Static

by Witt, L. A.

  “Think they’ll get custody?”

  “Don’t know. They haven’t been in contact with her in years, but besides me, they’re her only relatives who are of legal age to be her guardian. It’s either them or foster care.” He picked up his coffee, staring at it for a long moment as if the decision to take a sip required significant internal debate. Then he set the cup back down with a quiet clink. “I’m just worried about her. The poor kid does not need this shit.”

  “Neither do you. Alex, someone committed a crime against you. I know you want to protect your sister and keep this as far from her as possible, but you’re doing the right thing.”

  He finally met my eyes and whispered, “I hope so.”

  “Your sister will get through it. Yeah, she might be upset now, and she might even resent you, but there will come a time when she’ll understand why you had to do this. Or rather, why your parents have to take the consequences of what they did.”

  He rubbed his hand over his face. “Depends on how brainwashed she is.”

  “In which case, the way she feels is on them, not you.”

  Alex nodded, but said nothing.

  “Any idea how long before your parents go to trial?”

  “Not long. Arraignment is tomorrow, and they want me in for a psych eval on Friday. The DA is pushing it hard, and he said this afternoon it probably won’t be more than a week before the trial starts. Isn’t like they need much evidence, you know?”

  “I suppose they don’t. You going to go?”

  “I have to. I’m testifying. And there’s that whole ‘facing your accuser’ thing.”

  “Oh, right.”

  “My boss will love that. ‘Guess what, I need to take a week or so off to testify while my parents stand trial.’” Alex groaned and shook his head.

  I searched his expression for a second. “Do you want me to be there?”

  “It’s up to you.” He looked into his coffee cup. “I can’t ask you to take that much time off work.”

  “I have vacation time. Don’t worry about it. I don’t think . . .”

  He lifted his gaze. Then his eyebrows.

  I cleared my throat. “I don’t think you should have to go through that alone.”

  We locked eyes for a moment. Some unspoken thought lurked behind his. All at once he took a breath, his lips parting slightly as if about to bring the thought to life, but then he let the breath go and looked into his coffee again.

  “Something on your mind?” I asked.

  Alex chewed his lip. His hands—first the left, then the right—slipped around his coffee cup and held it for dear life. He might have shuddered, but I couldn’t say for sure. He swallowed hard.

  “Listen, during the trial,” he said without looking up, “you’re probably going to hear a lot of things. About me, my past, my parents. Stuff I’d really rather not talk about right now, but . . .” He trailed off. Finally, his eyes met mine again. “I wanted to let you know up front. It isn’t going to be pretty.”

  “It’s a criminal trial, Alex. I don’t expect it to be pleasant.”

  “I know. But there’s a lot of things I haven’t told you. And from talking to the DA, it’s going to come out during the trial.” He let go of his coffee cup and laid one arm over the other on the edge of the table, strategically placing them so the faint scars on his forearms weren’t visible. “All of it.”

  “Wouldn’t it be better for me to hear it from you, then?” I asked. “Rather than with whatever spin the lawyers try to put on it?”

  He definitely shuddered that time. “Probably. But I’d . . .” He fidgeted, dropping his gaze, and something tightened in my chest when I noticed the hint of white in his knuckles as he dug his fingers into his arm.

  “Is it the kind of thing you’re not comfortable with me knowing about at all? I mean, are you trying to tell me you’d rather I wasn’t there, or—”

  “No, it’s not that,” he said quickly. “In fact, I—” He paused, swallowing hard. “I want you to be there.” With some effort, he looked at me, and his eyes said nothing if not I need you to be there. “If you’re really okay with it, I mean.”

  “Of course I am. If you need me to be there, I will.”

  A faint smile pulled up the corners of his mouth. “Thanks.” The smile faded as quickly as it had begun. “I just wanted to make sure you knew what to expect ahead of time.”

  I leaned forward. “Alex, if you’re worried about what I’ll—”

  “I’m not.” He looked at me through his lashes. “It’s just, a lot of stuff I really don’t want to discuss. Not that I don’t want you to know about, but . . .” Another shudder.

