by Shelly Crane
He was looking at my photos; I was looking at his bare feet. Not adorable, my butt.
“You played volleyball?”
“Yeah. And swim team. Come on,” I said, seeing that he was done with his sandwich. “Come to bed. You look like you could sleep for two days.”
He looked back at the pictures like he didn’t want to leave them.
“I feel like it.” He put his glass on the tray and climbed on top of the comforter. I went and turned my light off and got beside him under the same big blanket I had pulled over us the other night. “Your bed’s going to smell like smoke tomorrow,” he whispered as I slid closer to him.
“That doesn’t matter. I’ll wash the comforter.” I let my elbow rest against his chest; I didn’t know how much room to give him for his bruise. Frankly, I didn’t know how he liked to sleep or if he just wanted some space after everything that happened—
“Ava,” he groaned and reached under my elbow to tug me until I was against him on our sides facing each other. “The only thing I need is you,” he said simply, tiredly, and with finality.
I sighed. Okay.
“I quit,” he said. It was obvious that it was not up for discussion. He was just letting me know. “It’s not uncommon when there’s a traumatic incident for it to be too much and firemen quit sometimes. No one will think anything of it.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I did this.” He stroked his fingers down my arm. “Now I’m fixing it. I told the chief you knew a classmate in the building and just happened to be there.” So he had asked why I was there. “Landon and Gibson didn’t say anything. And they kept telling me to tell you ‘Thank you’.” He chuckled a little. “And I thought Landon had a crush on you before...” He swallowed, his hand moving to my back just under the hem of my shirt and kept moving small circles. “I don’t know what I’m going to do now, but I promise you…”
I kissed him, loving that even in this state he searched me out for more, but then I scooted up a little and wrapped my arms around him, pressing his cheek to my chest, letting him settle into the nooks and crevices our bodies made together. We fit together so well just lying there in the dark as I tried to tell him that everything was going to be all right with every stroke of my fingers through his hair.
He was asleep before I was.
Fourteen
I covered my mouth as I looked at him. “What’s wrong?”
“There was a fire.”
I gasped. “A fire! What—”
“No, I’m a fireman, Ave.” He smiled as best he could. “I’m just exhausted. No offense, but I hoped I wouldn’t come here tonight. But…as soon as you fell asleep, I felt the pull.”
“You’re a fireman?” I smiled a little and bit my lip.
He shook his head. “What is it with women and firemen?”
“I’m sorry. What happened?”
He shook his head. “No.”
“You look exhausted.”
“I am exhausted.”
“I’m so sorry. Is there any way that you can go back?”
“No. Not with you. With everyone else, I can come and go as I please and they always remember when they wake up. You’re different. It’s like I’m stuck here.”
“I’m sorry.” I licked my lips, feeling so bad. He obviously needed to sleep and instead he was stuck with me.
I felt his fingers under my chin. I hadn’t even seen him move. I pulled my legs to me so he could sit on the bed beside me. He looked so guilty and I didn’t understand.
“I’m so sorry. I keep…” He looked down and back up to me. “I keep treating you like you’re not the same girl, the same person, but you are. I’m sorry. You’re not keeping me from her. I just had a really crummy day and—sorry I took it out on you. It’s no excuse for being an ass.”
I looked around. “Maybe if you lie down in the dream, you’ll get some rest for your real body. Yeah?” I said hopefully.
He smiled, letting his hand fall to grip mine. “Thank you, beautiful girl, but it doesn’t work that way. We’ll have to find something else to do to bide our time.”
“Well,” I said coyly, “we do have some plotting to do, don’t we?”
His eyebrow rose. “Plotting?”
“Operation get-your-family-to-trust-you-again?”
He laughed once. “Oh, that. I’m not sure it’s going to work.”
I smirked. “Ye of little faith.”
He rubbed my knuckles. “Even your subconscious completely believes in me.”
I tilted my head. “That should tell you something.”
“It does.” His sigh was rough as he leaned forward to cup my face. “It does.” He leaned in and kissed my forehead. “Let’s get to work.”
