19. Calista
NINETEEN
CALISTA
I knocked on the door, taking in the chipped black paint.
The sun was setting behind the row of townhomes.
The halo of oranges and reds made it look like the world was on fire.
It definitely didn’t feel that way. The plastic bags in my hand crinkled as a light gust of wind blew by and a shiver wracked my body.
As I stood on the front porch of Lincoln’s house, I reconsidered Ella’s offer to use her car for practicum.
Now that the weather was changing, I was reminded of how much I didn’t want to spend another frigid winter waiting in bus shelters.
After an eternity, Lincoln answered the door. He was wearing his signature black T-shirt and a pair of gray sweatpants that hung low on his hips.
“Hey,” he murmured, his voice thick with exhaustion.
“Hi,” I replied with a whisper of a smile.
Lincoln shuffled to the side, hand still on the doorknob. “You didn’t have to come all the way out here. We could have video called or something.” He rubbed the back of his head. His dark hair was more disheveled than usual.
I moved into the foyer, stepping on the backs of my heels to remove my shoes. “It’s no big deal. It’s nice to get off campus from time to time.” Especially for things that didn’t involve going to the hospital.
Lincoln took note of the groceries in my hand. “What’s all of that?”
“I picked up some ingredients for my mom’s famous garlic soup. She used to make it for me all the time when I was sick.”
Lincoln scrunched up his nose. “Garlic soup?”
“It sounds scarier than it actually is. Promise.” I allowed an airy laugh to escape at his expense. “I’ll prepare it while you’re writing the mock-quiz I brought for you.”
“Mock-quiz? I thought we were done with those passé ways of studying.”
“Passé?” I scoffed, wandering into the kitchen to place the bag of vegetables on the counter. “Sorry, some of us can’t beat the crap out of something while listing all of the muscles in the human leg.”
Lincoln eyed me with his arms crossed. His shoulder was flush against the trim of the door. I could feel him analyzing me. The intensity caused the hair on the back of my neck to stand.
“Besides,” I pressed on, turning back to him. “It’s just a marker to see what we need to focus on more. I was pretty sure you didn’t have a whole gym for us to work with here.”
“You wouldn’t be wrong.”
I slipped my coat off my shoulders. “How’s Sadie doing, by the way?”
“Better than last night,” Lincoln said as he rubbed at his forehead. At that moment, I took in how tired he looked. Dark shadows loomed under his eyes. Even his olive skin was paler than usual. I wondered if maybe he was coming down with something, too. “She’s sleeping right now. ”
“I’m assuming neither of you did much of that last night.”
Lincoln shook his head. Tufts of hair brushed against his forehead. “I tried to get a couple of hours in before I messaged you, while my mom was still home, but I had to meet with Coach. I only ended up getting a thirty-minute nap in.”
I blinked at him. “He had you train? Did he know you didn’t sleep last night?”
“Not exactly.”
Of course not, because Lincoln Pierce was not the kind of person to mention something as important as that.
In his eyes, asking for grace was a weakness.
It was the same reason why he was adamant about not needing a tutor.
Lincoln wasn’t one to ask for help. And that was probably because he was used to dealing with the brunt of his problems on his own.
To say I was surprised when he asked me to watch Sadie was an understatement.
But even then, it came with a transaction.
“Okay, change of plans,” I marched over to him, wrapping my hand around his wrist, and tugged him into the living room. “You’re going to get some rest while I make dinner.”
“I thought you had a mock-quiz for me to write?” Lincoln protested from behind me.
“You’re no use to me if you’re tired.” I fluffed a grey pillow that lay on one end of the couch. “Lie down.”
For once, Lincoln followed my instructions without question.
He lowered himself onto the cushions, lying on his side.
It took him a minute. His frame fit along the length of the couch as long as he tucked his knees a bit.
Once he relaxed, I grabbed the fuzzy throw blanket from the back of the couch and draped it over him .
“Comfortable?” I asked as Lincoln’s eyes began to flutter closed.
“Yeah,” he whispered, sleep taking over.
I tucked my hands into the back pocket of my jeans. “We’ll work on some stuff later if you’re up for it. Just rest for now.”
With Lincoln curled up on the couch, I went back to the kitchen to prepare dinner.
