Chapter Eight #4
He blinks at me, stunned, and I rack my brain for how to put it better.
“No, no, no. I mean, yes, the options are limited, but I…got lucky, I guess, to be on this doomsdate with you.” I try to smile. “I think, if you’re willing, you’d make a great, um. Professor. For that, as well.”
Crimson floods Everett’s neck, crawling up his jaw, ending on his strong cheekbones. An instant of hunger flashes in his eyes, which drop from mine to my lips, then back. Heat flares within me, low in my belly. I half expect him to take me in his hands and lift me to his mouth right now.
Just as fast, concern clouds over the raw want I thought I saw in his eyes.
“Maisie, I’m—I’m incredibly flattered, but we’re traveling together for the next few days, maybe more. What if sex makes things complicated between us?”
“It won’t,” I rush out. “I promise. I’m not looking for love or anything, I just want to have sex. One time, and we can be done.”
He doesn’t look convinced, and suddenly, I realize what he’s actually saying.
I place my hand on his jittering leg, and he freezes.
“Even if this trip goes badly, if you piss me off or hurt my feelings or never manage to hold your own in a zombie fight, I will still get you to your sister. Then, when it’s time for me to leave you in D.C.
, I will.” I give him a small smile. “No Misery scenarios, I promise. And in case it’s not clear, you can say no to me right now, and it won’t change a thing. I will help you no matter what.”
But please don’t say no! I silently beg. I know my thirtieth-birthday sex deadline is a ridiculous thing to worry about when the country has gone to hell, but it’s one problem that, maybe, I can fix. One thing I can control. One bright light in this sea of darkness we’re swimming in.
Also, I just really want to kiss him again.
“So you want sex lessons…” Everett trails off, his eyes finally registering his hand still on my thigh. He releases it suddenly, and I do the same to his.
“Yes.”
“From me.”
I arch an eyebrow. “Yes.”
He raises his eyes to mine slowly, timorously. “Can I—think about it?”
I blink, trying to hide how the hesitation stings. I’m attractive. My pubic hair is already shorn. Am I really that weird that he’d rather spend the zombie apocalypse not getting off?
I knew I shouldn’t have told him about Mom.
“Yeah, sure.” My voice is distant, but I plaster on a smile. Cannot let this get weird right after I promised it wouldn’t.
“Maisie, I…” he begins, and he has that tone, that I’m about to disappoint you tone. It makes my stomach clench. “It’s just—the locks on your door. Your past. Your apartment was full of weapons. You clearly have trust issues.”
“So?” I fold my arms over my chest tight enough to hurt. “I’m working through them.”
“But you trust me enough now to…” He stops, swallows. “Do that together? Really?”
“You know what? I’m tired. Forget I asked. Can you take first watch?” I stand quickly, then thumb toward the tent. “I know it’s empty out here, but if we’re sleeping outside, I think it’s best we take turns staying awake.”
Everett nods quickly, his face still clouded over. “Absolutely, sure. Get some rest.” He smiles, a furtive bend to his lips he seems to have ordered there.
“Wake me up if you hear anything.”
“Got it.” His voice is too bright, too chipper. He gives me a thumbs-up, and I cringe as I trudge toward the tent.
God. How much humiliation am I going to experience with this guy?
The thrippp of the tent’s zipper divides the moment into the before, when I thought asking the last hot guy in the United States to teach me about sex was a good idea, and after, now that I know it wasn’t.
I collapse onto my butt, hiding my burning cheeks behind my hands.
I don’t even know Everett! It only feels like I do because I’ve seen so many sides of him in the last twenty-four hours—friendly, passionate, horrified, freaked out, sad, hurt, unsure.
I’ve witnessed him on a date, in my apartment, in his home environment, draped in the past he feels too guilty to let go, and now by a campfire in the dregs of winter under the stars.
We’ve even gone shopping together, for god’s sake.
All these snapshots of a person that maybe you’d get in a normal relationship’s progression over weeks or months for us have been condensed into one long, wild twenty-four hours.
And it’s the most I’ve known anybody, really, except for Mom and Gramps.
It doesn’t mean I know him, though. And he’s right—I don’t trust him.
With a jolt, I pat my pockets until I find the map and my car keys, then exhale.
I don’t think Everett would leave me here in a frozen mountain range, but I can’t afford to be wrong about that, either.
I’m about to zip the tent closed when Chicken noses inside and nestles by my sleeping bag.
I settle in beside her, stroking her fur as a single, stupid tear rolls into my hairline.
I fall asleep to the glow of the heater and the sweet, rumbly sound of her purring.