by Amelia Stone
Dad gave me a smile. “Then that’s all that matters, isn’t it?”
Three hours later, I was standing on Graham’s porch in my pajamas and a hoodie, my hand poised to knock.
This was ridiculous. I needed to just turn around, get back in my piece of shit Chevette, and go back across the bay to my own house.
Except that my own house now felt more like a stranger’s than Graham’s ever had.
It didn’t help that Taylor had managed to ghost on me while I was gone. I’d come home Saturday to find her closet empty. All her makeup was gone from the bathroom, her shoes emptied from the cubby in the hall. She’d even taken her fat-free Greek yogurts from the fridge.
And I had no idea where she’d gone. She hadn’t left a note anywhere in the house. I’d even dug out my cell phone from the junk drawer, charged it, and checked for messages that way. I had nine hundred and forty-seven missed calls, sixteen hundred and three missed text messages, and my voicemail was full. Just about the entire town of South Bay had been trying to get ahold of me.
But not my supposed best friend.
I missed her more than I thought I would, given how much she annoyed me in general, and how much she’d hurt me the night of that horrid double date. I’d never realized that having her there to talk to me, watch TV with me, or even sing her stupid pop songs to me, had kept me from being alone with my thoughts. Now, having the house all to myself was more time in my own head than I could take. I couldn’t even stand to look at my front door – or what was left of it – without an irrational urge to take a sledgehammer to the entire cottage. The walls were closing in on me, the ceilings pressing down from above.
Things had gotten so bad that I’d actually stopped counting how many times a day I’d taken that stupid fucking envelope out of the drawer. The whole thing was pointless, since I was never going to open it. So why bother counting?
And the bed that I’d shared with my husband for so long? Forget about sleeping on it. It felt like I was in a hotel. It was comfortable enough. But it wasn’t mine. Not anymore.
Sleep deprivation had made me insane, clearly.
So here I was, standing on Graham’s front porch at – I checked my watch – six minutes to midnight, debating whether to knock.
The choice was taken out of my hands when the porch light flicked on, and he opened the door.
“Larkin?” he asked, looking sleepy and rumpled and delicious in a pair of Star Wars pajama pants and an army-green tee shirt. “I thought I heard someone.”
I closed my eyes, feeling like a dick for waking him up. “I’m sorry, never mind,” I muttered. “Go back to bed.” I turned to go.
“No, stay,” he said, reaching out an grabbing my wrist. I shivered, attributing it to the frigid night air. “What’s the matter?”
I bit my lip. This was most definitely not his fucking problem, and it was completely unfair to disrupt his night like this. But I was going crazy here. Desperate times, et cetera.
“Larkin?” he prompted, running a hand through his already-messy hair.
I took a deep breath. Fuck it. I’d come all this way. Might as well try to get what I came for. I looked up into those leaf-green eyes, now hooded and soft in the dim light.
“I can’t sleep,” I told him, hating the desperate, pleading edge to my voice.
A slow smile creeped across his face as he opened the door wider. “Come on in.”
“You take my hand and give me your friendship
I’ll take my time and send you my slow reply
Give me an inch and I’ll make the best of it
Take all you want and leave all the rest to die.”
- Ultravox, “Reap the Wild Wind”
I was catching up on work when I heard a knock on the door.
A glance at the clock in my computer’s system tray told me it was well after ten, and I frowned. Who the hell could be at my front door at this time of night?
I grabbed my phone as I left the room. Maybe Ellie had an emergency? She would normally text or call when she needed something, but I’d had my headphones blasting 80s tunes into my ears all night. I might have missed the notification.
But a glance at my phone as I descended the stairs told me I didn’t have any missed calls or texts. My frown deepened. Was it a neighbor, then? Or the police?
My heart rate picked up as I flew down the stairs and to the front door. Please God, don’t let it be the police.
The mystery was solved when I flipped the porch light on and looked through the glass. Larkin was here.
Huh. I wasn’t expecting her.
