Chapter 14
MICAH
A serpentine line of cars dragged toward the campground’s exit, and I tapped my fingers against the steering wheel, my blood buzzing from the closing band. Spending the day on muddy campgrounds made me feel grimy as hell, and I was desperate for a hot shower.
Nik adjusted his seat backward and rested his hands on his stomach. The lights of the carnival at the campground still blazed with life, their colors glittering along his profile. Even with the sunburn that grazed his nose, he still looked otherworldly.
It was hard not to watch the way his chest rose and fell, how his lips parted when he was relaxed. He looked the same when he snoozed between rounds of sex, like all his edges had been softened, and it kicked the breath out of my lungs every time.
I ripped my eyes away, plucking a random thought to talk about and focusing on the road. “I’m glad today was the last day, or Dakota would’ve tried to get us to stay in one of the campers.”
Nik spoke through a long yawn, his words elongated and a little distorted. “Hard pass on that. Crazy shit happens on those campgrounds, and I ain’t got no interest in it. The amusement park does slap, though.”
I raised my eyebrows. Going by the way Nik had been acting all day, I figured it was his first time at Astral Motion. Hell, the first time I’d gone with Dakota, it was a sensory nightmare, being on a campground with thirty thousand other people.
So, it was impossible for me not to say, “I didn’t know you’d been before.”
Nik didn’t speak for a long time, and I figured he’d fallen asleep. The traffic had finally started to gain some speed, so I had to pay more attention to the road.
“It’s been a long time,” Nik said, his voice subdued. His palm glided down my arm, his fingers twisting above my elbow. “I don’t remember most of it. Today... today was different.”
“What was different?”
“The music. Your crew.” His grip tightened, a testing squeeze. “You.”
A tingle zoomed up my spine and back down again, spreading a tremble to my knees. I repressed the urge to pull over and do something that would very likely get us arrested and said, “I’m glad you were there.”
By the time we got back to my apartment, Nik was dead asleep. I gently brushed my knuckles along the side of his neck, and whispered, “Hey.”
Nik’s groaned and stretched his arms over his head and groaned. “We home?”
“Yeah,” I said, unbuckling my seatbelt, desperately trying to ignore what his slip of calling my place home did to my heart rate.
It took Nik a sec to get out of my car after me, but when he did, his bag was half draped on his lean body, his shoulders slumped with exhaustion.
I stepped closer, cupping my hand on his hip. “Wanna hang tonight? You can crash here if you want.”
Nik’s face scrunched in apology. “Please don’t be offended, but I don’t think I could get my dick working right now even if my life depended on it.”
This pulled a loud laugh out of me. “You look like you’re about to fall asleep standing, and that’s not my thing.” I ran my thumb over his hip. “I just figured we could chill.”
“Does chilling include a shower?”
“Shower is mandatory,” I said, peering down at myself. “I smell like sweat and dirt. And that’s not my vibe.”
“Facts,” Nik said. “If you’re cool with me borrowing your clothes, I’m down.”
“Consider it returning the favor,” I said. I tugged Nik closer and brushed my lips over his, earning a lingering kiss. Electricity shot through me, and if I wasn’t also exhausted, I’d likely push his ass against the car and continue.
Nik pulled away, a groan rumbling in the back of his throat. “Let’s write a check on this and cash it another time, because I’m literally crashing.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” I said, heading toward the apartment.
Everything was perfect. The sense of Nik behind me, the smell of cigarette smoke from an upstairs neighbor, and the small dashes of light from fireflies roaming around. By the time I put my key in the deadbolt, I’d already been drumming up a taco order from DoorDash.
I opened the door, and the perfection broke.
My apartment was wrecked. Pillows and cushions covered the floor, and my coffee table was upended against the sliding glass door. Hooks stuck out from the wall where artwork used to be, the end tables no longer held any lamps, and the TV stand was completely empty. The kitchen was trashed, with open, emptied cupboards and things all over the floor.
Blood pounded in my ears as I rushed to my bedroom and found it hadn’t been fucked with. My heart dropped to the floor, and I spun around and ran into Ada’s old room.
Everything was gone.
