Chapter 9
“Nooo.” Liam groans, dramatically covering his eyes with both hands. “Don’t go any closer. She’s right fricking there.”
He wasn’t kidding when he said he hates scary movies. Here we sit, Mutt between us on the couch, Liam watching through his fingers. The movie has hardly kept my attention; I’ve been so entertained by Liam.
“Agh!” he squeals when Bathsheba launches herself onto Andrea. “I can’t watch this. Tell me when it’s over.”
Deciding to put him out of his misery, I turn it off. Slowly, Liam’s hands lower and he breathes out a sigh resting his head on the back of the couch.
“Thank you,” he whispers. “I need something wholesome after that.”
“Got any board games?”
Liam tilts his head my way, his mouth shaping into a smile. “I have something even better.”
He stands and walks to a cabinet beside his mantel. I can’t see what he’s pulling out, but when he turns, I gasp. In his hands is a Nintendo Wii, and a pair of controllers.
“Tennis?” Liam holds out a remote and I take it. Within minutes we’ve got our Mii characters on the screen, his somehow looking just as cocky as the real man standing next to me.
Turning, Liam flashes a wicked grin. “Hope you’re ready for a beat down.” He rolls his shoulders, doing some arm and leg stretches while I watch on with amusement.
“Yeah, well. I haven’t played this since college, so you’re probably right.”
“It’s like riding a bike, Cassie. It’ll come back to you.” Liam presses start and launches his first serve.
It did not, in fact, come back to me.
He’s laser-focused, precise swings and foot placement, making it clear I will very likely lose every set.
Our Mii characters sprint back and forth across the screen as we chase the ball, and I quickly break a sweat.
I’m doing a half-decent job until the next volley, when my return lands several feet past the line.
“You’re over swinging,” Liam says, pausing the game, leaving my Mii frozen mid-stumble.
I plant my hands on my hips. “Okay, well, show me how to swing correctly.”
Liam crosses the distance between us and moves behind me, his front to my back and I swallow hard. He encircles my wrist with one hand while the other goes to rest on my hip, adjusting my stance. Every rational thought drops straight out of my head.
“Relax,” Liam murmurs—no, purrs—against the shell of my ear, and the word itself does the opposite of what it should.
The calloused pad of his thumb brushes the bare skin where my shirt doesn’t quite meet my waistband.
Back and forth. Just once. Like he doesn’t even know he’s doing it.
But oh, my body knows. Every nerve ending from my head to my toes lights up like a Christmas tree.
“I am relaxed,” I manage, but my voice betrays me, the sound of someone who is anything but.
His chest vibrates against my back with a low laugh. “Sure you are.”
For a moment neither of us moves. His hand stays on my hip. My back stays pressed to his chest. Our Mii characters remain frozen on screen, oblivious.
“Now imagine the ball is coming toward you.” His hand tightens around my wrist and we swing together, a slow arc through the air.
But I’m having trouble focusing on the imaginary ball.
Liam’s breath is warm on the side of my neck and if I turned my head just right, my mouth would be dangerously close to his.
I don’t turn my head. But god, I think about it.
I expect Liam to step away, but our feet stay rooted in place. The heart in my chest is beating hard enough for both of us as the moment stretches, taut as a high wire, and I know if I stay here one more second, I might do something that can’t be filed under friendship.
With herculean effort, I take a step forward, and the loss of his warmth is immediate. Physical. Like stepping out of glorious sunlight into the shade.
He takes his position again next to me, and I search for anything to break the remnants of tension still simmering in the air, so thick it’s almost corporeal.
“So…” I clear my throat. “Clearly your training in virtual athletics has paid off.”
Liam blinks rapidly as if surfacing from a trance, and his face slowly breaks into a smile.
“Yeah, well.” He shrugs in a false self-deprecating way. “I try to stay in peak physical condition.”
Peak physical condition indeed.
Liam starts the game over, but despite his very distracting demonstration, I still lose every set.
And I couldn’t care less. Because all evening I’ve been present in the moment, having more fun than I remember having in a while.
I haven’t thought about nasty break ups, brothers who are more broken than they realize, or mothers that avoid her children.
We play for over an hour, but eventually end the game and settle back on the couch. Mutt is no longer between us, rather, he’s sitting on my lap like I’m his new best friend.
“What are the books?” I ask, tilting my head toward the leather-bound books on his bookcase.
Liam doesn’t respond right away, only stares at the bookcase for a second. But then he stands, walks over, and selects one bound in a deep wine-colored leather. He flips it open, takes his seat on the couch, and begins reading.
“It was many and many a year ago, in a kingdom by the sea, that a maiden there lived whom you may know, by the name of Annabel Lee. And this maiden she lived with no other thought than to love and be loved by me.”
Liam weaves spells with words, reading of love that was more than love, that not even death could destroy.
I lay my cheek against the back cushion and just listen to the soft melodic cadence.
I watch the way his lips shape each word, the way his lashes cast shadows on his cheekbones in the lamplight.
There’s a reverence in the way he holds this book, as though it’s something sacred, and I realize I’m not just listening to a poem.
I’m watching a man peel back a layer and reveal a part of himself others rarely see.
