Chapter 12 #5
By the time I’d slipped on a pair of pale pink sweats and a grey sweater, my hair was damp-dry, and I french-braided it so that it would stay out of my face as I rummaged through my bookbag, deciding to make sure I would be caught up on schoolwork since I was missing today.
I searched for a pencil so I could make some notes on Othello, but my bag had become a dumping ground for loose papers and receipts.
Rather than take the thirty seconds to clean it out, because I’m that lazy, I wandered over to Vail’s desk to borrow one from there.
The surface was immaculately clean, with only his closed laptop sitting there, so I opened one of the side drawers only to find a well-used copy of The Body, a novella by Stephen King.
The cover is worn, the spine cracked, and some of the pages have been bent, much to my chagrin.
I hate it when people fold the pages of books.
But I didn’t know that Vail was ever a big reader, but evidently, this was his favourite.
I carefully picked it up and flipped through the pages, wondering if I might like the story, too, when something slipped out and fluttered to the floor.
I furrowed my brow in confusion at the photograph he had stowed away. Bending down to pick it up, I turned it over to reveal the image, and gasped.
It’s me.
My class photo from the beginning of the year that I had left in Harley, where I’m wearing that ugly maroon corduroy overall dress Mom had forced me to wear.
Back then, I’d always worn my dark hair in a ponytail but had promised to let my mother style it by braiding it the night so that it fell in waves.
I’d also vowed to smile with my teeth showing, and even though I was giving the tiniest of smiles, I kept my word.
I’d been so embarrassed walking into school that way, dressed up like a girl rather than one of the boys.
It was the first time I’d noticed the way they all looked at me.
It had been… different. I could feel it.
I may have only been two months shy of my eleventh birthday on class photo day, but I knew full well what was going through my three boys’ minds.
And I wasn’t having it. I’d threatened them, and after that, I got nothing from them indicating they were interested in me that way.
That was, until the night that druggie broke into our house during my Saturday night sleepover, and Vail had dared me to kiss him.
And he had my photo…
The room had been trashed, from both the intruder ransacking it as he searched for stuff to steal, and from Vail almost killing the guy.
The frame had been found shattered, but no picture.
I just figured it had been ripped up or something and thrown out.
But no, here it was. Folded up a bit, aged… but he’d had it the whole time.
Because my heart aches for you, my soul cries for you. I need you and you need me. I’ve loved you from the very first moment, Casey. That’s never changed.
Oh fuck, I thought as my heart practically swelled. I was in so much trouble.
“Casey?”
I slid the photo back into Vail’s book, closing the drawer before turning at the sound of Shaw’s voice. He was standing in the doorway, hard-on gone, and was looking incredibly uncertain.
“Hey, what’s up?” I said, climbing up onto the bed, ignoring the fact that he’d caught me snooping.
Shaw strolled slowly into the room, looking a little flushed but otherwise okay.
His hood was off his head for once, and I could see how pale his blond hair was as it flopped over his brow and into his eyes.
I could sense that he was a little embarrassed about earlier, so I acted as casually as I could, lounging on the bed, hands behind my head as I stretched out.
Last night, sleeping on the floor wasn’t as comfortable as I remember from when we would do it as kids, even with the layers of quilts beneath me.
So lying out on a soft mattress with blankets and pillows is a Godsend.
“I just wanted to check on you,” he said at last as he sank on the very edge of the other side of the bed.
He’d been keeping a careful distance between us, and I have no idea why.
But I didn’t push him. One thing I’ve always known about Shaw was to allow him time to acclimate to things at his own pace.
He never liked being forced to do something if he felt uncomfortable.
Lucky for him, Vail had always proven to be a leader that was aware of our limits and was cautious about how we used to do things.
I couldn’t imagine him changing in that aspect.
“I’m doing okay,” I said to him, playing along as I tried to figure out what he really wanted.
“A little tired, though. Amelie is super cute, but holy crap. What an excellent method of birth control, eh? Go babysit a toddler,” I laughed, “Thank fuck I have the implant.” I observed him as he bowed his head, his fingers fiddling with a corner of the blanket. He didn’t react. “How are you ?” I ask.
“I’m…” His voice trails off, and for a moment, he looks legitimately confused.
“Shaw,” I said gently and held a hand out to him.
He peeked over at me, his blue eyes revealing his vulnerability, and I couldn’t help but think how he reminded me of a cornered animal, desperate for love and attention, however, he wasn’t sure how to go about it.
