the living room so I could get past. I darted by, my cheeks pink.
I had focused so much on wanting to learn to defend myself that I didn’t focus on what that would actually mean. Close physical contact with Anders. I shut the door and leaned against it for a moment, letting my heart rate settle into a better rhythm.
I dug through the dresser and sure enough, there was a collection of men’s clothing.
I found a pair of sweats and a t-shirt that I thought would work and pulled the drawstring tight to hold them up.
I would have to skip the shoes. I didn’t have my good tennis shoes and couldn’t very well learn to fight in my rain boots.
“Have a seat,” Anders said when I got back into the living room. He had pushed the couch against a different wall, close to the kitchen island, so there was as much available space in the living room as we could get.
“What?” I asked, surprised, freezing in the doorway, surprised by his directions. “I thought you were going to teach me how to fight?”
He leaned against the wall like we didn’t have important work to do. His arms crossed over his chest, causing his biceps to bulge and showcase just how big they were. He had to be doing this on purpose.
“I am, but before you can learn that, you need to know when to fight.” He hadn’t moved an inch and his eyes were boring into me, practically eating me alive. I squirmed a bit at that. “So, talking first and you might as well make yourself comfortable for that.”
Relief worked its way through me. For a moment there, I thought he had changed his mind, but of course, he didn’t. He moved the furniture, after all. His eyes bored into me, tracking my every move as I turned to the couch and took a seat.
“The first thing you need to know is what my first sergeant used to call near and far.” He pushed off the wall and walked towards me.
The move caught all my attention, and I struggled to pull myself back to what he said.
I examined at the carpet so the sight of him in those sweats wouldn’t keep pulling me off track.
“Look up for this one.” He said, closer to me than before, so close I could almost feel his breath on my skin, silky and smooth. Dang it. Get it together, Grace .
“Pay attention to what’s close to you and then expand your field of vision out and take in everything you can in between.
” He stood close to me. He took up my entire vision, blacking out everything.
I had a hard time pulling my eyes away from him, happily drowning in their murky depth.
“Remember to scan your entire area. Look for what might be different about your environment. Look for things that might stand out to you. Look for anything that seems odd or strange. Anything that tingles your spine.”
Something tingled alright, seeing him so big and in control and… competent sent little jolts of electricity down my spine straight for a part of me I thought dead.
He just stood there then. Seeming to wait for something and I remembered he wasn’t just there for my viewing pleasure. I had a job to do.
“Look at my environment for something different. Got it,” I said.
“So what’s different?” He finally asked.
“Uh. Like this environment, right now?” Familiar anxiety worked its way through me. I wanted to get this right. I wanted him to think I was good at something.
“Yes, right now.” He snorted once in laughter at me. “You spent time here yesterday. What changed?”
I took a deep breath and did as he asked. He had eclipsed anything else in the room, stealing my attention and erasing anything else around us. I almost said that out loud, but bit my tongue. He doesn’t need to know all that.
“You moved the couch,” I said confidently. That was almost too easy.
“What else?”
“What else?” I repeated like an idiot. I tried to remember what I saw yesterday. There was hardly anything in here, though.
“I’m not sure,” I said cautiously, sensing the trap as he laid it.
“Think about yesterday. What did you see in here?”
Yesterday was such a blur. Too many things happened. I went over the day again in my head and then remembered a short conversation we had when he first showed me around.
“There was a single chair by the island.” I hadn’t even realized I closed my eyes until I opened them after remembering that.
“The chair and coffee table aren’t where they were,” I said. I surprised myself with that one. I didn’t fully remember it until I said it.
“Good.” His praise washed over me, somehow thrilling and soothing at once. It bolstered my confidence. “Now get up and walk into the room again.” He backed away from me and went back to the wall like he was resetting the scene from earlier.
“This time, instead of just looking at me, practice looking around you and taking stock of what you see. Say it out loud, though you usually wouldn’t, so that you can get used to it. Remember, you’re looking close to you for threats nearby and then focusing out, looking for less immediate dangers.”
The reminder of threats and dangers did more for my focus than any internal berating ever could, washing over me like an ice bath, and I was keenly reminded of why I was even here.
I did what he asked this time and realized something I had missed before.
“The chair and coffee table are completely gone. So is some artwork that was on the wall.” There wasn’t much space for him to hide things in the small apartment, and I had been in the only other room when he cleared the area out so they couldn’t be there. “Where did they go?”
He shrugged and pointed to a door I hadn’t noticed until now. “The closet.”
“I didn’t even notice that was there, yesterday or today.” My shoulder slumped. I was not good at this.
“You’ll get the hang of it. Every time you leave the room, I’m going to change something about it.
It might be small or big. I want you to practice noticing what it is.
” His voice was encouraging and instructive, like he had done this many times before.
Maybe he had. “When we leave the building, I want you to pay attention everywhere we go. What stands out to you? What differs from what you would expect? Even in a new location, you might notice something off. Those differences are likely what will be the danger if there is any.”
He moved over towards me again and sat by me on the couch. He propped his foot up over his knee and stretched out beside me.
“You’ve lived in Savannah your whole life,” he continued. “You know what is normal around here and what isn’t. Trust yourself when something seems off.”
“Wait. You put on socks!”
He answer with a sly smile that warmed me to my core.
“I did. Good job. I was wondering if you would notice that.” He reached down to remove them now.
They were dark blue with swirling star patterns on them.
Obviously, he only donned them to see if I noticed.
I chuckled at that and moved closer to him on the couch.
Even in his letters, he always put me at ease, his words wrapping me in comfort.
Anders made himself comfortable again after taking off his socks. I guess the talking portion of training isn’t done yet.