But my ears perk up when Liam’s voice goes thick.
“And so, all the night tide, I lie down beside of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride, in the sepulcher there by the sea, in her tomb by the sounding sea.”
The poem comes to an end, and Liam closes the book, both of us lulled into a contemplative silence. I’m sure at some point in my education I had to memorize that poem, but never in my life have I heard it recited with the emotion Liam just possessed.
“They’re all books of poetry,” Liam says, cutting through the silence.
“Not only do I have ADHD, but I’m also dyslexic.
School was hard for me. Teachers didn’t understand that I had a learning disability.
They only focused on how hyperactive I was.
I could sweet talk some of my teachers into letting me do bullshit extra credit work, enough to keep from failing completely.
All I really cared about was music. By then I’d gotten pretty decent at several instruments and I was trying to put together a band to play some gigs around town.
But by the tenth grade I was failing every class.
Made up my mind as soon as I turned sixteen I’d quit and go for my GED. ”
“And did you?”
Liam shakes his head. “I did not. It was actually Penny’s dad, Charlie, who realized what the problem was.
I guess my dad told him about my struggles in school or something, I don’t know.
But one day he called and asked me to stop in at the studio after school.
” Liam laughs, a quick sound. “I’d actually skipped that day, but didn’t tell him.
He told me his brain worked just like mine.
He pulled out a book of poetry and worked with me on reading the poems. We did this every day until little by little the words made sense to me.
One day he set the book down, offered me a cigarette—it was no secret I’d been smoking a while by then—and told me there’s nothing wrong with a GED.
But he’d really like to see me finish high school, and if I did, he’d hire me to be in the studio band. ”
“And let me guess.” My mouth curves into a soft smile. “It was straight A’s from then on.”
Liam scoffs. “Fuck no. I scraped by with Ds. But a place in the studio band was damn good incentive. Still didn’t get to walk at graduation, but I went to summer school and had my own personal ceremony.”
His voice lifts when he says personal ceremony, and I raise a questioning eyebrow. “I sense a story there.”
“I already had the cap and gown. Mom asked around at the school and figured out when summer school diplomas would ship out. She sent invitations to a few of our friends, and with everyone standing along the front walkway of my house, Mom played “Pomp and Circumstance” on her phone, and I walked to my mailbox to receive my diploma.”
I’m still smiling from ear to ear when Liam walks me to his door an hour later.
I step over the threshold and turn back to face him.
He’s leaning, one arm braced against the doorframe watching me with an expression that causes liquid heat to simmer in my belly.
The porch light catches the green of his eyes, and for one held breath, his gaze drops to my lips, lingering there.
Liam opens his mouth to speak, when fwoosh.
Not even I, with all my horror loving tendencies, could have predicted this.
I now know what Melanie Daniels felt like in The Birds.
Out of nowhere a blur of black swoops down, and I fling up my arms to shield my face from the attack.
I feel something land in my hair and I let out the most undignified scream.
Mutt charges out out, barking at my feet, and I hear Liam say, “Fucking sky rats.”
“Liam,” I hiss, “do you mean to tell me there is a goddamn bat stuck in my hair?” My voice is shaking and I feel near to panicking.
The bat starts to move in my hair, and that’s when the panic really sets in.
I fling my head over, hoping to jostle it loose, but this only causes the bat to become more entangled.
“Get it out, Liam. Do something. Shave my head if you have to.”
“Cassie, you have to hold still. If that bat scratches your head, you’ll need a rabies shot.”
I’m trying to imagine myself with a shaved head, when I feel Liam’s hands gently untangle my hair.
“You’re doing great, angel. I’ve almost got him.” Liam’s words cause some of my panic to ebb, his gentle hands calming my racing heart. And then I feel the weight of the bat leave my hair, and it’s taking flight. Slowly, I straighten, sucking in a deep lungful of air.
Before I can say anything, Liam’s fingers are in my hair again, parting it section by section.
“What are you doing?”
“Just making sure he didn’t get you.”
When he’s satisfied, his hands slide down to frame my face, and I peel my eyes open to meet his concerned gaze.
“Are you okay? That was insane.”
Wordlessly, I nod, and Liam pulls me to him, wrapping his arms around me, the panic I felt seconds ago already dissolving as he squeezes me tight. With my head burrowed against his chest, the only words I think to say fall from my lips.
“I guess we won’t be watching The Birds next movie night.”
An hour later, I’ve showered to wash away any trace of the sky rat but I swear I still feel those leathery wings in my hair. I let out an involuntary shiver at the thought. I’m just climbing into bed to do my nightly scrolling when a text notification pops up on my screen.
My Favorite Person
Every time I close my eyes I think I’m being attacked by Bathsheba. You said you’d hold my hand through the scary parts.
My Favorite Person
What happened to your pinky swear?
I long press the text until the reactions pop up and I select the crying laughing face, then type out my response.
Well, every time I close my eyes I see a bat flying at me.
My Favorite Person
What a fucking night.
You can say that again.
My Favorite Person
Goodnight. Don’t let the bed bugs bite.
My Favorite Person
Or in your case the sky rats.
Too soon, Liam.
My Favorite Person
Night Cassandra.
Goodnight William.