  My stomach tried to fold in on itself. I wanted to ask. I wanted to know. I wanted to hear it straight from him, but I knew this low, depressed state well enough not to push. Alex could clam up and shut down like nobody’s business, and he was already close to that point. No sense throwing gas on the fire.

  Alex unfolded his arms and picked up his coffee cup. I looked into my own drink, avoiding any chance of the scars on his forearm catching my eye and making him more uncomfortable.

  His coffee cup clicked on the saucer, the sound echoing in the taut silence between us. Neither of us said anything more. We finished our respective drinks, paid our checks, and went out into the chilly evening air. The silence followed us, and it stayed as we stood outside the door. Hands in pockets. Eyes down. No words.

  It was Alex who finally spoke.

  “How are you doing with all of this?” he asked.

  “What?”

  “This whole situation. With me. Us. Everything. How are you doing with it?”

  I shrugged. “Okay, I guess.”

  “You guess?”

  “I don’t know, to be honest. Still . . . processing it all.”

  Our eyes met. He was the first to break eye contact, looking out at the street. Then his eyes flicked back to me again. Beat. It was my turn to look away.

  Muffling a cough, he looked at his watch. “Man, it’s late. I guess I should get home.”

  Something sank in my chest, and I pretended not to recognize it as an opportunity slipping away.

  “Will you be okay tonight?” I asked.

  “Yeah. I think I just need some sleep.” He didn’t look at me when he said it, which meant “sleep” could be loosely translated to “I’m going to drink until I pass out.”

  “Alex, are you—”

  “Don’t.” He looked me in the eye, and the determination was as palpable as the fatigue. “Just, don’t. Please. I’ll be fine.”

  I want to believe that. From the back of my mind came another thought that promised to keep me up tonight. Even if you’ll be fine, what about us?

  Alex shifted his weight and glanced up the street toward the Mat and, presumably, his car. “Guess I should get going. Seven o’clock comes early.”

  “Yeah.” I swallowed. “It does.”

  We made, broke, and made eye contact. Neither of us moved.

  Talk to me, Alex.

  Goes both ways, his eyes said.

  I don’t know where to start.

  Neither do I.

  Alex cleared his throat and made another gesture toward the Mat. “I’d better go. I’ll, um, call you?”

  “Sure. Yeah.” I rocked from my heels to the balls of my feet. “Have a good night.”

  “You, too.”

  So, without touching and with far too much left unsaid, we went our separate ways.

  I wondered if Alex slept that night. I sure as hell didn’t.

  How are you feeling? Worried about you.

  D

  The email stared back at me from my too-fucking-bright-when-I’m-this-hungover screen.

  I should have known better than to drink that much on a work night. In fact, I did know better, having learned it the hard way a few too many times, but I did it anyway. Again. At least that meant I’d gotten some sleep. Restless sleep, maybe, but also blissfully dreamless. Booze or no
booze, I was guaranteed to feel like shit this morning, so I didn’t suppose it made much of a difference.

  I hadn’t looked at anyone on the way into the office, but the whispers started as soon as I stepped off the elevator. Seconds into what promised to be a long day, and the disgusting, dirty feeling already clung to my skin like a spiderweb, refusing to go away, refusing to be ignored. This would be the day from hell. As would tomorrow. And the next day. And the one after that.

  Muttering a string of profanity to myself, I’d put on my headset and logged onto the phones, hoping for a call to come in and bring a few minutes of blessed distraction.

  Nothing.

  I’d busied myself with emails, reports, and all the other things I was required to do in between calls. Unfortunately, if I wasn’t getting calls, no one else was either, which meant they were free to gossip incessantly or come by my desk for no reason.

  Then Damon’s email had appeared in my inbox, and for a moment, the spiderweb lifted off my skin.

  How are you feeling? Worried about you.

