Not yet.
“Sorry,” he mutters. “I didn’t know you were awake.”
And I didn’t know that your skull on my chest would ruin my weighted blanket for me.
I keep that to myself and just shrug.
“I have the lunch shift at Cornfield’s, so can we get going?”
“Yeah.” He glances at me, then away. “Sorry.”
I wonder if he’s also apologizing for clinging to me in his sleep. But as far as he knows, I’m unaware of that, so it’s probably just the bathroom thing.
“I found a toilet, so you are forgiven.”
George nods. And then he holds my car door open for me. Weird, but I slide in anyway and wait for him to return the room key to the office. I bet he also tells them about the leak in the ceiling and gets zero acknowledgment because I say again: teenagers.
Meanwhile, I search the glove compartment of the car and hit a jackpot when I find some mint gum. And it’s that kind that you pop the little white rectangle out of its individual foil pocket, so I don’t even feel gross about it being random car gum.
George slides into the driver seat with a frown on his face.
“Did you tell them about the leak?”
“Yes.”
“Did they care?”
He grimaces. “I don’t think so.”
I snort, chew aggressively, and try to channel my inner teenager and remain completely unaffected by the proximity of George Bunsen for the entire return trip.
I am unsuccessful.
Chapter
17
George is touchingme again.
Okay, it’s kind of impossible for him not to touch me when we’re in this cockpit together. Cessnas seem to have been manufactured for slim people, not six-foot-something men with shoulder widths to match.
Every time we’ve flown, George’s bicep has pressed into mine, rubbing my shoulder whenever he depresses or pulls back on the yoke.
Only now when he touches me, I have a whole catalog of other ways our bodies have pressed together for my anxious brain to cycle through.
The unrelenting way he held my wrist in the diner.
The grip of his arms hugging my thighs.
The heavy press of his head pillowed on my stomach.
At least he doesn’t know that I know about those last two touches. There’s a kind of safety in that. A plausible deniability.
Neither of us have said a word to each other since we took off. Normally I’m asking questions and he’s relating the answers in hisprecise way. But not this flight. Still, things aren’t technically soundless. The roar of the engine filters through my headphones, but it’s just a white noise to accompany our not talking.
The not-silent silence stretches into the return trip until George finally breaks it. Honestly, I thought it was going to be me, but the buzz of his voice in my headphones startles me out of my thoughts.
“How do you feel about roller coasters?”
