Chapter 7
CHAPTER
SEVEN
LILY
“I don’t like this at all.” It’s warmer inside, but not much. “At least we’re full,” I add, because I am grateful for that. “Truth serum.” The words finally catch up to me now that I’m not shivering.
That does explain why we’ve been so talkative.
Who knew truth serum was even a thing?
Not me!
Zan stares around the strange room that we’ll share for the night.
There’s a small mattress on the ground, if it can be called that.
It almost looks like a felted beanbag made of some strange material I’ve never seen before.
Not that I’ve seen many of the things on this space station reality TV hellhole masquerading as a planet before, so no surprise there.
The entire interior of the structure appears to be wrapped in some sort of metal, the shining iridescence suggesting that it’s nothing I would have a name for.
“Great. Typical. Wonderful.”
“You seem irritated with the house itself,” Zan observes, arching an eyebrow at me.
“I’m starting to think that everything irritates me,” I tell him once again, the truth pouring out even though I don’t want it to.
I sigh, crossing my arms over my chest. “I don’t think I’ve ever felt this exposed in my life.
First the heat making me want to do things with an alien I have no business doing anything with, and then the truth serum.
Ken was bragging about giving us a dose, apparently, and the barbeque sauce I couldn’t get enough of.
Now I no longer have physical inhibitions, nor do I have any type of filter to stop me from saying whatever I want.
” I clamp my mouth shut and look around.
“That’s for bathing,” Zan tells me as I eye a contraption that barely reveals itself, hidden in a panel in the wall.
When I walk by, the white panel goes translucent, showing the tubing behind it.
“That’s cool,” I say, impressed in spite of myself.
“They’re fairly common on our planet,” Zan tells me. “In fact, this whole dome is set up like one of our forward post tents.”
“Forward post tents?” I repeat, trying to make sense of what he’s saying.
“Oh, I forget you Earth humans haven’t colonized any planets nor had to protect any of your terraformed colonies.”
“Oh, I’m sure we would colonize every single planet if we had the ability to,” I tell him archly.
He grunts, an amused quirk to his eyebrow. “I don’t know if that was the truth serum working—”
“Nope. Just blunt. I have no doubt that the Federation government would absolutely try to colonize every single planet that it could.” I cross my arms again, tapping my fingers against my biceps. “To be clear, I don’t think that colonizing is the greatest thing.”
“The planets we colonize are uninhabited. The forward posts, based—” he gestures to the dome that we’re standing inside “—are designed to protect us from the elements.”
“Ah,” I say, understanding dawning. “We don’t necessarily have to share the bed.”
“No, we do not have to share the bed if you do not want to,” he says.
But a hint of humor and mischief glints in his eye.
“If we are to compete on the level that Ken expects us to, which apparently includes having our lives on the line, then we can only hope to get as much sleep as possible so that we are prepared for the day ahead and whatever Ken has planned for us.”
“I can’t decide if I hate you for being so logical or I’m relieved that we don’t have to play the ‘no, I’ll sleep on the floor’ game.”
Zan’s look of mischief turns to one of utter confusion. “Humans play a game called sleep on the floor?” he asks slowly, enunciating each word carefully.
“No, we do not. It’s just, you know, the whole one bed thing.
It’s like this recurring theme event thing; I don’t know the words for it.
” I throw up my hands, completely annoyed with everything.
“If you watch enough TV and read enough books, you know that if there’s only one bed in the room, then the couple that are not together as a couple—two people, or an alien and a human—”
Realizing I’m babbling, I slam my mouth shut, taking a deep breath and collecting my thoughts before I continue.
“Fuck this fucking truth serum. The two people that are not a couple, when one bed is presented, they fight over if they are going to share the bed or who will sleep on the floor, out of this idea of chivalry.”
“I’m supposed to fight you over sleeping on the floor?” he asks, clearly confused, which is frankly adorable, and I am not pleased at all that I find his confusion adorable.
I scrub a hand down my face, annoyed at him, at myself, at the truth serum, at Ken, and very, very, very much annoyed at my friends who insisted we sign up for this goddamned reality TV show in the first place.
“What happens after they argue over the bed and who gets to sleep on the floor?” Zan asks.
I don’t want to answer him, and I try as hard as I can to keep the words from coming out, my jaw clenched tight, my eyes squeezed shut.
But there must be something in that truth serum that makes me want to tell him the answer to his questions, so I grit out the words with a pained expression on my face.
“They usually wake up cuddling.”
“Cuddling,” he repeats. His normally superior sneer and mischievous look have been replaced by pure confusion, his purple brow furrowed, white eyebrows nearly disappearing into his silver-white hair.
He looks cuter like that, like he doesn’t know what the hell I’m talking about. His wings fan out a little in confusion, his tail curling around his ankles, and his entire demeanor is so completely unlike anything I’ve ever seen from him that I take pity on him.
“You don’t have cuddling where you’re from?” I ask. “I’m sure you do,” I answer before he can say anything. I don’t want to embarrass him, at least not right now.
If you’d asked me a few hours ago if I’d like to embarrass him, I probably would have said yes. But right now, after he saved me from the giant evil chicken and listened to me and then was sweet and cooked for me, I might as well do him a solid and tell him the truth.
