Chapter Twenty-Eight. When You Have a Conversation in the Dark
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
WHEN YOU HAVE A CONVERSATION IN THE DARK
FARREN
I watch from my window as James crosses the long pasture between barn and house three times. Pacing, but with a field of distance instead of a room’s worth.
I rode Daphine home instead of getting back in the car. The perfect excuse, or, better put, escape. I needed to process. With Colm’s actions and Willa’s offer, my head is swimming. I also didn’t want anyone seeing us together, especially James’s father. Again.
After what happened today, I don’t know what to even say to James. But I do have questions and my emotions keep bouncing from fear to anger and back again.
So, I wrap a sweater over my brown plaid dress and I meet him halfway. James stops his trudging upon noticing me, a statue in the grass. “We need—I mean, I want to talk to you,” he calls out, a few feet away.
“I know a place. Follow me.” I move in a diagonal, toward the cliffs.
“Where?” he asks as he jogs to my side.
I glance at him. Realize his face is too much for me right now and look back to my destination. “Not far.”
Toward Jeffrey and Shelly’s new home the cliffs become riddled with smaller caves, the perfect locale for Feyling dragon colonies.
As we approach the murky property line and the cliffs, a light show begins off the coast as a flutter of Feylings emerges to hunt for bugs.
Hundreds of tiny dragons whizz across the open ocean, glowing like the twinkling of stars, coating the skyline in blues, greens, and pinks.
James halts. “Wow.”
“Pretty right?”
James nods in appreciation, watching the Feylings whirl and sparkle. My breath catches as hundreds of dragons flock together in unison. In a moment’s notice the grouping transforms from the random twinkling like firefly lights to a wash of color, like paint across the sky.
I settle down in the grass. James sits right next to me and in the silence and darkness I am alert to his every movement. We do need to talk. I just … Today feels too big, too awful.
I sense when James turns toward me. “Are you okay?”
I grab a fistful of grass so cool it feels damp. “No,” I answer honestly.
“Yeah, bad question.” He waits a beat. I can tell he wants me to look at him.
But I’m so ashamed of how everything unfolded.
“Farren, you need to know. I didn’t tell Colm to ‘go for it.’ Not in the way he implied.
I said, if he liked being rejected to go for it.
I thought he’d ask you out and you’d shut him up better than I could, since…
” He practically stammers at the end. He’s nervous.
Just as nervous as me. “Since our deal,” he finishes.
“Pretending to hate each other.”
He sighs. “Yes.”
I blow out a breath, wondering if I should admit this next bit. “That was my first kiss,” I blurt into my hands so I can’t see his confusion, or worse—his pity.
When I do glance at him, it’s not confusion or pity though. Anger lays plain across his face. “I’m sorry. I think … I think he noticed me come into the tent. You know how I told you some of the guys talked about you and I’d tried to stop it—”
“By calling me worthless? Yes, I remember.”
James winces. “I think he kissed you to get revenge after losing the race so badly.”
At first, I want to deny that accusation, but it makes sense. The way Colm switched from yelling at me to kissing me—it wasn’t just me not being able to read him. Yet, I still feel foolish and used. “That doesn’t make me feel any better.”
James catches me looking at him and suddenly we’re staring at one another.
“I’m so sorry, Farren.” His eyes soften as he studies me.
It amazes me how different staring at James Murphy now is, how I desire his attention more than anything.
His warm eyes, all those freckles, his reddish-brown hair even longer than when he arrived.
The darkness reminds me of the night the hatchlings were born.
The sky is calmer, but my heart thunders.
I break first, eyes flicking back to watch the Feylings. “I’m so embarrassed I admitted that was my first kiss.”
He rubs the back of his neck. “If it makes you feel better, I’ve never kissed anyone.”
“What?” I tumble through my memories. Never did I think we would be equally inexperienced.
There were countless girls in our year who talked about wanting to make out with James.
Had none of them actually kissed him? Back then it wasn’t like I cared about that information, at least not like I care now.
“Walsh, I’ve never dated anyone. All I do—or did—was training, school, homework, and more training.”
Much like my schedule, taking care of dragons in lieu of training. But dating isn’t a prerequisite for kissing. Not for most people anyway.
“Don’t count Colm,” James says, so quiet I barely catch the words.
“What?”
“Just say your first kiss is when you kiss someone.”
“Okay,” I whisper, heat crawling up my face. “I meant to thank you for saying you crafted that bronze. You saved me.”
