by Shay Savage
“Save me some hot water?” I manage to keep my voice steady and smile at her as she disappears into the bathroom. As soon as she’s gone, I drop back down on the chair and put my face in my hands.
I don’t know why I’m thinking this way. I feel like I did in the ninth grade when Ms. Shapiro taught my English class. I couldn’t watch her as she discussed Shakespeare—wearing her flowy dresses and tossing her long blonde hair around her shoulders—unless I had my bookbag on my lap.
Then, I could blame the adolescent hormones. I don’t know what to think of myself now. Sure, I’m a red-blooded, heterosexual guy and all, but my hand has always been enough for me.
Maybe that’s what I need…
I consider it, but the thought of her walking back into the room while I have my hand wrapped around my dick is horrifying. It might even be worse than the day I forgot to bring my bookbag to English class.
I hear Aerin start up the shower, and I grit my teeth as images of her naked and wet burst forth.
Maybe I can practice a little self-love in the shower.
In the meantime, I need a distraction. I head over to the bookshelf to check out the titles. I find an eclectic mix, including some classics alongside some popular fiction like Douglas Adams and Anne Rice. I notice two geology textbooks and another on organic chemistry. I wonder if Aerin has read all of these or if they’re left over from the prior resident.
I try to remember which books she had been checking out when I first saw her at the Thaves’ residence, but I hadn’t been paying close enough attention at the time. Now I wish I had. Now I wish I had time to run to Hilltop and ransack a house just to steal books for her.
For all I know, she hasn’t read any of these.
One of the books on the bottom has no title on the spine, and I remove it carefully. The cover is blue and is devoid of writing as well, so I open it up somewhere in the middle and take a peek.
Inside, I see a handwritten poem with credit given to someone named George Roemisch, and the words go on and on about forgiveness and violets. I turn the page to see another poem written in the same handwriting, this one by Robert Frost. The page after that starts with a date.
Tuesday, May 12, 2136
Tomorrow I leave the capital and head over the mountains. Mom is convinced I can do this, but I have my doubts. I don’t want to go. I’m not even sure what I’ll be able to accomplish, and I dread leaving Rick behind. He’s going to be so pissed that I left without saying goodbye, but it’s not like I can tell him…
I thumb through a few more pages, realizing this is someone’s journal and wondering how long ago the writer might have been here. The first entry I saw was only a year and a half ago, and I was under the impression this facility had been vacated long before that. I find the last page with an entry and look it over.
October, 2138
I’ve lost track of the actual day. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t really matter, but it’s bugging me anyway. I had an interesting encounter this evening. I ran into a thief in one of the houses where I was gathering supplies. The bastard actually held a knife to my throat before I turned the tables on him. He ended up chasing me out of Hilltop, but he’s not going to forget that punch anytime soon…
I quickly close the book and shove it back into place on the shelf. I take a couple steps backward, putting some distance between me and what I now realize is not just a diary, but Aerin’s diary.
“Shit!” I cover my hand with my mouth, wondering if Aerin can hear me over the sound of the water running.
Shit, shit, shit!
Moving farther away from the bookshelf, I run my hands through my hair and over my face as I glance toward the bathroom door. I can still hear the water running, and I can only hope she didn’t see what I had just done.
No, she couldn’t have. If she had seen it, she would have said something. She probably would have yelled something. She might very well have punched me again.
I sit back down in the chair and rub my palms on the thighs of my jeans as if that would undo what I had done. I feel like a total jackass, and I have no idea what I should do now. Should I tell her I read it by accident, or just pretend it didn’t happen?
I never would have touched it if I had known it was hers. Reading someone else’s diary is the epitome of betrayals, so maybe it’s best not to say anything. If I tell her, she might get pissed—seriously pissed—and I want her to trust me.
I want her to like me.
I breathe deeply for a moment, then begin to panic again as I hear the water shut off. I can’t let her see me this agitated, so I jump up and go to the kitchen sink to splash a little water on my face. I dry myself off with the edge of my jacket, totally forgetting there are actual towels here, and then sit back down in the chair. I take another deep breath and wait.
Aerin steps out of the room a moment later with shiny, wet hair glistening down her back. She’s wearing shorts and a black tank top, and I can’t stop myself from looking at her long, lusciously sculpted legs. She moves toward the kitchen, wafting steam and a strong floral scent in my direction. Without a doubt, it’s the same scent I smelled in her hair when we were lying next to each other in the shaft, only stronger, and just like the first time I smelled it, my dick starts to respond.
