Chapter 30
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Home is where the Maelin is.
Zakery
Is it a good or bad thing that Maelin’s parents didn’t immediately laugh in my face and say no ? Is it a good or bad thing that Hank said, Looks like we have a minute to think about it… Mae, come help me find the flashlights ?
Feeling Maelin’s weight leave the couch beside me was almost as daunting as watching her mother’s phone light illuminate the whites of her eyes. Painful, still moments passed while that light gleamed across Taylor’s cheeks, then she shook her head and said, It’s bad out there. Would you feel more comfortable sleeping in Morana’s bed or on the couch, Zakery?
Naturally, I sat there, on the couch, with my mouth hanging open, as my world crashed and burned around me.
Dreams of decompressing over noodles and going home evaporated, leaving me stranded in a static overlaid by pouring, pouring rain. I still don’t know where I’m sleeping tonight. I just know that when Maelin came back from the other room, she was carrying a little electric lantern and looked as beautiful as an angel. Her mouth moved. Her mother’s mouth moved. She looked at me. She said something else to her mother.
At some point, I think we had sandwiches for dinner over candlelight, but I don’t completely remember.
And now I’m in a tiny bathroom with a spare toothbrush that Maelin clasped in my hands a few minutes ago. Staring at the gaunt lines of my face in the lantern light and counting my strokes, I let my mind race beneath the thunder pounding in my skull.
They didn’t say yes .
They didn’t say no .
They didn’t get a chance to answer before the power cut. All I saw before darkness swallowed us was their appalled faces.
Maybe in that split second after the lights went off, they calculated the fact we wouldn’t be able to leave safely tonight, so maybe they knew better than to tell me no while I would be trapped here with the shame of not being good enough for their family. Maelin’s kind. I bet they’re kind, too.
Kind enough to spare me a night of humiliation.
Maelin reappears, wearing a cotton nightgown and offering me a white t-shirt. “Dad says you can wear this to sleep in.”
I search her, spit out my foam, rinse my mouth, take the shirt. “Should…I beg now?”
“Huh?”
Labored breath fills me. “For you. Should I beg, for you?”
“Oh. Um. No.” She smiles; it is hauntingly beautiful. “If it comes down to you needing to beg, I will give a signal. Let’s come up with a signal.”
I’d rather kiss her, while I still have the chance.
Defeated, I pull her into my arms, kick the door behind her closed, and drop my forehead against her shoulder.
“Zakery?”
“Tell me about the ramen place, please.”
She settles herself in. “It’s a dollar fifty to add a boiled egg. Can you believe that? I can. They’re that good. I think I could eat their boiled eggs every day. Eep. ”
I exhale against her neck, kiss again, murmur, “Don’t stop.”
“B-but…um…Zakery…you’re being distracting.”
I bury my nose against her throat. “I want ramen…”
“We’ll get some tomorrow.” She combs her fingers through my hair. “The rain’s supposed to stop in the middle of the night, and the power is supposed to come back in a few hours. There’s some flooding on streets, which is delaying repairs. The ramen place isn’t in a flood zone, and the water should drop after a few hours once it stops raining. We’ll get so much ramen. Breakfast ramen, even.”
“Your parents won’t be upset if we leave before breakfast?”
“No?” She gasps, stiffens, narrows her eyes. “But they will want ramen if we mention our schemes. We must be vigilant and certain not to reveal our plans.”
“I’ll get them ramen.”
“You…will?”
I wrap her up. “ If they let me marry you.”
“That’s an effective ultimatum. Keep it in your back pocket as a last resort.”
“Maelin,” I whisper.
Her fingers stop playing in my hair. “Yes?”
“Do you want to marry me, even a little?” Forcing myself, I release her and go cold from the loss. “Or are you waiting until you see what being in the same room as your ex again will do before you think about that?”
“Harry’s barely crossed my mind for days, Zakery… I haven’t even checked his Leopard account to see if he and ‘MoonWoof’ are still together or if he’s bragging about being her plus one to the ball. As far as I know, he might not even be there.” Her eyes roll. “Whether he’s there or not, though, I don’t really think I care anymore. Losing a relationship I put a lot of time and energy into hurt. I lost a lot of firsts with him. I’m grateful I didn’t lose all of them. But…I don’t think most people get to have their firsts and lasts with the same person, so I’m glad I’ll get to have at least some with you.”
“ If we get married.”
“Zakery,” she whispers, “it’s not if we get married…it’s if we get married in a week. That’s the only thing in question here.”
My strangled heart beats with hope. “What?”