She’d come over every night this week, always with the excuse that she was unable to sleep in her own bed. And I was more than happy to lend mine. But I’d fallen behind on work, since her presence predictably meant that I couldn’t concentrate on much of anything but her. I would try to focus on technical drawings and spreadsheets, but I usually found that I’d rather cook dinner for her, or talk to her, or make her laugh, or watch her while she slept. I especially would rather do that last one.
But spending all this time with her meant that my demanding job had become even more demanding as of late, since I wasn’t putting in my typical after-hours time. And when I’d made an offhand remark about the unread emails in my inbox hitting the triple-digit mark, she offered to stay away for the weekend, to let me catch up. And though I really did not want her to, my boss had glowered at me every morning this week. So this morning, when she’d offered to give me some time to catch up on work, I told her I’d see her on Monday.
I looked at her through the leaded glass of my front door again as I reached for the knob. I had no idea why she was here on this rainy Saturday night, but I didn’t care. I was just happy she was.
“Hey!” The door flew open, pushed by the wind, and I made a grab for it. “I didn’t expect to see you tonight,” I said, once I’d got ahold of the door.
I ushered her in, and she hurried into the foyer, dripping all over the Turkish carpet that used to be in the foyer of my parents’ house. Heavy rain had been clattering against my roof all evening, audible even with the music cranked up. Larkin had obviously gotten caught in the storm. Her hair was plastered to her head, and she was shivering, her arms wrapped around herself like she was trying to keep warm. And it wasn’t hard to see why. She was absolutely soaked to the bone.
“What happened?” I hurried into the hall bath, grabbing a towel and draping it over her shoulders.
“T-t-t-th-th-the-” Her teeth were chattering too hard for her to get the words out. “Th-th-the c-c-c-car br-brok-k-ke d-d-d-d-own.”
“Shit.” I pressed my hand to her forehead, then her cheeks. She felt clammy and feverish. “Come here.” I took her hand, leading her into the bathroom. Then I pulled the shower curtain back, turned the taps on, and cranked the water as hot as it would go, letting the steam fill the room.
“Take those clothes off and get in the shower. I’ll go grab you something dry to put on.”
I turned to go, but from the corner of my eye I saw her sway, listing toward the sink like she was about to crash. I rushed over to her, putting my arms around her to steady her. The last thing I wanted was for her to pass out right now.
“Good?” I asked, watching her carefully.
She nodded. “S-s-s-sorry,” she muttered. “S-s-s-s-s-stu-stupid c-c-c-car.”
“Eh, car troubles happen to everyone.” I pulled her into me, trying to transfer some of my body heat to her. “You didn’t have an accident or anything, though? You’re not hurt?”
My heart raced once again as I thought of the variables here. It was raining cats and dogs. Visibility would be shitty. She might have crashed, or spun out, or even hydroplaned. I pulled away just enough to rake my eyes up and down her body, checking for any obvious signs of injury.
But she shook her head, and I let out a sigh of relief. “Thank God.”
She didn’t answer, instead pressing herself to me again. She clung to me almos
t like she wanted to crawl inside me, like she was Luke and I was the tauntaun. Under any other circumstances, I would have been overjoyed to have her this close to me again, and so eager to touch me, at that. Even though we’d been sleeping in the same bed all week, any touch between us had been strictly platonic. I hadn’t actually held her like this since the night she’d told me about her husband.
Crazy to think that had only been a week ago. It seemed like I’d know her for longer. It seemed, in some ways, like I’d known her forever.
She shivered again, and I mentally shook myself. I needed to focus on getting her warm and dry. She needed me to take care of her right now.
“Well, we can handle the car tomorrow. For now, let’s get you warm and dry, okay?” I rubbed her back, her arms, everywhere I could reach, trying to get her blood circulating.
She shuddered. “Oh-k-k-kay.”
When she finally stopped shaking, I pulled back. She looked up at me with those lavender eyes that were so much older than the rest of her.
“Th-thanks,” she whispered.
