Chapter 13 #2
Cole looks at me and sighs. “Now what?” he asks, with the same resignation he had when I came in with my eye covered. Hearing it now is just as gutting as it had been that morning.
“That’s how you reacted when I came to tell you about my eye. Do you know that?” I ask, genuinely curious, though I can anticipate his answer. “When I came to tell you that something terrifying was happening to me, your first thought was that it would be yet another inconvenience to you.”
He’s shaking his head, tiny little side-to-side jerks of denial. “I don’t remember—”
“I’ve obsessed over those two words that just tumbled out of you. I’ve turned it into a mantra,” I add, with a bitter laugh, “and you don’t even remember saying it.”
I hate that I’ve done that. That I can give him the slightest bit of credit for the changes I’ve made, even if they were motivated by spite.
And I can be mad about the disrespect for my belongings, and my time, since I got to empty his drawers.
Those texts I hadn’t responded to had asked if I’d “really thought this through,” and where I kept the colander.
Nothing about my eye or my general well-being.
No apology. He’s never even asked why I left in the first place.
Shame smothers what’s left of my anger. “I made myself so small for you,” I say. “My wants, my pain, just to avoid inconveniencing you. And I can’t even be mad at you for missing it, because I never expected you to notice.”
I don’t know when the scales tipped, when my desperation to remain relevant and useful in our relationship outweighed the actual affection that should have been its foundation.
It’s mortifying. Or it should be. Now, only a week removed from that version of myself, it’s like I’m pitying someone else.
I can extend her some grace, the poor thing.
She doesn’t even know that she can climb a rope.
“Hey.”
I start at the sudden voice and look up to see a familiar figure in the doorway. Or, a chimera of familiar figures, the bottom half in its uniform of shorts and sneakers, and the top half I know from the results of clandestine image searches scorched into my memory.
Because it’s Ian’s familiar figure. And it is shirtless.
Ian fills the doorway, bracing his hands on either side of the frame.
Every line and plane of him is defined, perhaps not as sharply as in the years-old photo, but the man remains a vision; an anatomical chart as rendered by an artist’s hand.
The expanse of him uncovered makes him loom larger, the position of his arms showcasing the swell of his biceps and pectorals, the angle of his body compelling the eye downward to the segments of his abdominal muscles, and the chiseled v that vanishes into his waistband.
And he’s fuzzier than he’d been in the photo.
I force my attention upward, but his face is just as staggering. His attention is fully fixed on me, storm-cloud eyes assessing, shaded with concern. He cares.
He cares. The realization cuts through me, severing the me I’d been with Cole from who I’m determined to be now, shearing off the weighty disappointment. My smile comes unbidden. No more “Now what?” Just…now.
For now.
Ian watches me for a beat longer, then his face softens, mollified.
He tips his head almost imperceptibly to indicate Cole, marking him as his intended audience.
I assume that my gawking established how unprepared I was to see him, so I streamline my returning nod to convey that while wildly unnecessary, the demonstration of his vitality is nonetheless appreciated.
This nod is received with an eyebrow twitch and the tease of a smile.
I’m not sure what I’m supposed to get from it, but we’ve been maintaining eye contact for a good handful of seconds, so it’s pretty hot.
Ian steps in, pausing to ease off his shoes, and reaches out to Cole for a shake. “Ian Hammond.” Cole’s hand, in the fingerless, neon-yellow cycling glove, looks like a toy as he takes Ian’s massive paw. I hope one of Ian’s calluses snags the nylon.
It is surreal, seeing them beside one another.
Not simply the disparity in builds—Cole is fit, but in a refined way, the opposite of Ian’s functionally brutish form.
It’s the vast difference in my life that I’m staring at.
Cole, for whom I’d so narrowly defined my limits, and Ian, who’s been helping me uncover how much more I’m capable of.
It wouldn’t take a literature curriculum writer to see the symbolism.
“Hayes?” Ian asks, and I come back to myself. “We got your bed over to the house, but no mattress. Is there one you need from here? Because”—his almost-smile turns into a lascivious smirk, eyes smoldering—“you’re welcome to stay on mine.”
Oh, God, he is good. Too good. Because I’m visualizing the mattress I’ve been sleeping on all by my lonesome, but my mind has him on it with me, and we. Are. Naked!
I cock my head, pretending to consider his proposition as I savor how very, very still Cole has gone in the wake of it. “You know, I think I’ll stick with yours,” I say, keeping my phrasing vague. “Thank you for sharing it with me.” To the fully rooted Cole, I explain, “Ian’s my boss.”
“Your…” He goggles at me. “Where are you working?” It sounds like he expects my answer to be “a zoo.”
“Firehouse Fitness. Ian’s the owner. I’m on reception.”
“Stop in,” Ian says. “We have sports conditioning classes Monday and Wednesday evenings. Very popular with cyclists.” Returning to me, he points to the armchair, asking, “Want some help with this?”
“Thank you, that—”
Footsteps thunder in the hallway, and I am as unsurprised to see Diego and Grant burst through the doorway as I am by the fact that they, too, have opted to remove their respective shirts.
Did the three of them discuss this, or was there some brotastic vibe exchange that had them all commit to terrorizing Cole via muscle mass?
“And here’s Grant and Diego,” I say. “My other roommates.”
“You are Cole?” Diego growls. He literally puffs up his chest as he closes in on him.
Cole scoots back half a step, clip-bottomed shoes sliding on the wood. “Yes?”
Diego mutters something containing pendejo. Grant just glares. He has his arms crossed, hands tucked high beneath his upper arms, further showcasing his considerable biceps. Ian’s doing the same, expression passive, but no less intimidating.
I feel myself standing taller, too.
“I’m done here,” I say, directing the words to the trio at the door, but hoping that its deeper meaning finds its way to Cole. “We can—” I look where I’d left my shoes inside the entryway, but they’re gone. I frown. “Did someone take my shoes down?”
Grant’s stern face goes apologetic. “Um… maybe?”
Cole huffs a derisive laugh, and I bristle. So much for getting out of here on top.
“We can handle that,” chimes Ian. “Grant, Diego? Think you can manage the chair with Ellie in it?”
The potential spectacle is just compelling enough that I don’t insist on walking.
“It would be an honor,” Diego bites out, glare still fixed firmly on Cole.
Grant maneuvers the chair into the hallway, then stands to one side of it. “Milady?” he asks with a grin, gesturing to the seat as Diego comes to stand on the opposite side of the chair.
Without even looking at Cole, I step into the hallway, Ian behind me. We silently agree to leave the door open, so that Cole can watch me take a seat in my makeshift throne, the velvet upholstery which had seemed so indulgent when I bought it suddenly fitting.
“Gentlemen,” I say, “Let’s go home.”