“Bathroom,” he said, pointing to a curtain behind me. I pulled it back slowly. By bathroom he’d meant a hole in the wall that happened to have a stand up shower and a toilet.
I pulled off my wet clothes and stepped into his shower, ignoring the different towels hanging on the rack and stopping myself from wondering which were Shannon’s. The water never warmed, so I jumped out when it felt like the grossness of the day was on its way – rather sluggishly – down the drain.
There was one messily folded towel on the back of the toilet. It was dry, so I used it.
His shirt came to my thighs. If we were in California in our old life, I’d consider going out there like this. But I’d traded that life, so I put on his pants.
He was just pulling up a dry pair of jeans as I stepped out. He scrambled for a shirt, awkwardly throwing his arm across his back before turning it away from me. I chuckled. “You don’t have to hide your scars. I told you I’ve seen them. I’m surprised you’re self-conscious about them.”
We walked out of his bedroom, wonderfully close together in the narrow hall. “Why are you surprised?” he asked.
“Because the scars don’t bother you in our old life. You like when I touch them.”
He cleared his throat, and I gave him the space his expression said he needed from me. Avoiding the leaks in the roof, I toured his little home. It looked like a child had built it two hundred years ago. The wood used to be a few colors, most recently a greenish-blue. It reminded me of the pool house in a way – the way he kept things, in an order only he saw in his mind. I knew he’d meant for the tattered armchair to be slightly crooked.
Testing him, I nudged it with my knee as I passed it. Slowly, he walked behind me and nudged it back to its crooked place.
I laughed. He was
so
my Nate. Time and this awful world hadn’t changed him a bit.
“What's funny?” he asked.
“Oh ... nothing. Um … why don’t you two have pictures? Don’t happy couples have pictures?”
“I don’t know how happy we are.
Were
. But even if things were perfect, we wouldn’t have pictures. Do you have any idea how much a camera costs on Julian’s side? I saw one at the Common Market once. Ten whole old world dollars.”
I laughed and spun around with my eyes closed, enjoying the light moment in the midst of pure death. “Ten dollars is a lot of money to you in our old life too. Even though no one else would think that, you would.”
“And that amuses you? My poverty?”
“No. It’s just funny today. Not so much before I jumped through the portal. Money, or the lack of it, was sort of an issue in our relationship. I bought you a car.”
“A what?” I rolled my head dramatically around my neck. “Like … a vehicle thing? A human thing?”
“Yes, Nate.” I chuckled. “A human thing. Oh dear God, I need the sun!”
I plopped down on a worn little sofa that looked like someone had left it outside in the trash. The green and white flowers gave me vibes from the 70s. So did the mildew smell coming from it. To keep warm, I pulled my arms inside Nate’s shirt and huddled my knees under it too.
“It gets pretty cold some nights. This forest has a mind of its own. I could make you a fire,” he said.
He threw a few logs into a little fireplace that looked way too small to contain real flames. But I wasn’t afraid. Even though this Nathan was a stranger, I felt completely safe with him.
I remembered my wet clothes and undies in this bathroom. I hoped Shannon wasn’t planning to come over. I didn’t think I’d win that fight. And there would definitely be a fight because Nate was still shirtless and unbearably sexy, leaning over the little fireplace to make me warm. He didn’t need the fire. I wanted out of these clothes as I stared at him.
“There was water in your bag. Do you want one?” he asked.
“Sure.”
He threw his bundled shirt over his shoulder, like he’d decided not to wear it, and brought me a bottle of water.
“This plastic looks so clean. Did you boil it or something?”
I shook my head. I didn’t even know what that meant. I took one sip and lay down on the smelly sofa, soaking in the warmth of the flames and following Nate around the room with my eyes.
He leaned his head back, tilting water into his mouth, making his body curve in a way that twisted my stomach in painful knots. He moaned. “That’s …
really
clean water,” he said, like it was pure gold. He inhaled the rest of his bottle as I stared at the lines on him. I needed to touch him. Stupid Shannon. How could she want to dance to folk music more than being in this charming house with this sexy boy?
When he’d emptied his bottle, he stared at it almost in regret.
Maybe for drinking it so quickly.
“Want mine?” I asked.
“No, it’s fine. Drink up.”
“Come on. You know you want it. Just take it,” I said, holding out the bottle to him. He just stared, at me, not the water. He shook his head fast and crossed the invisible line that marked the beginning of the kitchen.
He returned with more water in his bottle, browner water.
“You’re nervous,” I said, because I knew him better than anyone. He didn’t pace when he was nervous. He was always overly normal, doing things that wouldn’t be out of the ordinary for no reason at all. Like looking out of the window and drinking water just a little too intently. “Relax.”
“How? I brought a human to my house. I’m worried that someone will come barging in at any moment and ... take you." He sighed. “Which is stupid, since I just met you.”
“Are you saying that you care about me?” I asked.
“No.”
Clearly a lie.
I chuckled, and he glanced over his shoulder to me. It took him a moment, but he smiled. It took every ounce of restraint I possessed to stay seated. “What would Nate think about you caring if I cared about you?”
His tone was blatantly flirtatious. It made me giggle like an idiot. “What would Shannon say about you sounding jealous?” I asked. “Of yourself, might I add?”
“She wouldn’t be surprised. I’m jealous of everything and everyone, according to her.”
He sat on the floor in front of the fire and rolled over to his stomach, his head on his arms. He closed his eyes and breathed in deep, pressing his nose against his skin. "I like talking to you," he whispered. It sounded like a confession, a guiltless, honest confession.
"Me too."
"I was never going to turn you in. It takes about three days to walk to the human border. I thought … maybe you just needed some time to sober up and someone to talk to.”