  He may as well have written, I know you drank yourself blind last night. At least let me know you’re still alive.

  My cheeks burned, and the throbbing in my head didn’t help the guilt any. Damon rarely gave me crap about my drinking, but he knew about it. I sucked at hiding it, just like he sucked at hiding how much it bothered him.

  Pity I’m not as good at hiding my drinking as I was hiding the fact that I’m a shifter.

  I winced and rubbed my eyes. Christ, just tell him you’re alive so he can relax.

  I sent him a quick email.

  I’ll live. Just need some coffee.

  Me

  Drumming my fingers on my desk, I read and reread Alex’s email. I wasn’t sure if he was being terse, or just short and to the point. The presence of the message was a relief, though. He’d dragged himself into work and could form a coherent, if brief, message. That meant I could stop worrying quite so much.

  His email did nothing to help me concentrate, though. A few words, and my already preoccupied mind was inching even farther away from all things work-related. Like I needed an email to distract me. There was a photo of Alex and me pinned to the corkboard beside my desk, and today, that picture was driving me crazy.

  It was one of those slightly crooked camera-held-at-arm’s-length self-portrait snapshots, taken a few months after we’d started dating. Not something that would win any photography awards, but I liked it. I had one arm around Alex and the camera in my other hand, and she had both arms around my waist. Her hair was up in a messy ponytail as it often was, and she had a smile that still made my heart skip. Looking at the photo now, I kind of wished we’d left our sunglasses off so I could see her eyes.

  I sighed and turned my attention to the computer screen and the work I’d neglected all morning. There wasn’t much point. It wasn’t like I could concentrate. Even when I’d looked away from the picture, I couldn’t stop myself from seeing it.

  After a while, I gave up and stared at the picture.

  I still had no idea what to do about us. I didn’t know what Alex expected me to do. Elbows on my desk, I clasped my hands together under my chin.

  In theory, I could leave because she’d lied to me. She’d deceived me into believing she was a static woman, and it was only when the issue was forced that I’d learned the truth. No trust, no relationship.

  Or I could say I refused to deal with Alex’s drinking anymore.

  Hell, maybe I could sell myself some oceanfront property in Arizona while I was at it. It would be nothing but a cop-out. Total bullshit.

  It was no lie that I had a tough time with Alex’s drinking. It had bothered me throughout our relationship, but I knew why she drank, and if I were in her position, I’d have probably drunk a hell of a lot more. It wasn’t healthy, but it was understandable. That, and if it was a deal breaker, it should have been a deal breaker six months, a year, two years ago.

  “You’re going through hell right now,” I could say, “but I’ve just conveniently decided that I’ve had enough of your boozing. G’bye.”

  As for her dishonesty, the truth was I knew why she’d lied. I just regretted not making her feel like she could tell me.

  The even deeper truth was that I didn’t want to leave. I just didn’t know how to stay. Did we go on as friends? A celibate couple? No, we were both far too sexual to be happy living celibate lives. An open relationship? That thought made me fidget. I wasn’t wired for that kind of relationship. Monogamy had always suited me. That was why I’d wanted to get married in the first place.

  My heart sank a little farther.

  I didn’t want to leave, but I couldn’t manufacture a physical attraction to this man who lived in Alex’s house, had all of Alex’s quirks and mannerisms, and knew mine the way only Alex did. That wasn’t the Alex I’d thought about in the shower before work this morning. Or the Alex I was terrified of losing. The Alex I refused to believe I’d already lost.

  I winced. Of course he’s Alex. But he’s not. But he is. Leaning forward, I rested my forehead on my tightly clasped hands.

  Fuck it. We needed to discuss this or I’d never be able to concentrate on anything.

  I unfolded my fingers and ignored the tingle of blood rushing back into them. I pulled up the email he’d sent earlier and clicked reply. My fingers hovered over the keyboard, but the words didn’t come.

  Why don’t we stay in tonight so we can talk things over?

  Backspace. Backspace. Backspace.