I nodded. “Any time.” I dropped my arms reluctantly, not really wanting to let her go. But she needed to get out of those clothes and get warmed up. So I stepped back until I was standing in the hallway.
“Hey,” I said as a thought popped into my head. “You never said why you came here tonight. I thought we weren’t hanging out again until Monday?”
Hanging out. What a weird euphemism for what we were doing. I mean, on paper, it was just sleeping. Talking a lot, too. Eating a lot of dinners. But it felt like so much more than just “hanging out.”
She closed her eyes, giving me a guilty frown. “S-still can’t s-sleep.” She shook her head. “Should have just s-stayed home.”
Shit. I didn’t want her to regret coming here tonight, possible hypothermia and all. The last thing I wanted was for her to feel weird about our “hangouts.”
Or worse, put a stop to them.
“It’s all good. You know mi bed es su bed.”
She shook her head, disgusted by my Spanglish, probably. But she also smiled at me, letting her unease go for now. Then I winked at her, giving her one last look before I shut the door.
I could hear the smack of wet clothing hitting the tile floors, then the rasp of the shower curtain sliding along the rod as she closed it. I stood outside the door for a moment or two longer to make sure she didn’t crash. When I was sure she was okay, I headed back upstairs.
I foraged through my dresser, trying to find more of Ellie’s clothes, but I came up empty-handed. Finally, I grabbed some of my clothes for her to wear. They’d be huge on her, but they were at least better than the sodden ones she’d just taken off. And I even had the brilliant idea to put them in the dryer for a few minutes, so they’d be nice and toasty for her.
Unfortunately, that also meant a trip to the basement. I sighed. At least I’d be getting some stairs in tonight. I’d skipped the gym today, so I’d take the exercise where I could.
While the dryer ran, I went up to the kitchen, pouring some milk in a saucepan and setting it on a burner to heat up. Then I got out the cocoa, vanilla, sugar, and salt, carefully measuring everything into the saucepan. I was just putting everything back in the pantry when her voice startled me.
“Man, I feel so much better.”
I turned around, and the sight that greeted me made me drop the bag of sugar in my hand. Which then tipped over, spilling all over the pantry floor. But I couldn’t really find it in me to care, preoccupied as I was by all my blood swiftly rushing south.
Because Larkin was standing in my kitchen wearing nothing but a towel.
Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. I closed my eyes, stepping behind the island so she wouldn’t be able to see how much her current nearly-nude state was affecting me. I was wearing flannel pajama pants that left Little Graham with nowhere to hide.
“Uh,” I croaked. “Glad to hear that.”
I was pretty sure my voice cracked, too. Because she had reduced me to a thirteen-year-old, all with just one strategically-placed and probably not securely-fastened towel. She looked like she’d walked straight out of my Weird Science fantasies, for fuck’s sake.
“What you got going here?”
I blinked, shaking my head to try to clear it. Then I started reciting the dimensions of every processor my company had made since 1994, because making a database of old records was the ridiculously boring task my bosses had given me last summer, when work was slow. The good old days, as my co-workers and I liked to say during this hellish time of too much to do and not enough resources with which to do it.
“Graham?”
I blinked. Yeah. Boring work shit had not distracted me from the fact that Larkin was standing in my kitchen, wearing nothing but a fucking towel.
“Um, just making some hot cocoa.”
“Oh,” she said, that husky voice not helping my downtown situation. Not at all. “That’s really domestic.”
I barked out a laugh, still way too jittery. She loved to tease me about my love for all things culinary. But she also ate everything I cooked like a starving woman.
“Someone has to be able to cater the Sasquatch Club meetings,” I reminded her.
She smiled. “Wouldn’t we just munch on sleeping bags and the odd chipmunk?”
I shook my head like I was disappointed in her. “Everyone knows chipmunks are better in a stew. Some potatoes, leeks. Sleeping bag stuffing. A little tarragon.”
“My mistake.” She laughed, and goddamn it, I was trying to make my hard-on go away, not get worse.
