Sixteen
‘GOT A LITTLE WET TONIGHT, HUH?’
In the middle of dragging yet another wipe over the fake scales making a mess of my skin, I freeze. Steeling myself, I look away from my reflection in the small mirror I hold a few inches from my face, and tilt my chin toward the man sprawled on Imani’s bedroom floor beside me. ‘What?’
‘Your hair.’ Kai reaches for me, twirling a still-damp strand around his finger and tugging. ‘You go for a swim?’
‘Oh. Uh. Yeah.’
It’s literally tangible – the shift of mild curiosity to much stronger, mischievous intrigue. ‘What did you think I meant?’
Though my mouth remains shut, I fear my flaming cheeks give me away.
Luckily, an interruption saves me from an interrogation.
Knuckles rap against the door a second before Brendan peeks around the edge, his Chucky costume gone and replaced with pajamas, though fake blood still stains his red hair. ‘Heath in here?’
‘Said he had to go home,’ Imani replies from the en suite, yelling to be heard over the running shower.
Blue eyes drop to the checkered dress discarded on the floor. Brendan swallows. With a sharp nod, he disappears, leaving me with the acrid tang of guilt coating my tongue.
I didn’t know Heath had left. We all walked here together; I figured he was staying over too.
I’d resigned myself to a sleepless, fretful night spent thinking myself in circles and avoiding his gaze – which I’ll probably still have anyway.
Without that last part, but with the added knowledge that I drove him away from his friends.
‘Lover’s quarrel?’
The shake of my head is slow, and not anything close to convincing.
‘Are you—’
‘Leave her alone, Kai.’ Emerging from the bathroom wrapped in a silky bathrobe, Imani kicks her inquisitive friend as she walks past us on her way to her wardrobe. ‘Go make yourself useful. I want a large Hawaiian pizza on my doorstep by the time I’m dressed.’
Though he gags at her choice, Kai dutifully climbs to his feet. On his way out the door, he makes sure to shoot me a look that promises this isn’t over.
‘And a Veggie Lover for Dani,’ Imani calls in his wake, bent at the waist as she shimmies into a pair of boxers. ‘Light on the cheese.’
I don’t get the chance to insist that I’m not hungry – or to marvel at the odd, simple loveliness of someone knowing my fucking pizza order.
Quickly pulling on a t-shirt, Imani drops to sit cross-legged opposite me.
‘Okay.’ She claps her hands together before clasping them in her lap. ‘Spill. What happened?’
Too quickly, I blurt, ‘Nothing.’
Brows high, Imani snorts.
‘Y’know, it’s not really any of your business.’
‘It’s not,’ she agrees. ‘But I think you should tell me anyway.’
Her hand lands on my knee, and I swear to God, it plucks the fight right out of my body. Rasping an exhale, I close the mirror still in my grip with a snap, my fingers closing tightly around it. ‘I—’ I start and fail, and try again. ‘I like Heath.’
Imani’s gasp is a gentle tease, not quite mocking. ‘I know, babe,’ comes out genuine, soft. ‘I have eyes.’
I huff, frustrated. She doesn’t get it, she doesn’t know, she thinks I’m a real girlfriend confessing feelings for a real boyfriend, she thinks I’m allowed to have feelings, she thinks I just go around having feelings for people.
‘I mean . . . it doesn’t . . . It doesn’t feel right,’ I do a piss-poor job of trying to explain. ‘It feels like too much.’
Sympathy marks soft lines in her expression. ‘Oh, Dani.’
As my fingers rise to rake over itchy skin, my gaze drops to the floor. ‘And tonight we, uh, hooked-up.’
‘Did he . . . did he do something you didn’t want?’
‘No. God, no. I, uh, wanted it.’ My ears burn so hot, they fucking ring. ‘I really wanted it. I liked it.’
‘That’s good,’ she almost questions. ‘You’re supposed to.’
‘I know, but I don’t. Not all the time, not usually. I’m not, like, interested.’
A soft ah makes my stomach hurt. ‘It freaked you out.’
Barely, I nod.
Floorboards creaking beneath her, Imani shifts closer until our knees touch. A cleared throat is an obvious demand, and when I begrudgingly look up, I realize I was wrong. That isn’t sympathy she’s wearing – it’s empathy.
‘I’m like that too, kind of,’ she admits, with none of the shame that plagues me.
‘Can’t get off with strangers, can’t relax enough.
It only feels good when it’s someone I really know.
’ Imani looks down, watching her fingers as they fiddle with the hem of her t-shirt, a faint smile twisting like a frown. ‘Someone I care about.’
Like Brendan? I almost ask, but I don’t dare. Whatever’s going on between them is not something I should be wading into – I do, just for a second, let myself dwell on the fact that I want to.
And then I move on.
‘I think,’ I slowly mouth, ‘that’s what it is for me too. Kind of.’
