Chapter 16
Sixteen
The mindless hum of elevator music dissolves into the squeak and roll of carts over linoleum.
I can’t help wishing for something livelier. Melodies with more tempo that’ll keep people entertained instead of turning them into nosy onlookers.
“You sure you don’t want to branch off separately?” The sting of another side-eye grates. Honestly, I’ve lost track of the running tally.
Carson slides me a look of his own, the kind that orders me to shut up and keep moving. The first time I suggested splitting up, it was because I thought he’d prefer it. Now, I’m only offering it for his sake.
People see my face, trace the line of the six-foot-something figure beside me, and fill in blanks that aren’t even there. He gets the hate. I get the head-tilt of pity.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.” It carries the slightest hint of exasperation.
He cranes his neck just enough to catch my eyes.
Conviction pinches at his corners. “I know I didn’t do that to you.
You know I didn’t do that to you. Anyone who actually matters knows I’d never lay a hand on a woman.
What sense is there in letting strangers make me feel a type of way? ”
Huh.
He has a point. A solid one. But still…
“It doesn’t bother you at all? The staring?”
“It bother you?”
Yes, but only on his behalf. How can it not, when the bruising cream in my bag says everything about the kind of man he is?
Carson, as always, misses nothing. Without breaking stride, he pulls off his baseball cap and holds it out.
“This might make it less visible to wandering eyes.” When I don’t immediately take it, he gives it a shake. “Go on.”
The fabric’s threadbare and worn beneath my fingertips.
This is what I mean. He’s always doing things like this. Small, quiet gestures that somehow speak more to me than the big, flashy ones.
Too wrapped in the thought, I don’t notice what I’m doing until it’s too late. A flick, the clip’s gone, and long strands cascade down my back. It’s only when Carson’s gaze dips that I realise what I’ve just done.
Panic. Raw, unforgiving panic, blinding me to the falter in his expression, the lock of his eyes to the fall of my hair. I battle so hard against the urge to contain it all, because that’d be weird, right?
After all, it’s just hair.
Only it isn’t. Not to me. For so long it was my identity—our identity—and now it’s nothing more than a brand of the loss I can’t escape.
The bite of nails into my palms is supposed to ground me, but everything’s slipping—my grip, my mask, my control. Carson only makes it worse, searching quick, quick, quick over my face like he’s reading every secret I’m trying to bury.
I pre-empt him before he can ask. “Can you adjust the cap?” Somehow, miraculously, my pitch is even. “It’s loose.”
His eyes narrow. For a second I think he’s going to call me out, maybe remind me I’ve got two working hands. He doesn’t; he just motions for me to turn.
The moment he steps in, I know. His chest at my back, warmth pressing into the hollows of my spine. I focus on that. On solid weight of him behind me, not the sting in my palms or the fluorescent glare bouncing off every mirror in the store.
His fingers move with practiced finesse. “All good?” he rumbles, and it brushes across my nape like it has a second meaning.
“Maybe tighten it a little more.”
It’s already a perfect fit. I just need the few stolen breaths to glue myself together. Still, those seconds slip right through me.
He’s hardly moved away when a chirp floats down the aisle.
“Carson!”
I blink at the sudden flash of her. Bright blue eyes, hair styled into effortless waves, and a shine that follows as she beelines straight for him.
“I thought that was you!” Her hand lands on his arm like it belongs there, pressing into muscle that shifts beneath her touch. “It’s been so long. Where’ve you been hiding?”
He takes a step back, then another, until he’s at my side and her arm is forced limp at her side.
“Been busy, Maya.”
Even though his tone’s curt, she must find an invitation to continue in it.
“Too busy for even me?” She pouts. “You should swing by sometime. We could all hang like we used to.”
She’s angling for more, that much is clear. If it weren’t so obviously one-sided, I would’ve slipped away already.
But it is.
“No. I don’t think so.”
“Then maybe something at yours? I heard from Jacob you’ve been back a while.”
Jacob. The name’s familiar, and it doesn’t take long to place him. He’d been at the barbecue.
“Sorry, Maya. Not happening.” Carson’s voice is final, but she’s undeterred, closing in.
The first step is a hit to Carson’s jaw, hardening it, the second to his shoulders, bunching them like he’s bracing for impact.
He’s uncomfortable.
The realisation hits me like a shockwave and knocks my own mess into the background for a second. No wonder he thought I was coming onto him.
Before she can crowd him again, I intercept. “Hi.” My hand’s conditioned by habit to lift, but a niggling feeling that she’ll leave me hanging keeps it lowered. “I’m Brielle.”
Her head turn is slow, but Carson’s isn’t; he zeroed in on me the second I stopped fading into the background.
“Did you go ten rounds with a bat?”
Well then.
I could swear Carson stands taller, but I don’t flinch. I lift a finger. “Just one round, but close enough.” I mean, the arm did impact like a baseball bat.
She’s not expecting the quip, but her recovery time is zero to none. “Have you never heard of makeup? Why would you walk around like that?”
“I don’t know… I think I look pretty hardcore.” A glance upward at Carson—and was that the ghost of a smile? Surely not. “What do you think?”
His face goes completely blank, which is why I’m completely unprepared for it. “You couldn’t catch me approaching you in the dark.”
…Is he—?
Yeah. He is. Joking. With me.
An inside joke, no less.
Suddenly, Maya’s interruption isn’t so bad. In fact, it’s the perfect diversion, resulting in a crisis averted. The smile I throw isn’t completely fake anymore.