For fuck’s sake, when did I revert to being a fourteen-year-old again?
“My turn!” I chuckle nervously as I rush past her and quickly close the bathroom door before she can say anything.
Once inside, I close my eyes and lean against the door, trying to get myself together again. It doesn’t work. I’m equally disturbed over my increasingly sexual thoughts and my guilt over reading part of Aerin’s diary.
I sigh deeply and look around the tiny bathroom.
Along one wall is a small sink and a cabinet underneath and a toilet. A new, unopened toothbrush sits next to the sink along with a tiny tube of what I assume is toothpaste. The remainder of the space is taken up by the bare-bones shower. It’s really only a square on the floor with a short lip to catch the water. I see a small round drain in the center and a showerhead up above. A rod runs around the top, but there is no curtain to offer additional privacy. Still, it is a shower—an actual, hot-water-producing shower. A shelf holds a bottle of shampoo, and a folded towel sits on the tank of the toilet.
I shed my clothing and step in.
The handle is a little stiff and creaks when I turn it, but the water comes on quickly, and I let the heat pour over me. I try to ignore how the liquid around my feet turns nearly black as the dirt is washed from my body, choosing to focus on the water flowing over me instead of how badly I needed to bathe. Every muscle in my body relaxes, loosens, lets go…every muscle except one.
I look down at my cock, which is jutting out from my body like a divining rod that has just discovered one of the Great Lakes.
“You have to stop that shit,” I whisper. “At the very least, it’s fucking rude.”
My cock doesn’t seem to care.
I close my eyes and try to recall what I would think about when I was in high school and this kind of thing would happen to me. Music, sports, the general state of the world…nothing seems to be helping.
I wonder what Ava would say to me right now, and thinking about her reminds me of how I ended up in the woods last night in the first place. I recall stalking Mack all the way to the river, and images of blood and death quickly end my erection.
Killing Mack needed to be done. Men like him don’t do something like that just once. Ultimately, I did the entire community a favor. It’s not like there is any kind of organized justice system in Plastictown, and taking matters into my own hands was the only option.
The notion doesn’t stop me from feeling a little sick to my stomach. I lean forward, resting my forehead against the shower wall. I feel like a total idiot, but at least I’ve had a little relief from my wayward cock. I close my eyes and attempt to blank out my mind.
Instead, I begin to wonder wh
at Ava is thinking now. Is she wondering why I haven’t returned? I’ve been gone for days before but never under such circumstances. She is bound to think that something is up, and I don’t want her to worry about me.
Eventually, I calm down enough to get to the intended task at hand. I reach for a bottle of shampoo—definitely the source of the floral scent—and rub some of it into my hair. I find a bar of soap as well, though I don’t see a washcloth or anything. The soap is already wet and sudsy, so I can only assume Aerin used it on herself. With that thought going through my head, I try not to think about what parts of her body the soap might have touched while I use it on myself.
I finish up and turn the water off. The towel is a little threadbare and has a hole in it, but it does the job well enough. I wrap it around my waist and look down at the floor as I step out.
My clothing is lying in a soggy heap on the floor due to a clump of long, dark hair twisted around the shower drain. Nothing is totally soaked, but when I pick up my shirt, filthy water drips from it. I can’t really put it back on now, and all my clothing is dirty, so I end up washing everything in the sink.
After I hang each item over the curtain-free rod around the shower, I realize I only have one extra pair of shorts, and they’re in my pack in the other room. In my hurry to get out of Aerin’s presence, I completely forgot about having something to wear when I was done.
My choices are to either sit in the cramped bathroom for hours until my clothes are dry, put on wet clothes, or go out in a towel—a threadbare towel with a decent-sized hole in it, a hole that didn’t really matter until just now—to retrieve a pair of shorts.
I am fucked.
I’ve never felt particularly shy about my body. I’ve been completely naked in front of Ava on a few occasions and never thought anything of it. Now I find myself turning this way and that, making sure I didn’t miss any spots of dirt and wondering just what Aerin would think of me.
I begin to fiddle with the towel and, more specifically, with the placement of the hole. Obviously, I can’t have it in front, but it’s particularly noticeable when I place it on the side, over my thigh. Is the back any better? If I am really careful to keep my back to her, I just might be able to pull it off.
Unless she raises an eyebrow at me. If she does that, my cock will become a very obvious towel rack.
I end up with the towel wrapped snugly around my waist and the hole over my left butt-cheek. As long as I’m careful about how I walk, I should be able to casually stroll into the next room, grab my shorts, and be right back here in the bathroom in under thirty seconds.
