Chapter 15
the horrors persist, but so do i
Nolan
My mom gets home just before eight in the morning. The sound of the door opening and closing startles me; it takes me a few seconds to remember where I am and why I'm on the couch.
"What are you doing out here?" she asks. "Why is Elias's dog here?"
"The dog is here because no one is at home to watch her. And I brought a friend," I tell her. "She's sleeping in my room."
"You brought a girl home?"
"I told you—just a friend."
"If I stayed up to meet her, would I see this friend again?"
I sigh, sitting up and pushing my hair away from my face before grabbing my glasses from the coffee table. She's tired. She just worked a double overnight. I'm not going to ask her to stay up to meet someone who is only here because she has to be.
Someone who—let's be honest—never would have slept with me in the first place if she didn't feel like she had to because she owed me something. And even if she does like me a little bit, she'll get sick of me soon.
I can't even blame her. I'd get sick of me, too.
"No, probably not."
"All right, I'm going to go to bed then. I love you. Thanks for coming over."
"Love you, too. Hey, Mom?"
"What?"
"Avery's been watching some really weird stuff on TV."
She sighs. "Well, what do you want from me, Nolan? I'm doing the best I can, and I'm doing it alone, aren't I?"
There's an implication in her tone. I know she blames me for the last part.
"You're barely around, and neither are your grandparents—not since Grandpa got sick," she continues. "Most of her friends are on social media—there's a lot worse shit on there than she's going to find on our television. I'm not that bad of a parent."
"I didn't say you were a bad parent; I just thought you might want to know."
"Well, I already know. Okay?"
"Okay."
"You're coming to her dance recital, right?"
"Yeah, of course."
"All right. I'd hug you, but I know you hate it. Good night, son. I love you, and I appreciate your help. I'm just tired."
"I know. It's okay. Good night."
She smiles at me before disappearing down the hallway, her bedroom door closing shortly after. I sink into the couch and start scrolling on my phone. I'm itching to go for a run; sitting still isn't easy for me, especially during the quiet hours of the early morning.
I hate it.
It makes the loner label I've secured even more frustrating. I hate being alone—almost as much as I hate being misunderstood. And I don't hate being hugged; it's much more complicated than that.
I notice I'm bouncing my leg and stand up, turning on the television and pacing the small space instead. Since I can't sit still anyway, I grab Arcadia's leash and take her around the block a couple of times.
When I get back, I start some coffee, tapping my foot and gripping the countertop with both hands while I wait for it to brew.
"Hey," Saige says from behind me, startling me.
She's dressed already, wearing a pair of jeans and the same hoodie she wore yesterday.
"Who's jumpy now?" she asks.
"I guess you got me back." But she's reading it wrong—I'm not jumpy, I'm relieved. So fucking relieved. It was about to get dark in here—in my head. I felt it. "Did you sleep okay?"
"Not really. I had more nightmares."
"Yeah, me too." Finally, the coffee finishes. I fill two cups and hand one to Saige. "Hey, my mom got back a little while ago. Let's go get some bagels or something, yeah?"
She shrugs. "I'm down for anything I don't have to make."
"Okay, I'll be right back."
I go to my bedroom and quickly change my clothes, splash some water on my face, take my pills, and brush my teeth before meeting her back in the living room.
"You ready?" I ask, slipping on my shoes.
"Yeah, sure."
She follows me out the door to my Jeep.
"Are you okay?" she asks as I back out of the driveway.
"Yeah," I tell her. "I just…like to start my days a certain way. My brain kind of misfires when I can't do that."
"Oh, right. It upsets your equilibrium," she says, repeating what Dax had told her.
"Yeah."
And it's definitely misfiring now. The house doesn't help, either. It was his, after all.
I chew on the inside of my cheek until we pull into the parking lot a few minutes later.
"You want to go here?" Saige asks.
"Yeah, what's wrong with it?"
"I thought you meant back on campus," she says. "I don't like being seen out in Aurora Cove under the best of circumstances, let alone accompanied by one of the popular kids who relentlessly bullied me with my stepbrother."
"I didn't bully you, Saige. And I'm not like Dax and Elias—people don't notice me when I go places, and if they do, they don't try to talk to me. Not without them around."