“Wow. I didn’t get that at all. You seemed sort of annoyed with me at first.”
“You
are
annoying. In a really adorable way.” I laughed, and he peeked his incredibly cute eyes over his arm. "In the way that bunnies are adorable. I didn’t mean anything by that."
"Whatever, Nate."
We sat in peaceful silence until my teeth started hammering.
“I’ll bring you a blanket,” he
said,
as he pushed himself up from the floor, uselessly and wonderfully flexing his muscles in the process. He slammed doors and ruffled things in his room for a while.
He eased into the living room with an odd look on his face.
Apprehension, maybe.
He cradled a fur blanket in his arms, being careful like it was precious to him, and stared into my eyes as he covered me with it. We’d had a lot of intense moments together, sliding down the slippery slope, but the seconds it took for him to cover me topped them all.
“It’s the only family heirloom I have,” he said, his voice shaky and breathless. He cracked a smile and forced a chuckle. “So don’t mess it up.”
I was too
far gone
to laugh with him. I was surprised the fire raging inside of me hadn’t caught on to the blanket and mildewed sofa. But it caught on to him.
He fell to his knees and pressed his forehead into my stomach. “This isn’t fair,” he whispered.
“What isn’t?” I asked.
“I’ve been hearing about this from other shifters for years. What the right girl will smell like, that her scent can hook you for life.
It’s
complete bullshit that you … smell like you do. You’re human! You’re on drugs. I don’t understand what I’ve done to be so unlucky.”
He ran his fingers lazily through my hair without moving his head. I didn’t know if I should smile or cry or kiss him. He wasn’t the real Nathan, and he seemed very distraught over how my scent made him feel, all of him but the hand in my hair.
“What do you mean?” I asked. “Why are you unlucky?”
“What else would you call smelling something heavenly fall from a rock and trading her for something I really can’t afford, then breaking up with my girlfriend because she smelled sad when we kissed?” He paused and I smiled, elated that he’d broken up with Shannon for me. “And now I can’t move. I shouldn’t have gotten this close to your scent. I literally can’t move.”
I twisted my fingers in his hair, and he groaned.
The girl who had always lived in this world tugged at me. She wanted to claim this stranger as hers and stay with him forever. The world was nothing like she thought it would be, not happy and free, but there were more wonderful things in it than Snowflake. There were handsome boys who turned into dogs when they wanted to.
No
. I pushed her away again. I had to hang on to my real self until twelve tomorrow or the necklace wouldn’t work.
“You don’t have powers, do you?” he asked. He looked up at me, and I shook my head. “You’re going to get me killed. This is
so
bad. I need to go apologize to Shannon, turn you in, and get back to my life. I can’t … feel this way about you. Not this fast.”
“How do you feel?” I asked, wanting to hear him admit it.
“Like you’re mine.”
I became very aware of my lip between my teeth and that his eyes hadn’t moved from it. He stretched his hand over my cheek. I leaned into it and closed my eyes. I puckered for the kiss that my lips felt coming, buzzing in anticipation.
When the moment fluttered away without it happening, I opened my eyes.
“You are a stranger,” he said. “And I am a sensible person. I’m going to bed.” He pulled my hands from his hair and moved away from me. He blew out the candles, one by one, slowly casting us into darkness. “Please leave in the morning. I patrol the forest at nine.” He pointed to the decrepit clock on the wall in his kitchen. “Make sure you’re gone before then.”
He lifted his hand and waved slightly, only lit by the dying glow of the fire.
The storm picked up again when he left, rocking the little shed. Thunder rattled the walls, and a new leak seeped through the roof, right above my head. I flipped to the other end and hid under the blanket.
The rain masked the sound of his shower, but I heard the knobs squeak off and the curtain open. Wiping my drool, I tried to think of anything other than my sexy boyfriend’s body double in that room wearing nothing.
The rain eventually made the sofa inhospitable. I took the blanket and huddled next to the fire.
The necklace was cold against my skin. I closed my eyes and thought about Sophia, begging myself to remember her – her hair, her laugh, how many times she’d barged in on me in the bathroom and held a conversation like we were in the park.
“Sophia Ewing,” I said. “I remember you.”
I clutched the necklace and watched the fire crackle. Something moved in the corner of my eye, red hair blowing past the window. I blinked and it was gone.
I stared out of the dirty window for minutes and saw nothing. Heard nothing. Surely if a girl had seen another girl in the house with her ex-boyfriend of a few hours, she would have done more than pass by the window.
“I’m being paranoid,” I whispered, and went back to the fire.
I sighed. There was no fire. Not anymore. I stretched out on the floor as the last of the flames died out. And now I was freezing.
After ten minutes of shivering, Nate tiptoed into the living room and picked me up from the floor. I couldn’t look at him. I would have kissed him if I had.
“I can’t let you freeze out here. Do you trust me not to try anything?” he whispered. I nodded against his chest. He was still shirtless.
He laid me on the bed, wrapped in my own blanket, and pushed in close behind me. “Tell me when you’re warm.”
“Okay,” I said, knowing I wouldn’t. I wanted him to hold me all night.
I closed my eyes. Everything in me wanted to turn around.
All of my heart.
My brain.
Every inch of my skin.
As the longing for him grew, I felt myself slipping away.
Years of wanting something like this bombarded me and crushed me into his thin mattress. I’d talked to Snowflake countless times about the person I’d fall in love with. I couldn’t have dreamed a better guy.
Gorgeous and caring and newly single.
Mom had told me once that she loved Dad from the moment she first saw him.
Fast, intense, and forever.
That was love, and I felt it for the guy holding me in his bed.
“How does Nate sleep with you every night with you this close to his nose?” he asked.