Chapter 48 Bohdan
Bohdan
What happened a year and a half ago when I destroyed us was bad.
What happened when my head cracked against the ice and destroyed my career was bad.
And I thought what happened this morning was bad. When Sloan stirred up all that magma still there because I’ll burn for her forever and forced it up through all that rubble and all those fissures in the earth when she told me she didn’t want it to end.
She smiled more today than I think she has in a long, long time, and maybe it was a trick my brain played on me when I caught her wiping away tears of laughter that made her eyes bluer than they had any right to be—and I thought I could be a good thing for her again.
How could anything to do with loving someone this much ever be bad?
It’s what made me pull her aside and swear we’d get through anything, because it would take something more than an eruption or an implosion to keep me from her again.
I meant what I said—we’ll get through anything and everything—and I promised myself when she blinked up at me, standing there under the sunlight, that I’d tell her anything and everything she needs to know tomorrow like she asked, and I’ll never leave again.
I memorized numbers in too many languages for her, and I’ll memorize the words I’m sorry, too.
Talon taps his foot impatiently at the top of the gangway.
He widens his eyes when we step back onto the ship and I put my arm around Sloan, tugging her closer.
“What took so long? You two decide you need to run back to Pompeii to collect dust samples from the rocks and take a look at that fossilized bread again?”
“Carbonized,” I correct.
Jay gives him a flat look. “The bread you thought you could eat?”
Talon throws his hands in the air. “I didn’t think you could actually eat it, I thought maybe it was partially—you know what? Never mind. Can we get a picture? It’s our last night.”
He hikes a thumb over his shoulder to the studio photography backdrop, displayed by one of the information desks, and the photographer waiting there, currently aimlessly clicking through as families line up one by one.
“Is that one of those ones where they superimpose you onto some obviously fake background?” Jay looks more disgusted than he probably should be by the prospect, but straightens the sleeves of his striped linen shirt.
“Talon,” Tia whines, tipping her head back before gesturing to her hair and the curls escaping what was once a ponytail. “I look like shit from the heat.”
“You could never look like shit.” Jay throws her a grin that only has her rolling her eyes.
I press my hand into Sloan’s shoulder. “Do you want a photo?”
She looks up at me, thoughtful. “Why not? Commemorate the occasion.”
Her voice drops a bit, but Tia’s eyes sharpen momentarily, a shrewd, assessing sort of look passing over her face before she cocks her head, studying the way my palm rests against Sloan’s shoulder.
She’s been looking at me like that all week—lying in wait to see if whatever new, inventive way she thinks I’m planning on hurting Sloan might somehow reveal itself in the set of my jaw or the way I roll out my neck.
But Tia doesn’t understand that the only thing I want as much as I want Sloan is to prove to her that even though a very bad thing did happen the last time she said I love you, it doesn’t mean it will again.
It won’t.
Tia doesn’t say anything, but she does smile a bit before rolling her eyes when her brother makes us stand in some sort of horrible, awkward prom pose, Sloan in front of me with my arms around her waist, positioning Tia and Jay similarly so he can stretch out across the floor between us.
He makes us wait until it’s developed and pinned to the board alongside all the other photos of smiling families. Jay was right—it is superimposed onto a very obviously fake photo of a beach, but Talon practically sprints to tear it down anyway, holding it up in something like triumph.
“I don’t think you’re supposed to do that.” Jay points to the ripped edges of the photo, jagged where Talon tore it from the board.
He waves him off. “Whatever, man, I’ll pay for it.”
“When you do, make sure you ask for more than one copy. I’m sure we all want to remember this week.” Tia flashes her brother a tight smile.
“I’ll put it on our next fridge,” I murmur, pressing my mouth to the top of Sloan’s ear.
They were words just for her, but three sets of eyes snap to us, each one our friends’ attention rapt, a bit like it was when they found me in her room the other night.
“Did you just say our?” Tia’s mouth parts and her amber eyes go wide.
“What fridge?” Talon blinks, confused.
“No shit.” Jay’s gaze darts back and forth between us, and maybe he senses the sort of cataclysmic shift that happened this morning when I heard her whisper what she wanted—that it was still me after all this time—because understanding dawns and he raises his brows, smiling fondly when he swipes a hand through his hair.
I feel Sloan fidget under my arm, the way she rolls her shoulders so they’re straight. “Bohdan’s going to come home with me.”
“No fucking way.” Talon glances back and forth between us, still holding the picture up. “For real?”
That same look crosses over Tia’s face, but it disappears into a smile when Jay starts shaking her shoulders, his face fracturing with a grin when he asks, “What should we do to celebrate?”
Sloan shrugs again, but I can feel the more relaxed slump of her shoulders, and I can hear the smile in her voice when she waves a hand in the air and says, “Let Talon pick, it’s his cruise.”
He doesn’t hesitate. “Water aerobics.”
There’s a collective groan—but no one argues with him.
It’s how we end up in a too-crowded pool with people trying to wrap their heads around the synchronized movements, and a too-loud thump of a bass from a nearby speaker that should hurt my head but doesn’t because it’s Sloan’s hand in mine, tugging me to the corner of the pool.
Jay takes it too seriously, claiming he hasn’t had a good workout the entire trip.
Tia gives up halfway through and stretches out a nearby deck chair, sun hat pulled low over her face so she doesn’t have to watch the spectacle.
Talon almost gets into a fight with a thirteen-year-old who accidentally knocks him over the head with a pool noodle.
Sloan doesn’t like organized group activities like this because she hates that people might be watching her, so we whisper about our friends and plan out our fictional new apartment.
I think of all the ways I can prove to her I’m worthy again, and occasionally pretend to look interested in the instructions when Talon throws a pointed glance over his shoulder.
He abandons the class eventually, making us move to a smaller pool where he swears up and down that he can swim a faster lap than any of us and successfully goads Jay into a race.
They tie, actually, but they each think they won, and they make me join so someone can actually come in first.
“Good luck.” Sloan’s mouth tilts into a soft, quiet smile. “You were always faster on ice than them. Water can’t be very different. I think you’ll win.”
I press my thumb to her bottom lip. “Already did.”