  I really think we should spend some time discussing—

  What? Us? Our relationship? This whole insane situation that still didn’t fit into my head?

  Backspace. Backspace. Backspace.

  I kept drumming my fingers on the desk while I stared at the blank email, at the empty white space, silently demanding an answer for how to fill it. I wanted to keep the line of communication open until I figured out what to say and how to say it. Finally, I settled on throwing the ball back in his court.

  How’s work going? Feel like doing anything tonight?

  D

  I scowled at Damon’s email. The only thing I felt like doing tonight was very similar to what I’d done last night. On the other hand, I needed to see him. We needed to talk about . . . Christ, what didn’t we need to talk about?

  I muttered a few obscenities and rubbed my aching temples. Then I sat back and, without thinking about it, let my gaze drift to the picture beside my monitor. My chest tightened, with emotion, frustration, maybe a mix of the two, and I caught myself seriously considering taking the picture down. More than ever before, that framed five-by-seven of Damon and me was pure, aggravating distraction.

  It was a shot of us at his brother’s wedding last year. Damon in a tux, me in a blue dress I’d damn near starved myself to fit into. God, we looked so happy. We were happy. Chuckling to myself, I remembered the look on his face when he saw that dress. Come to think of it, I never did get around to sewing it back together after we’d ripped it that night in our hotel room.

  My mind wandered back to a three-day weekend a few months before that picture was taken. We’d been casually dating for a while, but decided to go out to the coast together.

  Everything had lined up perfectly. Tabby gave me the entire weekend off. Damon and I snagged a reservation in a hotel right on the beach. My mind and body matched without the need to shift into something he didn’t know I was.

  And the weather? The weather had been awful. It was warm, being mid-summer and all, but it poured almost the entire time, giving us every reason to spend the whole weekend wrapped up in blankets and each other. Not that we’d needed a reason, but I couldn’t remember ever having so much sex in so little time.

  It hadn’t been just sex, though. We spent as much time lying in bed and talking as we did making love. The rest of the world didn’t matter, and for a few days, it was just us, a bottle or two of wine, and a California king bed.

  The ra
in had stopped on Saturday afternoon, so we took advantage of the break and walked down the beach. The blanket under his arm and the glances we kept exchanging said it all: we weren’t out there looking for seashells or sunsets.

  He’d barely gotten the condom on when the skies opened up again.

  “Damn it,” he’d muttered, glaring up at the clouds. “So much for sex on the beach.”

  “Says who?” I’d grabbed the front of his unbuttoned shirt and pulled him down to me.

  A file drawer slammed, startling me back into the present. I fidgeted in my chair, resisting the urge to crawl out of my skin. Letting myself daydream about a hot, intimate moment in my other form was hellishly masochistic when I couldn’t be in that form.

  I took a long drink, wondering when my coffee had turned cold, and tried to focus on the email I was supposed to be answering.

  I wondered what Damon thought of the situation now that there was the possibility this implant wasn’t coming out. Or, surgery or not, that my female form might never come back.

  And if it didn’t, what would happen to us? Losing half of my identity was bad enough. Losing Damon? I wasn’t sure I could handle that much salt in this wound.

  We needed to talk. Badly.

  I looked at my computer screen. We had a line of communication open, albeit one made of brief, noncommittal emails. Still, it was a start. As good a place as any.

  I put my fingers on the keyboard. What the hell could I suggest for tonight? Talking, that was what. We needed to do a lot of talking, and we needed to do it sooner than later. I didn’t particularly want to, mostly because I was afraid of the conclusions we—he—would come to about our situation.

  I scowled at his email again.

  Last night wasn’t a good time for a binge. Not just because of the headache and the redness that no amount of Visine would take out of my eyes, but because it gave Damon one more reason to step back. I’d practically handed him another excuse to walk away from me.

  Hey, Damon, I lied through my teeth for two years, and you know what? I think instead of spending more of this evening with you, I’m going to go home and drink myself stupid, and we both know it.