‘With Ben,’ Imani starts, and the mere mention of the man is enough to make us both grimace. ‘What was it like?’
‘Good at first,’ I say, and I mean it. Because it was good, the beginning of things between me and him. It wasn’t always bad. ‘Then fine. Then . . .’ I trail off, hoping a wave of my hand is an adequate replacement for the right words. ‘He used to . . .’
‘Make you feel like it was your fault?’ Imani rightly assumes. ‘It wasn’t. I would say it’s no one’s fault, however I do have this weird instinctive urge to blame Ben for literally anything and everything.’
I snort – God, do I share that urge.
‘Have you talked to Heath about it?’
‘A little.’
‘And?’
There’s nothing wrong with you, Daniela, echoes around my skull. Not a single thing.
I picture him last night, recall the awe in his eyes as he gazed up at me, the erratic flutter of his pulse beneath my fingertips. Flushing, I tuck my knees up to my chest and hide behind the curves of them. ‘You were right. He’s a really good guy.’
‘Yeah.’ Pride stretches her mouth wide. ‘Matty and I trained him well.’
For a split second, I feel that weird almost-grief again as the what could’ve been of it all hits me.
As I imagine what it would be like to have friends you grew up with, friends you can’t remember ever not knowing; what it would’ve been like to have these friends, specifically.
‘I didn’t mean to chase him off tonight. ’
‘You’re not responsible for things he does of his own free will, Dani. He wanted to give you space, so he did. Simple.’
Simple, she claims, but it doesn’t feel so to me. ‘I just feel guilty.’
‘Well, stop it.’ She playfully reprimands me with a backhand to the shin. ‘He’s a big boy. He can survive one night on his lonesome. Although,’ her mouth crooks, momentarily wicked. ‘I guess he’s got some pretty good memories to keep him company, huh?’
I choke on a shocked, scandalized squeal of her name.
She only smiles wider. ‘Long night ahead of him, I bet.’
My hands slap over my face, hiding my mortified flush, muffling a strangled laugh. ‘Shut up.’
‘He’s gonna show up looking like Popeye tomorrow.’
I laugh so hard, my stomach hurts. Hands dropping, I shift my weight so I can free the pillow lodged beneath my butt and use it as a weapon rather than a cushy seat.
Yelping, Imani bats off my attack. It takes her a second to grab a pillow of her own and retaliate, getting in a hard thwap to my ribcage that I return.
‘Aren’t you supposed to be naked for that?’
Pausing, we both turn to the doorway – we both roll our eyes at Kai, who leans against the doorjamb, pumping his brows suggestively.
With outraged noises, we launch our pillows at him.
He catches them easily before tossing them back, ha ha’ing mockingly when he hits us both square in the face.
‘Your abominations to Italy are here,’ he calls, as he disappears again, footsteps taking him back down the hall, ‘and you have five seconds before I feed them to the rats.’
Clambering to her feet, Imani suggests he do something a lot more vulgar with them. As she drags me up too, I make a face. ‘You guys have rats?’
She shakes her head, snorting. ‘Our neighbor has a Chihuahua pack.’
‘Ah.’ I snicker, sobering quickly when Imani moves to leave the room. ‘Hey.’ I grab her, gently pulling her to a stop. ‘Thank you. For listening.’
Without missing a beat, she throws an arm around my shoulders and squeezes me tight. ‘Thank you for talking.’
I wake up rather abruptly when someone, unwelcome and unceremonious, sits on me.
‘Morning,’ Kai sing-songs, clearly unperturbed by my grunt-slash-growl and the vicious scowl one half-cracked eye shoots his way. Tilting a deep, plastic bowl toward me, he shakes it so the wrapped candy within rustles. ‘Want some?’
My nose literally turns up. ‘It’s—’ I reach for my phone where it sits face-down on the coffee table and check the time, ‘—eleven?’
‘Is that a question?’
No, it’s an anomaly. I am, and I always have been, a natural early riser.
I can’t remember the last time I slept until eleven.
I don’t think I’ve ever slept until eleven.
I know I had a late night – how people who spend almost every waking hour together still have so much to talk about at two in the morning, I’ll never understand – but still. Sleeping until almost midday?
As if a fire is lit under my ass, I buck Kai off and scramble off the sofa that served as my bed last night.
I might not actually have anything I need to do today, no class or practice, but I never just waste a morning like this.
I get in a few laps or I run or I study, I find something productive to do, I never just do nothing.
‘Good God, woman.’ Snagging my wrist, Kai yanks me back down. ‘Stop moving. You’re making me nauseous.’
‘I think that’s the Tootsie Roll you’re having for breakfast.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’ He scoffs. ‘I had Twizzlers for breakfast.’
I’m one hundred per cent sure that the look on my face is nothing short of horrified. Kind of like how Kai looked at me last night when he discovered my apparently criminal lack of a sweet tooth – Mounds bars being the exception to that genuinely had him reconsidering our friendship.