“Come here, please?” I knew better than to tell him what to do. I always gave him an option.
He inched a little closer, slowly reaching out to touch the tips of my fingers with his. He stroked the skin of my palm, up the length of my index, then forefinger, and finally, very lightly up and down my ring one, the touch so light it tickled a little.
“It’s weird being back here,” I said softly, continuing to watch his finger trail over mine again and again.
“In what way?” he murmured, staring at our hands on the tartan-style bedding.
“Just, seeing everything after being gone so long… seeing it all with new eyes,” I confessed and carefully turned our hands over so his were splayed, and I could run my nails over his palm.
He relaxed once I did, and I noticed that he was inching a little higher up on the bed.
“Everything is harder, a little darker… I feel like as a kid, I’d been wandering around with a blindfold on and missed what things were actually like here. ”
“A lot’s changed, too,” he said, watching my hand as my nails were moving down to his wrist, then up to the tips of his fingers, and back down again.
“It was always rough, but we’d grown up in it.
We were used to it. Then, after you left, it got worse and worse…
things are harder, darker… we’ve just been trying to survive while saving as many of our people as we can. ”
I stare at him, shocked by his little speech.
It was probably the most he’s ever said at one time.
But I wasn’t going to react. Instead, I lay back amongst the pillows again, continuing the trail over his skin.
I could feel the bed shift as he moved closer until he was lying in the space next to me.
He interlocks our fingers and holds my hand, his confidence back, and lies on his side, so he is facing me.
I turned to face him, relaxing on Vail’s ridiculously comfortable bed, and stared into the beautiful, haunting depth of Shaw’s eyes.
“What was it like, living on The Hill?” he asked in his low, raspy voice.
“Safe. Comfortable,” I said, my voice was flat as I thought about it.
“Matthew was kind to me, sweet to my mother, and his home was big and beautiful, and in the summertime, he took us boating on his yacht. I won’t lie…
I was incredibly… privileged.” I felt like an asshole saying that word, but it was the truth.
“I became one of those people that we always used to make fun of.”
“I don’t believe that.”
“You saw me on my first day back. I’d forgotten what it was like here.” I rolled my eyes. “I mean, come on… pearl earrings? I was so bloody stupid.” I sighed heavily.
“Were the kids there nice to you?”
I made a face, scrunching up my nose as the memories of my first few weeks came back.
“I mean, it could have been worse, I suppose. I wasn’t beat up or anything like that.
More like name-calling, typical pranks, and stuff.
” His hand squeezed mine hard when I added, “I think I called you guys ten times each after school every day that first week.” I remembered that, too.
How confused I was, how abandoned and lonely I had felt.
I quickly changed the subject. If I were going to confront anyone about that, it would be Vail, not Shaw.
“But one girl, my friend Nylah, she eventually broke down my walls and became my best friend…” I felt my heart clench thinking about her.
I hadn’t talked to Nylah in days, and the last time I received a message from her, she was checking in on me, but I’d put off replying because I was trying to focus on surviving this place.
If I answered her feeling like I had, she would have known something was wrong, and the last thing I wanted was to be a problem for her.
“Nylah… she was good to you?”
“The best. Her mom and dad are the sweetest people, and Nylah is just so… together. She’s smart and pretty, and I know she’ll go places.
” I sighed heavily, trying to hold it together.
I missed her. I missed her badly. I missed how she would run after me to paint my nails or help with my makeup.
I missed how she and I used to go to the park on weekends to play basketball together before grabbing brunch at The Station, the central shopping hub on the East-End.
Or the way she’d literally pick me up and carry me around, laughing when I’d resist by playing possum and going dead weight on her.
“I missed you, Casey…” he whispers finally. When I look up into his eyes, I can see the ache there, the longing and grief he suffered in my absence. So why did he let me go?
But I didn’t say anything about that now. Instead, I brought his hand up to my lips and kissed it. “I missed you, too. More than you know…”
Shaw reached forward then with his other hand and lightly touched my cheek, catching me off guard.
I didn’t even realize I had several tears running down my face until he pulled his hand away, the shine from the drops clear on his fingertips.
Before I could laugh off my emotions, he brought the finger to his mouth and licked my tears away.
My mouth fell at the sight. What the heck was he doing?
It was a little strange, but then again, so was Shaw.
He moved over then, coming so close that our bodies were completely flush together.
For a long time, we laid in absolute silence, until at some point, we both fell asleep, not as we used to by holding hands… but now, by holding each other.