_ _ _
When I woke, the next morning, I didn’t move a muscle. I was so warm and content, and couldn’t remember my body being this relaxed in a long time. I glanced over at my clock and saw that it was almost one in the afternoon. I didn’t know exactly what time we’d gone to bed last night, but it had to be around two or three. So honestly, for what the guy had been through, it wasn’t too bad. I saw that my curtains had been pulled to in my room and knew that Mom had been in to check on us. I had left my door cracked, knowing that she was going to be doing that anyway.
My parents were pros at worrying.
I was content to lay there for as long as he needed, seriously. It was funny to me that we hadn’t moved an inch in the night. He was exactly where I’d put him. I stroked his hair so gently. I didn’t dare wake him, but I did want to touch him. I almost wanted the hit our calm gave us when we’d been without it for a while. This was amazing, being filled to the brim with him, the buzz of him in my veins, but having a shot of him hit me all at once was also amazing.
I couldn’t see his face, but I imagined that it was peaceful. I hoped it was. I laid my hand on his head and left it there just as Mom came in again.
“Hey,” she whispered. “You’re awake.”
“Mom,” I said, unable to help myself, and weirdly not caring that my boyfriend was practically laying on top of me. Boyfriend. I smiled. “How is he… How does his face look?” I whispered. She squinted. “I mean, does he look peaceful? Does he look okay?”
She smiled, tilting her head. She even looked like she might cry for a second. I didn’t understand that. “He’s fine, Ave. He looks like he’s right where he wants to be.”
“I just didn’t want to let him keep sleeping if he was having nightmares or something.”
She nodded. “He’s going to be okay. And so are you. But for today…” I looked up at that tone. “It was meant to be a surprise, but then all this happened. The family is coming at six for a bar-b-que. To meet Seth.”
I grimaced. The good old Jacobson grilling.
They grilled the meat and then they grilled the new significant.
“And of course, everyone is dying to meet Seth because your cousins can’t stop blabbing about seeing him at the house that day.” I groaned. “They all want to know who this guy is who swooped up our Ava.”
I gave her a look, making sure to whisper. “Are you sure they don’t want to see the Watson and try to figure out if he’s for real or not?”
“I’ve assured them all that Seth is the real deal. After everything, after seeing you two tonight, I don’t know how anyone could doubt it, but that’s up to you. If you two aren’t up to it, I’ll cancel. No worries. I know it’s a lot. I just really wanted him to know the family before we went to the summit. It would be better than way. But…I get it if it’s too much today.”
I nodded.
She turned to go and looked back. “I’m proud of you, Ava.”
I felt my eyes burn and fill, my chest ached with surprise. “For what?”
“For being brave enough to do what needed to be done. I don’t want to know what happened.” She twisted her lips, as if keeping herself in check. “But I can imagine with the way you came home looking what it was like. And you did t
hat for him. Because you love him.” I smiled at my mother, feeling the first tear fall. “And one day, he’s going to return the favor. I know that my daughter is safe with him. I’ve seen the way he looks at you when you’re not watching, the way his hands fidget when he’s not able to touch you, and that’s a good feeling—to know that your daughter will not only be happy with the person she’s with, but he’ll keep her safe. Things won’t always be easy for our kind and I have a feeling that things are about to start getting worse.” She gulped. “Knowing you’re safe with him and that he’ll do anything to keep you that way is the best thing in my world right now.”
I didn’t say anything as she left. I didn’t know what to say.
I stayed there like that with him for another two hours, stroking his hair sometimes, before I felt him stirring. I didn’t move, just let him come out of it on his own. When he lifted his head, he looked at me, our faces so close, his hair spiked cutely from my fingers. I used my fingers again to comb them down, but he still just looked at me.
“Hey,” I eventually said.