With a deep, cleansing breath, I open the door.
Aerin is sitting on the edge of the bed with the blue journal in her hands. My first thought is that she has somehow noticed that the book has been recently opened or that she identified my fingerprints on it or maybe took a DNA sample.
I’m being ridiculous.
She glances up at me, and her eyes widen slightly before she quickly looks back down at her book. I watch her moisten her lips as she stares down at the pages, but I have to look away quickly. Just the sight of her tongue is making my heart pound again.
I keep both hands on the towel, gripping it tightly as I take a few steps out of the bathroom. A breeze from the ventilation system goes right through the hole in the towel, chilling my ass.
“Feels awesome, doesn’t it?”
“Wha-what?” I stare at her.
“The shower.” She gestures toward the bathroom with her thumb but doesn’t look up at me. “The hot water feels great after sleeping on the ground.”
“Oh, uh, yeah.” I chuckle nervously as images of Aerin covered in suds invade my mind again. “Yeah, it was awesome. I haven’t taken an actual shower in…well, I’m not sure how long.”
“Did you see the toothbrush I left out for you?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I did. Thank you.” I’d forgotten about the toothbrush. Now that she’s mentioned it, all I can think about is minty kisses. I need to move, and fast. The longer I stay out here, the more likely it is that my thoughts will become very, very obvious.
Of course, my pack is lying next to the bed, right at Aerin’s feet. I’m going to have to go over there and bend over to get the shorts out of it. I feel the back of my neck heating up, and I wonder if my face is completely red.
I close my eyes for a second, steel myself, and take the extremely short, far-more-time-consuming-than-it-should-have-been walk across the room to my pack. I tilt my hips away from her and half bend, half crouch to open the pack.
The towel starts to slip and then opens up completely in the back.
I grab at the edge of the towel frantically, which only makes it move more. It shifts to one side, exposing the front of my thigh and maybe even my dick. I’m not sure.
Aerin stares at me with one hand over her mouth and her eyes nearly bugging out of her head as I grab the shorts and try to use them as a second shield around my crotch.
“I’m just gonna go change.” I look up at her with what I’m sure is a totally stupid grin on my face. “Just be a sec!”
I chuckle again, grinning maniacally as I back up, holding the shorts in one hand and the end of the towel in the other but using both to try to cover my front while the breeze apprises me that my backside is now completely exposed.
I back into the bathroom, slam the door, and consider just sleeping on the floor. I take one more step, slip in a puddle of water, and land flat on my bare backside.
“Are you okay in there?”
“Yeah!” I yell out, horrified. “I’m fine! No problem! We’re all fine here now, thank you. How are you?”
I hear her laughing on the other side of the door, and I realize I just quoted Han Solo.
My shorts are now slightly damp from landing with me on the floor, but I pull them up over my hips, and then lean forward with my elbows on my knees and my head in my hands.
I am a complete moron.
“Pull yourself together!” I whisper.
Pushing myself off the floor, I use the towel to mop up some of the water, hang it next to my clothes, and brush my teeth. With my more intimate parts covered, I head back out into the other room.
Aerin is on the bed, knees up, and leaning against the pillow with one of the Douglas Adams’ books in her hands. She doesn’t notice me right away, and I spend a moment just looking at her profile, her slick, dark hair, and the smooth, soft-looking skin of her neck, shoulder, and arm. Again, my cock begins to twitch.
I have no idea why I’m acting like such an uncoordinated dimwit around this woman, but I’m going to have to stop it if I hope to get any answers about her, this place, and what she’s doing here. After my most recent display of idiocy, my internal guilt about the diary, and my inability to look at her without getting a hard-on, lying in bed next to her is going to be a problem.
I really should have masturbated in the shower.
Chapter 11
I slide into bed and under the blanket without making eye contact.
I thought the shorts were enough, but now that I’m next to her with the bare skin of my upper body close enough to brush up against her arm, I know they aren’t. The brief, warm touch is enough to send a shiver down my body. I wish I were wearing a parka or at least some heavy flannel pajamas.
Keeping my breath slow and steady, I slip down a couple of inches and pull the blanket up to my armpits and then tuck it around my sides a bit. I’m not sure it will help, but it’s something.
The mattress is a real, honest-to-god mattress and not some bit of cloth wrapped around straw. It’s incredibly soft, and I feel like I’m sinking into it. By Thaves’ standards, it’s fairly low-end, but it feels like a pile of down to me. Most anything beats sleeping on the ground, but this feels particularly luxurious.