“My loss.”
It’s only because he’s close that I catch it. The shadows in his eyes easing just enough to let something lighter leak through.
It’s nothing, really. Barely even a reaction, and definitely not a response, but the drop of dopamine sure doesn’t treat it so casually. Maybe, just maybe, we have inched forward.
My lips twitch, even truer this time. His gaze drops to follow it.
“How’s your mom, Carson?”
Just like that, he’s ice again. Shielded so completely I start to wonder if I imagined that spark of something molten.
The look he levels Maya with is one I know too well, grey eyes edged with frost, sharp enough to cut bone.
I have a feeling it’s warranted, because while her brows try for concern, her eyes tell a different story.
He doesn’t waste another word on her. “Come on,” he says, just for me. “We’ve got shit to do.” The dismissal is almost cruel in its ease and the look on her face says she’s not used to it. Maybe I’d feel sorry for her if she didn’t go below the belt. Using family, no less.
The charge sticks to him as we drift from aisle to aisle until I can’t keep it in anymore.
“Does that happen a lot?”
“What?” It comes out a little harsh.
“People assuming access to you like that.”
His face changes, subtle but enough to catch it.
“Y’know,” he mutters, busying himself with dropping something into the cart, “I was wrong.”
My pulse trips. Finally. Finally he knows that’s not what I was doing.
“Yeah?” I try not to sound too eager. “About what?”
“For making it out like you’re dumb.” He stops, locks eyes with me. “You’re not.”
Oh. That’s… not where I thought this was going. Totally at a loss, I grab the nearest item just to have something to do. His bewildered stare tells me what it is before I even check the label.
Hemp seeds.
“What?”
“Thirty-five dollars for that? There’s a seven-dollar bag right there.”
“Yeah, but—” I ping-pong between the two bags, searching for the difference. “These ones are organic.”
He scoffs. “So what? It’s extortion.”
“Fine, but look…” I wave the pricier bag. “Protein. This one has protein. Swimmers need a high intake, right?”
“Yeah, but trust me, there’s better ways than paying thirty-five bucks for bird food.”
“Fair enough.” I’m reaching for a bag on the shelf when his question lands out of nowhere.
“How are your swimming lessons going?”
My fingers falter, almost dropping it.
“Oh. Uh, good.” I clear my throat. “Well, as good as learning in the ocean with someone who’s never taught before can be.”
His face is unreadable. “Reese that bad?”
“No. He’s really trying. It’s just…” The words snag on the memory of salt-slick skin and the way I bolted upright gasping last night. “I’ve got my own issues.”
“Such as?”
Right. I forgot he doesn’t know. I try for nonchalant, rolling a shoulder. “Ocean’s a scary place.”
He raises a brow and, in the driest manner ever, asks, “Is it?”
I know exactly what he’s alluding to and why oh why does heat crawl up my nape? Talk about a delayed reaction. I wasn’t flushing red when he pulled me out of the water. Back then it was all adrenaline and shaky laughter. Ecstasy, even.
“Can we just… forget that night?” I say finally. By we, I mean him, because I’ll never let it go. It’s stitched into me, pivotal as it’s been.
He watches me through half-lowered lids, giving away nothing for what feels like forever.
“Why?”
“So…” Helplessly, my face reshapes into something close to hope. “…we can be friends?”
Lately, I’ve felt it. A crack in the numbness. Every time Carson’s near, it only splits wider. It used to come natural, brushing off his cold shoulder, but it doesn’t really anymore.
And since I’m tight with his friends, we’re bound to orbit each other all summer. Might as well try for something amicable, right?
“I know I was a mess that night. You’ve got every right to feel however you feel after that train wreck of a first impression. But, if we can get past it? I think it’ll be good, for both of us.”
“Friends,” he repeats, like everything else slides right past him except that. “Me and you?”
“Yeah.” Why does he make it sound like it’s impossible?
He gestures lazily toward me. “Party girl and…” Points to himself.
“Swim freak?” I toss back, because if he’s throwing out labels, I can too.
This time I don’t miss it, that tiny twitching at the corners of his mouth. It eases the planes of his face, makes those grey eyes less clouded.
“See? I made you smile. Proof my party-girl self being your friend isn’t that far-fetched. Don’t worry, I promise you won’t turn into a raging alcoholic around me.”
Just then the clatter of cans crashes through the store. Heads whip toward the noise, mine too, but when I look forward again, I freeze.
Carson’s eyes never left me. If anything, they’re fixed harder.
I swallow.
He sees it. Of course he sees it. When he leans in, it’s close enough that the rest of the store fades away.
“Is that what you are, then? A raging alcoholic?”
A second passes. Then another. I shake my head, because no.
I’m not.
Not yet, at least.
But that fear, the one that’s always lurking, nags at me. Like I’m one blackout, one bender away from crossing that line.
Maybe that’s why I find myself spilling something real. “There’s just… a lot going on in my head right now.”
“You understand that’s what drives substance abuse for a lot of people?”
I know he’s not trying to be harsh this time, but how can it not land that way?
“I know. I can own that this isn’t perfect, but right now—” It’s all I’ve got. I catch myself. “Never mind.” All of this. Never mind.
Friends, drinking, life. It’s just noise I can’t handle.
So I keep moving. Aisle after aisle, forcing my hand steady as I drop things into the cart. The silence between us knots deeper with every step, impossible to ignore. Only at checkout does it give.
“Okay.”
I blink. “Okay what?”
His eyes find mine, even. “I can try friends.”