They think I'm creepy—creepy enough that when someone started a rumor that I plucked a bird out of the sky at a skate park and bit its head off, people believed it.
Dax said Saige called me creepy, too.
"All right, fine," she says.
But she pulls out her sunglasses and puts them on, even though it's dark and rainy this morning, and then pulls her hood over her head, tying the string tightly at her chin.
"Well, that looks natural. Won't draw any attention at all, I'm sure."
I regret my word choice when I watch her physically struggle not to say something about how I don't exactly look natural, either.
I think it bothers me more that she doesn't say it than that she thinks it because that means she doesn't feel comfortable joking around with me, even when I'm the one who started it.
No one does—except for Dax. Even Elias can be uncomfortable around me and treats me like a victim at times.
I know I look weird.
Thank fuck it'll be cold again soon. Maybe after I graduate, I'll move to Yukon. I'm sure they need more doctors there, and Avery will be old enough to take care of herself by the time I finish med school; she won't need me anymore. If I'm going to end up alone anyway, why not?
Instead of saying what she wants, she says, "Well, it can't be worse than what they already say about me." Then she shrugs, grabs her backpack, and opens the passenger side door.
Sighing, I do the same, walking at her side into a small local bakery that allows dogs on the covered patio, which is why I picked it—I thought she'd like that.
She ties Arcadia's leash to the fence, patting her head a few times before we go inside and get in line. People stare, as anticipated, but Saige doesn't seem fazed.
"You know, you still look pretty hot like that."
She scoffs, shaking her head and looking down at her feet. "Yeah, right."
It hurts a little. I'm a guy who can't show affection; I'm not good with words or expressing myself, I have an aversion to physical touch, and secrets I can't talk about—the kind I medicate and do my best to stuff into a corner, but I still have to be prepared for them to pop back up at anytime and send me into a spiral.
And she's a girl who can't even take a compliment. What a match.
I guess I understand that, though. I know that when people tell you that you're something over and over again, eventually, you can't help but believe them.
But I'll never be able to tell her that I understand or why I understand.
I don't even know why I'm worrying about it—she's already getting that look.
The one that says, maybe this was fun for a while, but you're not enough for me.
And I can't blame her, even if her sad brown eyes feel like home.
Home was always sad for me, too.
We get to the front of the line, order, and then grab our coffees and wait at our booth for our bagels.
"Take off your sunglasses," I tell her.
She takes a drink of her coffee and then shakes her head. "No way."
I sigh and then pull my hood up over my head, too, just to give my hands something to do for a minute. I hate that I have nothing fucking meaningful to say or that I can't just fucking talk to anyone the way Dax can.
I hate that it's raining in that extra-humid, misty way, that I'm already overheating and my fucking glasses are fogging up. I take them off and clean the lenses with my sweatshirt. "I'm going to go see if our food is ready."
"Okay," she says, petting Arcadia's head while staring at her phone.
What's she looking at, anyway? She barely posts on social media.
A normal person might just ask, but I don't.
When I get inside, our bagels aren't quite done, but I decide to wait. A couple of minutes later, my order number is called, and someone sets them on the counter.
I grab both and head back outside, sliding back into the booth. The first bag I open has a jalapeno and cheese bagel inside, and I slide it across the table to Saige.
"Thanks."
"Didn't get enough jalapenos on your pizza last night?"
"I don't get enough jalapenos ever," she says.
"I like to eat them straight out of the jar.
They're even better with pickled carrots.
There's this restaurant on my old block that used to bring pickled carrots and jalapenos with corn tortillas to every table instead of chips and salsa. It was like…fucking heaven."
"Hey, guys."
Dax stands in front of our table in a white t-shirt with his hands in the pockets of his jeans.
He looks hungover, which doesn't surprise me given the illegible texts he sent me around three in the morning.
His curls are a mess, but he's one of those people who only look better the less put together they are.
It's like he's showcasing how good he can look without trying. I can't help but smile, feeling a little lighter in his presence. He has that effect on me.
But I also feel a little jealous. And that's new. That's a weird thing to feel about someone you're in love with.