“Hey,” he said, his voice gravelly. He pushed up a bit to reach me, pressing the lightest kiss to my lips. Once, twice, three times. “Thank you, Ava.” I was just about to say ‘What for?’ when he said. “I’ll have to start a list.” He groaned, sighing with his entire body, and laid back down on my chest. “Ah, I don’t remember ever sleeping so well.”
“You slept a long time.”
He looked up at the clock. “What the—have you been waiting for me to wake up?”
“It’s okay. Not for long. You needed the sleep,” I told him as I raked his hair back. He pinched his eyes together. “It’s okay.”
He shook his head. “Crap. Sorry. I didn’t mean to…” He looked at me. “Sorry.”
“I like lying here with you. It’s quiet. It’s peaceful. I don’t know. I don’t mind it. If I had, I could have scooted out,” I said wryly. “So, Mom had a surprise for you today.”
“Oh, yeah?” he said distractedly, enjoying my ministrations. When I didn’t say anything he lifted his head from my chest. “Oh, the kind of surprise where I get my ass kicked.”
I laughed loudly and cupped his face. “No. The kind of surprise where…you meet my entire family.” His eyes went wide. “The whole Jacobson clan will be here in a couple hours, unless you don’t want them to. Mom said it was up to you.” He ‘pffted’. “Really, if you don’t want to because of everything that happened we don’t have to. But we do have the summit and it would be better if you knew my family before then.”
He stared. “How many Jacobsons are we talking?”
I shrugged. “Fifty.”
“Fifty!”
“Or so,” I amended. I pulled him closer by his cheeks. “It’ll be fine. Unless you don’t—”
“I can’t back out. That’s the first sign of weakness. Besides, I know they all just want to get a good look at the Watson. May as well let them get—”
“That is not what’s going on. My mom is very convincing. When she tells people things, they listen, and she told them that this is legit, okay? They don’t care who you are, they just care that you’re mine. My significant,” I corrected. I smiled. “They just want to meet you. We always have a family together when someone bonds.”
“You do?” He smirked. “So I’m not special.”
“No, you’re not special.” I kissed him once more, happy that he seemed to be better today. “Want to take a shower? I’ll leave your stuff here and go take one in my parent’s room downstairs.”
He nodded and sighed as he stretched and rolled over. The white t-shirt rode up and I saw the bottom of his bruise peeking out. I winced and hissed.
“It doesn’t hurt that bad,” he acknowledged.
I lifted his shirt and felt my eyes bulge. It had more than doubled in color. It was now a deep purple with hints of blue around the edges. I whispered my fingers across it, my pale fingers a stark contrast against the colors. I felt sick looking at it, knowing that in just a few weeks, I’d be able to take it all away with a touch.
He put his hand behind my neck and tugged me down to kiss him. I protested—I was almost laying on his bruise.
“It doesn’t really hurt that bad, I said,” he told me against my mouth. “Don’t even think about it. It’ll be gone in a couple days.” He pecked my lips once more and released me. When I got up my hand brushed his stomach on the other side where his shirt had been lifted. I felt something there, too. I peeked at it wondering what other on-duty wounds I was going to find.
“That’s something from my childhood,” he murmured.
It was a long scar across his side. How had I missed that last night? I guess I was so focused on his bruised ribs not much else mattered. But from the tone, I could tell he didn’t want to talk about it and I certainly wasn’t ready to make him feel bad now. I wanted him to feel good after everything he’d been through yesterday.
“Do you have any more scars?”
He chuckled hotly. “A lot. We’ll have to have some time if you want to do that.”
For some reason, that made my neck hot. I smiled and looked down. He laughed again. “On that note,” he leaned up and kissed my forehead, “I’m going to take a shower.”
“Okay.” I watched him go. “I’ll be downstairs somewhere when you’re done. Just come find me.”
He nodded as he shut the door, a little smile on his lips. I sighed, feeling a million pounds lighter.
Holy to the crap. He was about to meet my crazy family.