It took me some time to find everything I needed from the cupboards, but I managed.
Removing the vegetables from the bag, I thoroughly washed them in the sink before dicing them and chucking them into a large pot I had found under the counter.
I took my time, enjoying the quiet that had settled over the house.
I didn’t do much cooking while I was on campus. We did have a kitchen for the dorm floor, but it was the size of a small walk-in closet and was regularly in use. So, while I hadn’t had much practice over the span of the last four years, I would say I was pretty kitchen-literate.
A lot of chopping and a half dozen text messages to my mother later, and I had the soup bubbling on the stove.
The wonderful aroma swept throughout the main floor.
It gave me a cozy feeling as I sat at the kitchen table, trying to busy myself with homework to pass the time.
I was in the middle of typing up a lab report when I heard gentle footsteps patter down the stairs.
Sadie appeared in a pair of pink bunny pajamas with Beary tucked under her arm. Her usually kept hair was in disarray. Thin strands escaped the fishtail braid that she wore down the back of her head.
I rose from my seat, happy to see that she was awake and walking around.
“How are you feeling?” I asked, meeting her by the kitchen door and crouching down to her level. Sadie’s cheeks were rosy, but her eyes were clear and bright. “I made some soup. Do you want some?”
“Yes, please.” The soft sound of her voice almost didn’t seem real.
My lips parted, and it was as if the world around me had stilled. Was I hearing things, or did Sadie actually speak to me? The silence between us stretched on for a long moment before I pulled myself together. Making a big deal out of things wouldn’t help her progress with me.
“Great!” I chirped with a little more enthusiasm than necessary.
I ushered Sadie to the table and helped her into a seat. She placed Beary in the chair next to her as I cleared my schoolwork and tossed it back into my bag.
“It’s a little hot,” I cautioned. Steam rose from the bowl as I placed it on the table. “I put a couple of ice cubes in it to cool it down faster. Just give it a couple of minutes, okay?”
She peered into the bowl. “Okay.”
My heart swelled at the simple, four-letter word. I wasn’t imagining things.
“Can I fix your hair while we wait?”
Sadie nodded her permission, and I got to work on re-braiding her hair.
The hair tie that secured the end of her braid was holding on by a thread.
I gave it a gentle tug, Sadie’s blonde tresses cascading down her shoulders like a waterfall made of starlight.
Using my fingers, I brushed through her hair, careful not to tug on any stray knots I found.
“Does your mom normally do your hair?” I said, giddy that Sadie was speaking to me.
“Sometimes,” she murmured, tugging at the fluff on her teddy bear’s ears. “Most of the time, Lincoln does it.”
I raised an eyebrow. “He knows how to braid? ”
She gave a short nod. “He learned from YouTube.”
I had to bite back a coo. That might have been the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard. While Lincoln carried around a hard shell, there was no doubt he had a soft spot. Especially when it came to Sadie.
“What’s going on over here?”
Lincoln appeared in the doorway, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. He was undoubtedly still exhausted, but he looked better than when I got there.
“Cali’s fixing my hair,” Sadie replied.
“That’s really nice of her,” he mumbled, his gaze connecting with mine. He was awake now, his eyes widening a fraction at the fact that Sadie was speaking in front of me.
Pride swelled in my chest as I continued working on the simple three-strand braid.
A hush had settled over the house again.
The only sound came from the bubbling of soup over on the stove.
Sadie had tucked Beary into her lap, playing a wordless game as I finished twisting the strands around each other.
“There,” I said as I made the final loop with the hair tie. “All done.”
“Thank you,” she said, scooting closer to the table. “Can I eat now?”
I smiled down at her. “Yes, you can. Be careful, though, it might still be hot.”
Sadie picked up her spoon. It was all too big in her small hand. She dipped it into the bowl, collecting some soup and blowing. Some liquid spilled off the utensil with the motion before she put it in her mouth.
“How is it?” I asked, wincing in anticipation.
Sadie gave me a smile paired with a thumbs-up.
“Good,” I said, returning her smile. My gaze travelled over to Lincoln. He was still in the doorway, eyes trained on me. “Did you want some?”
It didn’t take the three of us long to finish eating and migrate over to the living room.
We had settled on the couch, Sadie curled up between Lincoln and an armrest. He had flicked through a couple of channels until he decided on a movie.