Everything. All of Ada’s belongings and anything we’d bought together to furnish this place. Our television, the Xbox we used to play games on together, and a tablet I’d just bought myself last month.
Fury burned inside of my chest like acid, cause my stomach to roil, and my mouth water with the threat of throwing up. I swallowed hard, my fingers folding into a fist.
“Fuck!” I yelled, slamming a fist against the door frame.
“Holy shit,” Nik said as he rushed up to me, digging in his bag for his phone. “Don’t touch anything, all right? I’m calling 911.”
I grabbed Nik’s hand, stopping him from completing the call. He looked up at me in worry as I slumped against the wall and said, “This wasn’t a break-in. Technically.”
“Tech... nically? You could’ve fooled me,” Nik said. He spun around slowly, taking in the chaos in my apartment—mine and Ada’s apartment. “If this wasn’t a break-in, who the hell did you piss off?”
I ran the heel of my hand over my eye and tilted my head to the ceiling. My heart pounded against my chest, and my face flooded with heat. Fury and heartbreak punched at each other, trying to win the fight. It made me want to scream and cry at the same time.
“My sister. But she’s too smart to be this sloppy, though, which means it was probably the current loser she snags her dope from because she’s always in debt.”
Tears broke through the barrier, and I wiped my stinging eyes. Nik kept a healthy distance and wetted his lips. His shoulders were tense, and his eyes kept skittering around the angry chaos that surrounded us.
I pushed myself off the wall, too exhausted from a day in the sun to fight the betrayal and humiliation and convince Nik to stay. This was a problem I’d face tomorrow when I wasn’t covered in sweat and dirt. “If you wanna leave, I don’t blame you. I’m going to be spending half the night cleaning this up.”
“Like hell I’m leaving.” Nik sounded furious. He stormed into the living room, tossed his bag onto the dining room table, and pointed to the kitchen. “I’ll start here because it’s the worst. I’m pretty sure I can figure out where shit goes because she didn’t completely rip everything out.”
“Ah, blessed I am for Ada being fucking short,” I said without inflection.
Nik laughed, which was a relief. I don’t think anyone else would’ve found humor in the situation, not even Dakota, and he’d known Ada as long as he’d known me. The icy shard in my chest melted a bit.
“Count them blessings when you can,” he said over his shoulder while he walked to the kitchen. “Because we never get enough.”
After a couple hours, we were finally done. I sank on the couch, too exhausted to care about my dirty, sweaty, clothes. Nik came into the living room with a small stack of framed photos, putting them down on the coffee table. He grabbed one as he sat down, studying it.
Nik tilted the frame to me and pointed at Ada. “Your sister?” I nodded, and he breathed a chuckle. “Yeah, kind of a dumb question. You look like twins.”
“That’s because we are,” I said, reaching for the photo. Nik handed it over, and I looked down at Ada—her glowing smile, her raven hair, the college graduation gown she was wearing adorned with an array of colored cords.
I tilted the phone back to Nik. “Ada had been accepted into her master’s program here. People would ask if I ever got upset that Ada was so much more successful than me, but I wasn’t. She was the giant in the crowd, and wherever she was going, I’d be there with her.”
“Y’all sound really close,” Nik said, keeping his voice low as if we were sharing secrets.
“That’s an understatement. Ada used to say that sharing a house with someone before you take your first breath is a special type of privilege. We understood each other in a way even our parents didn’t fully understand.” I set the photo face down on the coffee table. Looking at that would snap away the fibers of my already threadbare heart.
“We had no secrets between us. But now all she has are secrets. The person she is now is a stranger to me.” I allowed myself a few tears this time, my hand running over the tattoo on my arm. It used to be a signal of hope for me, an illusion I’d dreamt up, as if an age could signify that there was a chance Ada could get clean. Now, every time I cried about Ada I wondered if it would be the last, but somehow, from some grace of god, I could muster up a few more.
Nik’s hand slid across my shoulders, cupping the back of my neck. I feverishly wiped at my face and sighed. “Thanks for listening. And helping.”
Nik’s fingernails scratched along my scalp, and I leaned into the soothing touch. “No prob.”