She grips my hand. “My parents like you. We’re getting married. It just might not be in the middle of the night next Sunday. Presently, Dad’s mourning the fact I don’t want a big wedding. Mom’s stunned and keeps asking me if I’m aware you’re rich. She’s convinced I should have eloped the moment you mentioned wanting to marry me. Dad really, really wants a wedding. Both of them have periodically actually been asking a stray decent question on whether or not I’m sure, and have I thought this through…but most of it is: Dad wants a wedding, and Mom thinks I’m an idiot for giving you a barrier of entry.”
Even though my lips part, I don’t know what to say. They don’t hate me? Their answer is yes? Just with a question of when ? I can live with that. I think. My attention sweeps down Maelin, follows the curves of her body displayed beneath the fabric of her nightgown, and my breath stutters.
I think…she was right.
These feelings that crop up every so often, the ones I’m afraid to lose, they’re not going anywhere. Maybe they’re like fear. I’ve never had a problem recognizing fear. I’ve also never had a problem feeling it again.
I’ll be okay. We’ll be okay.
After all, feelings have nothing to do with love.
And even if I don’t feel the same way as everyone else, I know how to love someone.
So, if this burn dies, I will still—irrevocably—love Maelin.
“Are you all right?” she asks.
I nod, pulling my gaze back up to her face. “I’m relieved. If not next Sunday, when may I marry you?”
“Hopefully, it will be next Sunday. I told Dad that if he wants a wedding, he has to plan it. Send the invitations. Pick the cake. Order the catering. Everything. Including pay for it. Because I’m very busy saving up my money for fancy organic cereal. And you are a responsible rich person, who invests in stocks, not weddings. Probably.”
“You said exactly those words to your father?”
Her lip juts, and her eyes wander as she nods. “Pretty much, yeah. He laughed. I didn’t. I said I was serious. I may have described my koala cereal for a little longer than entirely necessary. Mom muttered that if I loved the koala cereal so much, I should be asking their blessing to marry it. She can, after all, only assume that my affections for the cereal are what’s making me hesitate on tying the knot with a millionaire.” Maelin’s head tilts. “Are you a millionaire? I wasn’t sure.”
I glide my fingers into my hair. “Well. Yes, I am. Kind of.”
“Kind of?”
“Technically, since we all pool our funds and share the pot, I have access to…billions? So. I don’t know if that means your mother would consider me a millionaire or…a billionaire?”
Maelin’s brows lunge upward. She whirls on her heel and reaches for the door knob.
“Where are you going?”
“To apologize to my mother and see if I can’t get one of my parents or a neighbor ordained online. We need to get someone over here to marry us yesterday.”
I can’t help it. I laugh. “I’m for that.”
Grinning at me, she glows. “Good. I’m sure that will make what I say next easier on your fragile constitution.”
Apprehensive, I echo, “Fragile constitution? Is that what I have?”
“Absolutely.”
“What have you done?”
“Did you hear Mom ask whether you wanted to sleep in Morana’s room or on the couch? Or had you already blacked out by then?”
I reach for the lantern. “I…vaguely recall. Did you put me on the couch? Where I have no hope of controlling when your parents see my tattoos unless I sleep in my usual clothes, thus scorning your father’s t-shirt offering and making him hate me forever?”
Her laughter dances across my skin. “No, no. Don’t be silly.” She tugs me from the bathroom. “I told them we’d be sharing my room.”
I freeze.
“I didn’t want you to be alone in an unfamiliar house, in case you had an episode.”
This is going to cause me to have an episode. Never mind that we’ve shared a bed before. We’re in her parents’ house. Maelin wants to wait for marriage before she goes all the way . That’s usually a taught belief. When it’s a taught belief, the teachers tend to say things like you have to be very, very careful and it can just happen . As though intercourse is something you fall into.
I mean.
To be fair.
If anyone were going to literally fall into having sex, it might be Maelin. She did, after all, fall into my bed the first time she wound up there. But. Still. I feel like there simply must be an element of decision here. We’ve slept together twice now without any accidents.
Maybe not panicking in the precursor is a decisive element? That’s good, then. Because I am panicking .
“Maelin,” I whisper, “is…this a good idea? I’d rather not do anything that would make your parents leery of me.”
“It’ll be fine,” she says, chuckling before she adds, “It’s a small house. So. I think they’re fairly confident we’ll behave.”
“Is this a test?” I ask.
“No?”
A deep voice rumbles from further up the hall, “Why? Should it be?”
I squeeze Maelin’s hand as she stops, and we turn, toward a man who certainly doesn’t look like a nightmare come alive in the odd light of my lantern. Nope. Not even completely. I gulp. “N-no, sir.”
“Glad to hear it.” He passes me and touches a kiss to Maelin’s forehead. “Night, pumpkin. Sleep well, you two.”
I doubt I’m going to sleep much at all in this unfamiliar place with these unfamiliar fears devouring my mind.
That is, until the moment I’m in Maelin’s bed and her arms close around me.
Suddenly, with that, I’m home .