James leans back on his hands. “That’s part of our deal, right? I help keep your secret. Besides, you’ve saved my life four times. I don’t think I could ever make it up to you.”
“Four? That sounds like an exaggeration.”
“First on the tracks. Then with Bex. Then Nity.”
“That’s very clearly three,” I laugh.
“Four is just in general. Keeping up with our deal so I can stay here.”
The fact that he feels just being here is saving him.
My stomach turns. I can’t stop myself from thinking about how today almost jeopardized that.
Colm, Dr. Burke, the recruiter, they could all suspect me of lying about my crafting ability.
Could suspect that James and I are friends.
Every race, the evidence builds against us and soon someone is going to gather enough to lead them to Nity.
“You need to know something about the first time I saved you.” The words tumble from my mouth. I can’t keep this secret any longer.
His eyebrows lower in confusion and he sits up straight again.
“When I saved you on the racing tracks, I tried to resuscitate you,” I start.
“I know.” Something seems to register in his eyes, and he flinches. “I’m sorry I ever joked about that being a kiss. I never meant—”
I hold up a hand. “That’s not where I’m going with this.
I did chest compressions over and over and I told everyone that it worked.
And I got you breathing, but…” I pause. For so long I vowed to keep this to myself so I could act like it didn’t happen.
Never in my wildest dreams did I think of telling James himself, needing him to know.
“There was a moment I thought you were going to die, and in that moment, I gave you gold.”
“You what?” He shifts toward me, scanning my face.
Slowly, I pull out the vial I always carry around. “I tipped about this amount of gold flakes into your mouth.”
He glances at the gold a mere moment before staring at me again. Now that I know him, it’s not a detached or emotionless expression. I can read his surprise like it’s my own.
“But why? Why would you risk—” He doesn’t have to finish the sentence. I risked Nity that day. I risked my family. I risked my entire world.
“I know what I risked.” I stand, unable to sit a moment longer.
The fear and shame and anxiety all come back revealing this truth.
I should have just kept at the chest compressions.
That was the sensible thing to do. But I’ve never been sensible when it comes to James.
I start back up the cliff, unable to face him any longer.
He scrambles to his feet to follow me. “Farren,” he calls.
I stop. “Because you would have died,” I announce to the dark path in front of me. At the time I was so panicked at the idea, being a spotter and failing at my job. I had the means, and I used it. Now the idea of his death cuts me to the bone.
“But you hate me?” The question pounds at my back.
I whip around. “I don’t hate you.”
“Okay, maybe not now, sure. But back then. Back then you hated me.” He punctuates the words and each one stings. “Heck, even a month ago you hated me.”
“And you hated me.” I throw back at him as I step closer.
He steps forward as well. “Are you joking?” There’s that surprise again.
“Until you came here you had barely said a few sentences to me. I was still a copper in your eyes. And you’re—” I stop.
I don’t want to finish my sentence. I don’t even know what I plan to say.
He’s a silver-crafter? Well, I’m a gold.
He’s a rider? Well, that’s not what he wants.
He’s a Murphy? Well, what does that mean in light of truly knowing him?
His whole body stills, and I know I’ve hurt him. “You can say it,” he says.
“I can’t. That’s part of the problem.” Because I don’t even know anymore.
My own misconceptions, my own ignorance in reading him.
My own competitiveness when James isn’t even that competitive.
I exacerbated our feud and maybe deep down that’s why I saved him with gold. Maybe I always knew I was in the wrong.
“I can take it. Please, tell me.” He clenches his fists, awaiting the blow. “It’s for the best anyway. I should know to keep the pretense up. We have to keep pretending.”
It’s in that moment I feel myself become unglued. All the hiding, the faking. For days upon days I’ve been smashing my feelings down in regard to James Murphy. Now they are bursting out of me, gnawing for attention.
“I’m tired of pretending,” I whisper.
I don’t wait for him to respond. Instead I lean forward and kiss him. I’m doing as he suggested, reclaiming my first kiss as something I choose. I’m choosing him.
When I pull back a moment later, my stomach sours at the disbelief on his face. Oh my god, I’ve read this all wrong. I threw myself at him when he was only looking for an explanation. And he’s never kissed anyone either. I’m as bad as Colm, forcing myself on him. I’m an awful, horrible, person.
“Did you…?”
“I’m sorry—I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to steal your first kiss.”
His eyes light up and all that surprise seems to turn into delight. “You haven’t. Not until I kiss you.”
Before I can respond he’s leaning back in, hands in my hair and lips against mine. And all at once James Murphy is kissing me like he never wants to stop.