“Cuddling is when people, um, hold each other close to show affection, or maybe even sometimes because they’re cold, you know, so they have to get close and share body heat.
You don’t do that on your planet?” I ask again, even though I didn’t mean to, and it could be that I’m completely uncouth and in desperate need of some couth, or because of the serum, but it slips out nonetheless.
“I do not know this cuddling,” he says. His tone is very grave, his expression as serious as I’ve seen it. “Can you show me what this cuddling means?”
I stare at him for a long time, trying to decide if he is lying, but didn’t we just take some truth serum? And trying to work out whether or not asking a question counts as a lie is frankly giving me a headache, and I’m exhausted after being hung upside down by my ankle.
The least I can do is answer him.
“Yeah,” I manage. “I can. I can show you what cuddling means. But first I have got to get clean. I can’t even remember the last time I was able to brush my hair, let alone wash it. "..."and cuddling means like we’re going to be touching each other, so—”
“You want your skin and hair to be clean for me.”
His cheeks turn a slightly darker shade of purple, and I run out of words. Not just words, I completely run out of thoughts.
For the life of me, I can’t figure out why he’s blushing.
“Are you blushing?” I blurt out, unable to help myself.
“I do not know the meaning of that word.” He shakes his head. “Do you need help washing your hair?” Another question, tentative. There’s a heat behind it that I certainly do not trust myself with, especially not after that kiss.
But I hate washing my hair, which is one of the reasons I have it incredibly short.
But now I’m wishing that it weren’t just at my chin.
I’m wishing I had a full-on pixie cut. But I can’t help the words from spilling out of my mouth, the truth forced from my throat even though my brain knows I’ll live to regret it.
“My arms are so tired. So yes, I would like help washing my hair.”
It comes out grudging, angry almost.
I stare at him, madder by the minute, but he just smiles.
“Is it so hard to admit you needed help?” he asks me.
“Yes,” I say, and this is a truth I don’t mind saying. “It was absolutely ridiculously hard for me to tell you that I needed help and that I wanted help, because as much as I want help, I don’t want to have feelings for you.”
A wounded expression crosses his face.
“I want to have feelings for you,” he says. “I already do, I think.”
“You can’t have feelings for me,” I say, rolling my eyes. “You hardly know me. I’ve only been mean to you. And any attraction you feel for me at all is probably because of the fact that you poisoned me with your heat garbage, and we’re both horny.”
“I am the only one with horns,” he says, tapping the purple twin growths curling over his white hair. There’s a devilish expression on his face, and it just makes me more irritated.
“Are you going to help me clean up or not?” I ask him, turning towards the strange translucent panel where the strange alien shower is located.
It doesn’t take me long at all to realize that even if I hadn’t admitted I needed his help, I absolutely do need his help because I have no idea how to work this thing.
I push on the panel with my palm flat against it, but nothing happens.
Perplexed, I tug at the seam I can just barely make out, but again nothing happens.
“May I help you?” Zan asks. There’s almost a trepidation to his voice, like he’s afraid of pissing me off again, which frankly he should be, but it also makes me feel slightly bad about the way I’ve treated him, that he feels like I’m going to lash out at him just when he asks if I need help.
In fact, it makes me feel completely shitty.
“Yes,” I tell him. “I have no idea how to work this thing.”
“That is alright,” he says. “You are quite adorable when you don’t know how something works and you need my help.”
I nearly growl in frustration, but instead I just grind my teeth. I don’t want him pissed off at me if he’s actually going to help me wash my hair. I have a delicate scalp, much to the annoyance of every hairstylist I’ve ever been to.
“You have to be really careful not to pull my hair,” I tell him quickly. “I hate to be a baby, but…” I trail off, staring up at him with large eyes, feeling ridiculous.
“My Lily, I think you will be shocked at how careful I can be and how gentle I will be in every way with you.” A tentative smile stretches across his face, and I’m surprised to feel an answering smile of my own.
“And I do not think you are a baby,” he says very seriously.
“You’re clearly very much a full-grown adult human female. ”
I snort at that because I don’t think anyone’s ever told me that I was a full-grown adult human female before, and they’ve certainly never said it in such a sincere way.
Zan points to the strange, short-backed chair nestled against the wall, and I sit down in it, my heart beating faster with anticipation of his touch.
“Your face is all scrunched up again, like you’re upset with me,” he says gently. “Are you really this afraid that I will hurt you?”
He sounds genuinely concerned, and guilt washes through me, leaving a bitter taste in my mouth.
“No, I don’t think that you’re going to hurt me.” I try not to say the rest of the thought, but thanks to the goddamn truth serum, it comes out anyway. “I’m worried it’s going to feel too good.”
I’ve been around him so long now that I’m used to how huge he is, but now that we’re in this small, strange alien dome, I’m all too aware of just how huge he is—the sheer breadth of his chest, his height, the fact that his wings nearly touch the sides.
“Fine,” I say when he doesn’t respond, simply humming under his breath, pressing the corner of the translucent panel, where it slides away with a hiss. I cross my arms over my chest and squeeze my eyes shut. “Let’s get this over with.”