The way Sadie’s face lit up told me she was excited about his choice.
We watched it together, Sadie occasionally making comments about the little blonde fairy on screen.
Her braid snaked across the pillow. Beary was pulled in close to her chest. Eventually, her chatter died down, and it didn’t take long for her eyes to flutter closed.
“Thanks for coming tonight,” Lincoln said, pulling my attention from the TV. He brushed stray strands of hair away from his sleeping sister’s face.
I focused back on the screen. “Of course. To be honest, I was surprised you messaged me at all.”
“Why?”
Shrugging, I replied, “I hadn’t heard from you since the party. I figured you needed some more time to yourself.”
“It wasn’t that. It’s—I lost control,” Lincoln muttered as he stared out of the living room window.
“I don’t like not being in control of my feelings.
It makes me feel like…” he trailed off. A moment of quiet blanketed the room before he continued.
“You’re the last person I wanted to see me like that. I guess I’ve just been embarrassed.”
I shifted forward, angling my body towards him. “Embarrassed for what? Coming to my rescue?”
Lincoln didn’t respond. His jaw was taut. The tension radiated down his neck and spine as he continued to stare out the window. I could feel the shame rolling off him in waves.
“Hey,” I said, placing my hand on his knee. “If you hadn’t come along, I don’t know what would have happened. Because he clearly wasn’t taking no for an answer.”
Lincoln swallowed.
I wanted to make the inner turmoil he was experiencing go away. And, because of that, I opted to say what I didn’t get the chance to on the night of the Halloween party. “So, thank you.”
Not giving Lincoln a chance to respond, I continued, “Who is that Silva asshole anyways?”
Silence ticked on for a long moment before he answered. “He’s another fighter.”
“Does he go to Fenton?” I asked, eyebrows shooting up high.
Lincoln offered me a wordless nod.
“He mentioned something about a Pit,” I recalled fragments of the confrontation that had happened between the two of them on Halloween night. “What is that?”
Lincoln’s lips parted as the lock of the front door clicked.
I removed my hand from his knee, both of us peering into the foyer.
Amelia came into view. She was bundled in a long coat that draped below her knees.
A tote bag hung off her shoulder. From my seat on the couch, I could see the navy blue scrubs that adorned her legs.
She stiffened at the sight of me. “Calista, I wasn’t expecting to see you again so soon.”
I bristled at her words, awkwardness seeping into my body. My back straightened, hands curling together in my lap. I forgot how intimidating Lincoln’s mother could be .
“She brought some things to make some soup for Sadie,” Lincoln said.
His words took her attention off me, but only for a brief moment. Her critical eyes wandered between the two of us.
“There are leftovers in the kitchen if you’d like some,” I added with a wobbly smile. “It’s still warm.”
Amelia didn’t respond. Instead, she remained rooted in her spot in the foyer before kicking off her shoes and heading upstairs.
“Cali—” Lincoln started, but I cut him off.
“I should get going,” I announced, getting up from the couch. “It’s getting late.”
Lincoln regarded me for a moment before giving me a curt nod of his head. We left a sleeping Sadie on the couch, Lincoln leading me into the front door. I busied myself with slipping on my shoes as he handed me my jacket.
“Umm…” Lincoln fumbled, stuffing his hands into his pockets after I had taken it from him. “Thank you again for tonight. For everything.”
“Don’t mention it,” I said, jabbing him playfully in the shoulder. “What are tutors for?”
Lincoln grinned down at me. One of those rare smiles that caused an eruption of butterflies in my stomach. Maybe I was getting sick, too.
“I think it’s safe to say that you’re more than just a tutor at this point.”
Tilting my head to the side, I asked, “Does that mean we are upgrading our status to friends?”
Lincoln’s tongue darted out, brushing across his bottom lip in a way that made me regret the words that had come out of my mouth.
The corner of his lips quirked. “Sure, let’s go with friends. ”
I folded my lips inwards, ducking my head as I picked my bag up off the floor. Lincoln moved around me, unlocking the door.
“By the way,” I said as I stepped outside into the brisk evening air. “Since you missed today, meet me in the gym tomorrow.” I flashed him a grin. “Just because we’re friends now, doesn’t mean I’m going to go easy on you.”