He acted so chill it was a little unnerving. Most people would probably do everything they could to get the fuck out of here after seeing someone’s addict sibling had trashed their apartment and then threw up their entire heart on the table.
Maybe he knew someone in a similar position. Did they get clean? What if he actually had the answer to fix her that I’d been searching for? Curiosity tugged at my belly, but I pushed it away. If Nik wasn’t freaking, I sure as hell didn’t want to gamble on it.
But the unsettled feeling intensified. I twisted my hands over themselves. The electrified hum of discomfort was so distracting, I couldn’t ignore it anymore.
“Can I ask you a personal question?”
Nik’s blue-gray eyes blinked sleepily. “Sure.”
I turned over the question, uncertain. If I talked about it, we’d be in it for good. Nik noticed my hesitation and adjusted his leg until his knee touched the side of my thigh. He waited without an inch of impatience, and that gave me the courage to push through my worry.
“Do you know someone who’s an addict? Because you handled all of this like someone who’s got experience.”
At this, Nik’s shoulders stiffened, and his hand slipped. The air crackled with an energy I couldn’t name. It made my stomach twist, stiffening the muscles.
After a bit, Nik blew out a breath, his cheeks puffing. “I have some history with it, yeah. I was one of the lucky ones, and because of that, I do what I can to help where I can. You ever heard of the Collective?”
There was a lot to process, but I stumbled through the jumble of questions in my head enough to say, “I go to a support group there. It’s the one that’s like Nar-Anon.”
“Yeah, I like the group who helps run that one. They’re good people,” Nik said, a smile that held pride playing at his lips. “I sometimes drop in for the ones that are for people in recovery and talk to them. There’s a couple of programs I help with from time to time too. If you want, I can give you some of their information, and you can chat with them.”
Knowing there was someone who knew people involved in recovery might be exactly what Ada needed. I’d been trying to do this all on my own and getting nowhere, but if there was someone who could help me...
“But the thing is, your sister’s gotta want it. No one else,” Nik said, almost like he could read my mind. “You can’t force it.”
I’d heard that a million times before. It was an adage that was passed around like holiday candy, but they never talked about the people that loved them through it, who held them when everyone else walked away.
Twisting my fingers around each other, the heaviness of tonight sinking into my bones. Loving Ada used to be effortless, but that had long exhausted itself. I’d become Atlas, responsible for carrying the weight of her suffering and the aftermath of her afflictions.
“Hey,” Nik murmured, his fingers running through my hair. “You want me to get you something?”
“Honestly, I just want a fucking shower and then be unconscious for a solid eight to ten hours,” I said, blinking sleepily at the feeling of his thumb brushing against my temple. “Will you stay? I don’t want to wake up alone.”
“Of course,” Nik said. “I’ll sneak in a power nap, then pop in after you’re done, if you’ve got a spare towel.”
Relief uncoiled the tension in my shoulders. Before hopping into the shower, I grabbed him a fresh towel and a pair of sweats and laid them on the chair by my bed, but I was out of the shower and under the sheets before he came in to retrieve them.
The sounds of his shower were a balm to my frayed nerves, and I drifted in and out of sleep.
“Hey, is it cool if I borrow a hoodie too?” Nik whispered through my sleepy haze.
“Yeah. Cool.” With my eyes still closed, I gestured toward my closet where I hung my hoodies. As I heard him walk away, I couldn’t help but crack my eyes open to watch him.
My pants hung low on his hips, and a few stray drops of water still dotted his shoulders. His lean muscles flexed as he reached up, and my eyes caught something on the inside of his elbow.
Old wounds dotted the otherwise smooth skin. Track marks. The history that Nik referenced was more personal than I thought. He’d opened himself to me with a confidence in way people who hadn’t lived a day through that life could. His bravery plucked at the strings of my heart, leaving a melody humming through my bones.
When he crawled into bed, I scooted closer and wrapped myself around him. “I’m glad you were here with me,” I whispered against the back of his neck as I placed my hand over his heart. “I’m glad it was you.”
Nik covered my hand with his own. “I’m glad too.”