And yet, there was a masochistic – and more than a little egotistical – part of me that wanted to keep her laughing. It had kind of become my favorite sound.
“Honestly, woman, you call yourself our president?” I scoffed.
She raised a brow. “I thought you said I couldn’t be the president.”
I pretended to think it over for a moment. “I dunno. I’m on the fence.”
“Oh, come on,” she cried, extending a bare leg to show off the hair. “Look at this fur!”
Don’t look, my brain urged me. Don’t you fucking dare look, Morris. Nothing good will come of looking at legs you can’t touch.
I looked. Of course I did. She was holding up one shapely, surprisingly long leg for inspection. How could I not check it out?
And now that I was looking, I wasn’t sure what she was so self-conscious about. She wasn’t even all that hairy. Yes, I could see that she hadn’t shaved her legs in a long time. But the hair looked soft, fine, and it was short and light in color, like the hair on her arms. And weirdly, it wasn’t a turn off. I actually found myself wondering what it would be like to touch it, how it would feel under my fingertips.
Which was frustrating as hell. I was trying really fucking hard not to jump my buddy’s bones here.
“I dunno, buddy. Can you really call yourself a Sasquatch if it takes a magnifying glass to see the hair?”
Much to my dismay, her laughter died, and she blushed, her eyes skating away. “You don’t have to be nice.”
I chuckled. “‘Nice’ is my middle name,” I told her, trying to ease her embarrassment. “Though I promise I’m not just being nice here.”
“Is it really your middle name?”
“What, ‘Nice?’”
She nodded, looking curious.
I shook my head. “No.” I didn’t elaborate, hoping she wouldn’t ask.
But of course she did. “Well, what is it?”
I waited a moment before answering, gathering my thoughts. “It’s Frederick, after my dad.”
Graham Frederick Morris. The name I’d had since I was eight years old. Frederick, for my dad, and Graham, for his dad.
“Your dad’s name was Frederick…” Her brow scrunched like she was trying to remember something. “I forgot what you said your real last name was?”
I frowned. I knew she wasn’t trying to be insensitive. Most people weren’t, when they inevitab
ly blundered in conversations with adoptees. But man, I really fucking hated when someone referred to my birth parents as my ‘real’ parents. As if the people who gave me and my sister a home, loved us like their own children – the people who gave us the kind of life every child should have – were somehow not ‘real’ enough.
“Morris is my real last name,” I grunted, making it clear that the topic was closed.
She looked up at me with guilty eyes, and she opened her mouth to say something else. But I didn’t want to face any more questions about my two sets of parents – or worse, hear an apology from her. It wasn’t really her fault that she didn’t have all the facts. I still hadn’t told her about my birth parents and how they died, partly because I didn’t want to upset her. But also because I just didn’t ever talk about them if I could help it. Not even with Ellie.
She had no memories of them, and I wanted to keep it that way.
I cleared my throat, interrupting her before she could get another word out.
“But anyway,” I said, purposefully trying to be playful again. Hoping everything was okay between us. “If you want to make up a body hair problem just to hang out with me, I guess I won’t discourage you.”
She smiled up at me, but her eyes were thoughtful. “Why do you even want to be my friend again?”
I grinned. “Because if you weren’t my friend, who would help me drink all this cocoa?”
She chuckled. “I am sorry to have to tell you this, my friend,” she intoned. But then she gave me an impish grin. “Actually, fuck that. No I’m not.”
I laughed. Now I knew everything was okay between us, if she was busting my chops. “Tell me what?”
“I don’t like chocolate,” she replied.
I stared at her for a moment or two, wondering how I didn’t already know this about her. I felt like I knew most everything else there was to know. All the important things, anyway. Like how funny she was, that she snored lightly, and that her favorite book was Fahrenheit 451. I knew she loved scallops but hated lobster, she liked to watch trashy reality TV, and she never bothered with her reading glasses even though she badly needed them. I knew her eyes were like fields of lavender after a summer storm, all covered in raindrops, shimmering in the sun that was breaking through gray clouds.