I went to my closet and ransacked it, looking for adorable-ness, but grown-up-ness in the same ensemble. I decided to go without the tights—give poor Seth a break for the day—and went with a long sleeve, scoop neck, canary yellow top with a pair of light jeans. I grabbed my gold bird dangle earrings and ran to Mom’s shower. I tried to hurry.
When I got out, I could smell the smoke on my clothes so bad. No wonder Dad had freaked out last night.
I decided to put my hair up this time. Instead of going back upstairs, I made do with Mom’s makeup, just using her eye shadow and eye liner and forgoing any face powder. Putting in my last earring, I could hear Ember laughing in the kitchen and should have known everyone would be early, so eager to get the grilling started.
In Dad’s ridiculously large four car garage, we had a big kitchen in back so we just had our ‘in-door bar-b-que’ in there when it was too cold. Everyone would set up tables and chairs and still play Cornhole and all their games in there. Dad always wound up playing guitar at some point. It was the loudest, most packed, best smelling, most ridiculous garage bar-b-que you’d ever been to.
I looked at myself in the mirror. I slicked on a touch of Mom’s lipgloss, her favorite thing she wore, and decided that I wasn’t going to be intimidated by my family. They were amazing, they meant well, they were just loud and in great numbers. I would protect Seth tonight from them, from their nagging questions, from their inappropriate prodding trying to be funny, and I would make this a good night for him.
I smiled at my reflection. I would get him to understand that this family wanted him, no matter what.
I inched out of the bathroom into the hall, not wanting anyone to know I was there yet. I peeked my head around the corner to find all of Ember’s family there with my parents. Uncle Bish and Aunt Jen, Maria and Dawson, Grandpa Peter and Nana Rachel. And Uncle Kyle, Aunt Lynne and their kids, Drake and Laurelyn—named after her mom.
And Seth was right smack in the middle of them.
He beat me out. He was leaned on the back of the couch, his hands in his pockets casually, he listened as Ember was talking about something, but I didn’t hear any of the words. I just looked at him.
He was wearing Dad’s clothes, but you couldn’t tell. The pants reached his big boots and that was good enough. Daddy had always been a big guy, so the shirt fit him pretty good.
Then he laughed at something she said and reached up to rub his arm as he did so. Wow, did t
hat shirt fit him…
And he fit in so well. I had been freaking out about making him feel comfortable today, rescuing him from the crazies, and look at him. He was a genius at it already.
It’s all in the eyes.
I looked up to see I’d been caught. He was smiling and maneuvering to look around my mom to see me. Giving away my position.
Traitor.
“Ava!” Ember called, but stopped when she saw me. “Ava, good…Lord.” She looked at Mom and back at Seth. “Did they ascend already?”
I knew what she was doing. When you ascend, you get that final spurt of growth and features for your face and body that make you feel and look so mature and just…finished. People look so beautiful and happy after they ascend. They looked that way before, too, but it adds a cherry on top of the sundae. It means everything is complete. That you are truly one and it has all come full circle. Your powers can be united and so much can happen between you now. It’s magical.
“Shut up, Ember,” I tried, begging she wouldn’t keep going, but she pulled my arms out to my side.
“Baby girl, if this is what bonding does to a body, I need to get myself bonded.”
“Cut it out,” I hissed and rolled my eyes as she laughed, even slapping my butt as I passed her. She was our wild one. I heard Uncle Bish sigh exasperatingly with a chuckle. We loved her.
I let my smile loose on Seth as I made my way to him. This room was like a tank full of swarming sharks. You couldn’t show any fear, couldn’t let a drop of blood fall in the water, or they’d start in, piece by piece. They’d love nothing more than to embarrass me, to share a story that would make me cringe, to see us squirm under their scrutiny.
Oh, no, Jacobsons. Not today.
Lesson learned.
Seth had heard my entire pep talk, and even though his face as he looked me over made me want to jump him right there on the living room rug, I casually turned slightly to face him, taking one of his arms hostage to claim him and—even though he obviously didn’t need it—hopefully offer him some sense of a shield if he wanted one. He laced our fingers together beside us and I smiled at the gathered masses.