She was probably going to say no. And she had every right to. I had brought danger into her life. I was the reason she’d almost had a medical episode so soon after being released from the hospital. Really, the smartest thing would be for her to march right out the door and never come back.
“Okay,” she said before sitting down and picking up her bowl again. “Do you wanna watch something?”
SEVENTEEN
GISELLE
Life in the Fast Lane
If someone had asked me how my Friday night would go, I would have said something along the lines of getting back to my regular lesson plans as well as writing a letter of recommendation for the sub who’d stood in for me. It wasn’t easy to come in so close to evaluations and then the holiday break, let alone for five full days, but they’d really hit it out of the park.
Granted, it was a bit easier than when I was a student, as my packets for the week had already been prepared online and I was able to check them myself in the system and grade them during my week of rest at home—I would have gone stir-crazy without them. But still, even with all of that going for them, a sub’s job wasn’t easy. Maybe I should get them a flower basket? The principal had sent me an email while I was out to let me know about the sub, but the only information I had was their name. Max Smith. No indication of gender, preferences, or even allergies.
Maybe I could ask the kids? Or the school nurse? Oh wait! Mademoiselle Delgato would know. She knew everything.
Except maybe about shifters.
...unless?
I chuckled and shook my head. I was supposed to be concentrating on the show Ben and I were watching. Luckily, it was a comedy game show where the rules were different every episode, so my laugh wasn’t out of place.
It surprised me that my mind could drift at all, because I was acutely aware of the situation.
When I’d called Ben, I assumed he would either want to meet in a neutral location or have me come over while his kids were asleep. But no, he’d asked me to dinner.With his family.
I would be lying my flat ass off if I didn’t admit that I had more fun hanging out with his kids than I had any right to. Normally, I needed to decompress after being around children all day, but Veronica was cute as a button and Benny? He was always a gem and had literally saved my life, but there was something so unfettered about him in his own home. I hadn’t realized that he was holding his personality back in school, but seeing him in his natural habitat, where he didn’t have to worry about keeping secrets, showed me there was still so much about students I would never be aware of.
Funny how a six-year-old had taught me something so incredibly important.
“I’m going to go get that plate we talked about earlier. Do you want me to put your ice cream back in the freezer to firm up a little?” Ben said, smiling at me with a cheeky grin that was so different from how he’d looked twenty minutes earlier.
After the panic attack and a few other glitches on our date, I’d known talking about Melton might trigger another one. But I hadn’t expected him to lock up like that. One moment he was there, and the next he was gone.
Luckily, he’d been ambulatory. I’d looped his arm through and led him to the couch. He’d sat down, then I’d started bundling him up in all the soft things I could find.
I’d been a little worried that he’d get overheated, but since he was still cocooned in the blankets, I knew I’d made him a comfy nest.
Good. I was having a hard time wrapping my head around how such a kind, charming guy was struggling with self-loathing. I understood that he’d gone through something truly devastating that I’d never understand, but surely he knew it wasn’t his fault... right?
It was Charles’s fault. All of it. Poor, awful, wounded, insidious Charles. Some small part of my heart pitied him because I knew abused kids so often went on to perpetuate that cycle, but most of me hated him for choosing the wrong path. He’d had a choice. He’d made the wrong one.
And he’d lost his life for it.
It didn’t seem like enough. I wasn’t a violent person, and I got the impression that his end hadn’t been a demure event at Ben’s hands, but there was still so much hurt, it felt like Charles had gotten off easy.
“Giselle?”
Goodness, I was being a bit like Ben, drifting off in mid-conversation like that. I guessed I was a bit in my head, too.
“No, no, that’s all right,” I said, somewhat sheepishly. “I kind of like it when ice cream gets to this texture where it’s not hard, but not soup either. Just kinda soft.”
My siblings still teased me about it. While I wasn’t as sensitive to texture as Nox, I had certain quirks about the things I put in my mouth, and ice cream was one of them.
Another was putting peanut butter and honey sandwiches in the freezer just long enough for the honey to start crystallizing. Oh, and onlycreamypeanut butter, of course.
I wasn’t asavage.
“You know, Natalie’s the same way.”