"What are you doing here?" Saige asks.
But she's smiling when she says it. She's trying to hide it, and maybe Dax doesn't notice, but I do. I'm the kind of person who notices everything about other people's mannerisms, unfortunately. It used to be essential to my survival.
"I missed you guys," he says. "And I track Nolan's location."
"It's giving stalker," I tell him.
"It kind of is, isn't it?" He slides into the booth next to Saige. "I've been doing some stalking lately, and I've got to be honest, I kind of enjoy it. It's thrilling. I'm still going to kill your stalker, though, baby; don't worry."
"Thanks," she says.
"How's it going? Were you nice to Nolan?"
"Yeah, why wouldn't I be?"
"Mmm…I don't know. Because you're sassy. And you like to push people's buttons," he says. "Did she push your buttons?"
"Only the good ones."
She smiles—just a little bit—before biting her lip to hide it again.
"Really?" he asks, raising an eyebrow before turning to Saige. "Okay, what's going on with the hoodie and the sunglasses, Ripley?"
I answer for her while she chews her bagel. "She's humiliated at the thought of being seen with us in public."
"Nuh-uh," Dax says.
Saige nods. "Yeah, pretty much."
"Wow. I've never been on the receiving end of such sentiment before," Dax says. "I'm not going to lie—it's not a good feeling."
"It is what it is."
"It's mean is what it is. It's hurtful. Don't you think it's hurtful, Nolan?"
"It's not ideal," I answer.
"And you just said you were nice to him, brat." Dax rips her sunglasses off her face, kissing her on the lips before she buries her face in his shoulder.
"Stop!"
He responds by pulling her hood down, hugging her against his chest while kissing the top of her head. "Hey, everyone, Saige Ripley is here! Now they all know your true identity, Saige," he jokes. "Oh, the horror! What are you going to do now?"
"The horrors persist, but so do I," she says, laughing as she struggles against him.
But she's happy. She likes him.
Eventually, she stops fighting him and wraps her arms around him, squeezing him.
It makes me uncomfortable in a way that watching her fuck him and suck his dick doesn't.
"Did you miss me, baby?"
"Nope."
"Liar."
She is lying; I can tell by the way she closes her eyes and breathes him in.
Which, again, is okay. I missed Dax, too.
I love Dax. But I know she wanted me to hold her last night, and I couldn't do it.
I know what it feels like when someone wants more from me—I'm more than familiar with the weight of the dead air between us.
It's painful.
Still, I'm glad she took her sunglasses off. It's nice to see her eyes.
"How was the wedding?" I ask.
"It was fine," Dax tells me. "Dude is still a douchebag, but Juliette is kind of a high maintenance…you know what, so maybe they'll have a couple of asshole kids and be just fine. Your parents were there, Saige. I told them we've been hanging out."
"What? You're joking, right?"
"Nope. I told them we ran into each other at a party, and we've gotten really close."
"Dax, why would you do that?"
He shrugs and takes a bite of the bagel in her hand. "I thought it was funny. They were very shocked."
"Whatever. I'll tell them you made it up."
"Yeah, good idea," he says. And then he holds out his phone and snaps a selfie of the two of them.
"What the hell? Delete it."
"No way. I'm posting it and making it my background."
"Well, I look terrible. That'll be just as bad for you as it is for me."
"I think you look really pretty, Saige," I tell her.
Finally, I get her sad brown eyes back.
She presses her lips together before she says, "I think you're pretty, too."
"I think so, too," Dax says, and then takes a photo of me. "I'm making that one my lock screen. I don't know if it's the whole rainy-patio-hipster-café-vibe or what, but you look especially broody in this one—it's hot. I'm going to send it to you, too, Saige."
I look especially broody because I am especially broody.
Dax goes on about who he saw at the wedding and all the Aurora Cove gossip he learned from his younger sister, Nadia, while we finish our bagels.
And when we leave, he suggests Saige ride back with him instead.
"You don't mind, right?" he asks me.
"Nope," I lie. "That's fine with me."
And so Saige goes with Dax, and I get to take Arcadia back alone. I turn the music up as loud as it can go, but it still doesn't quite drown out the silence.