Theo
Today was apparently soul-searching day, and I reached to rub the back of my neck absently as Illya poked around in the gas station. Springfield was nice, everything was clean, and this was definitely a place I’d like to come vacation if the urge ever took me. Leaning on the checkout counter a little ways from the register, I watched her carefully, so carefully, pick up every single item on the shelf, look at the ingredients, and decide she didn’t want it before putting it back.
“Your girlfriend’s really picky, isn’t she?” The Boston twang of the cashier wasn’t laced with snark or anything. In fact, she sounded kinda sad, and I glanced over with a curt nod. Her teenage face kinda fell, and I frowned under furrowed brows before turning back to Illya. She picked up a protein bar and rocked back on her heels, but my mind caught on the cashier’s question.
Was Illya my girlfriend? We’d never talked about it— we just ate together, practically lived together at this point. I fingered her, and she blew me, and then we fell asleep together.
What the fuck kind of dumbass question was that? Of course, we were together.
“This one.” Illya sauntered over to set her protein bar on the counter, and I didn’t bother pulling out my wallet just so she could tell me to fuck off. She paid the stupid dollar easily, and my gaze flickered to the check folded neatly in one of her wallet pockets.
“Do you want to stop somewhere and grab some lunch, and you can eat that on the way home?” Posing my question as we left the gas station, I swung my arm over her shoulders as Illya shook her head. “I’ll get something somewhere. I’m starving.”
“I thought you’d try to talk me out of going to my uncle’s house.” Shrugging as I pulled my keys out of my pocket, I flexed my bad hand as tension zinged up my arm. “Why not?”
“Why would I? Honestly, Illya, I don’t know enough about your shitty uncle to have an opinion. If you want to avoid being home and the fact that you work on Monday with this shit, which option is worse? That’s how it looks to me, at least.” And it was true— I didn’t know, and I didn’t really care. Illya came here on her own suggestion, which meant that her anxiety over Carlyle was worse than her lifelong teenage trauma. “I’m having a nice time, though.”
“Oh, that’s good.” A smirk tilted my lips, and I squeezed her to my side as I remotely unlocked my car. “I don’t even know if they still live there. Maybe they moved. I don’t know which I want more— them to be there or not.”
“I guess we’re gonna find out.” There wasn’t much else I could say unless Illya said it first. What little I knew about these people, they were scum. Parting from me to head to the passenger side, she furrowed her brows troublingly, and I pursed my lips thinly. This wasn’t exactly what I wanted to do with my day off, but I wasn’t stupid. Illya and I both had our ups and downs. We both had moments when we wanted something bad enough to say it, and then regretted it.
Like fucking her brains out. When she told me so many weeks ago that she’d work with Carlyle, I couldn’t think of anything but how accessible she’d be to me. We’d turn up the heat, do the thing, bump the uglies.
But it didn’t turn out like that. For all that talk, I wouldn’t blow her back out just because I wanted to. Ithadto mean something. Ithadto be special. Maybe, my not having been laid in a couple years made the notion more romanticized, but that was the easy way out.
I was in love with Illya, and I wasn’t going to fuck her until I knew she was in love with me, too.What kind of bullshit is that?
“Hey, Theo?” Humming softly in acknowledgment as I pulled forward, I glanced at the road under furrowed brows, and Illya sighed before continuing. “I have a bad feeling about this.”
“Do you not want to go?” My probe gave me the exact reaction I was expecting— nothing. Illya sort of shrugged, her expression unchanging, and I wasn’t sure if she was talking about working or visiting her uncle. “A bad feeling about what?”
It took a lot of time and effort to get a straight answer out of her. I was always surprising myself with how much patience I had with Illya. Her vague, dodgy replies and general lack of understanding of herself was something I’d grown accustomed to. After all, she never had an opportunity to know herself, and that’s what this whole trip was supposedly about.
“I don’t know. I just have this . . . this vague sense of doom. Like something is going to happen.”Anything that’s not a direct threat to her, she doesn’t know how to handle.“Things have never gone this good before. Maybe, I’m just overly pessimistic.”
“Illya.” Pausing to take a turn at a green arrow, I scanned for any fast food place as her self-doubt distracted me from the fact that we’d fought instead of having breakfast. “Okay, I’m not saying you shouldn’t be cautious and thorough, but the whole doubting yourself bullshit has to stop. If you feel like that, there’s usually a reason. You should trust yourself a little more when it comes to personal shit. I mean, you held your own against Carlyle the first time you met him, and he blindsided you and is generally pretty menacing regardless. Where’d that go, huh?”
“He can kill me. That’s straightforward, Theo.” I couldn’t argue with that point, and Illya ran her hand through her hair absently with a groan of frustration. “What’s wrong with me? Why can’t I just accept that I’ve got it as good as it can be and not trying to ruin it by psyching myself out?”
“Fuck if I know.” Flicking on my blinker, I reached to rub my jaw absently as my mind whirred. “Make a decision and stick to it, for better or worse. That’s my best advice.”
“It was a lot easier when I did things out of necessity instead of just wanting to do it.” Illya sat up, straighter at her own grumble, and I turned into McDonald's smoothly as she slapped her hands together. Arching a brow quizzically, I pulled up into the drive-thru lane before casting her a look. “That’s it, isn’t it? I can do whatever I want now. I don’thaveto do anything if I don’t want to.”
“You’ve never done anything, like, at all, just because you wanted to?” Skepticism thickened my tone, and Illya frowned under furrowed brows for a long moment before shaking her head. “Seriously? Are you fucking with me right now?”
“As an adult, no. I only did what I had to. I worked, slept, woke up, repeat. Until I moved here, I never had downtime. One time, I worked three jobs— that was while I was at the women’s shelter.” Scowling darkly at that, I covered my mouth as disgust coated my tongue. Suddenly, I wasn’t hungry, but I was in line, so . . . “Carlyle must’ve known that. That’s why he gave me two whole months with nothing to do. I’m not used to doing nothing.”
“He gave you time to go crazy with boredom? So you’d want to do something you like?” I mean, that sounded like something Carlyle would do. He talked all the time about Illya being so pathetic and how he felt sorry for her. Why would that be limited to after meeting her if he really did do all he could find out all about her? “It took you long enough to figure it out.”
“This is the first time I’ve left my apartment since moving there, though.”No wonder he feels that way. She is kinda pathetic.“All I’ve done is hang out with you or watched TV or tried on clothes. I have so many clothes, and I’m not even done yet.”
“I’m flattered that I’m the defining factor on your sanity.” Still, it seemed like such a simple concept, and Illya was looking for the one farthest from it. Downtime? Rest and relaxation? She smiled as I inched my car up the lane, and I gripped the wheel with my good hand to reach over the center console. “Even if that was the reason, how does that help you now that your time is up? You start on Monday.”
“I-I don’t know that, yet. Maybe, just the realization is enough. I mean, it took me two months to figure it out, right?” Rubbing her smooth cheek, I pursed my lips and simply accepted that. Illya looked for the worst of the worst in most situations, so ignoring the most mundane reason wasn’t so out of character. It might’ve made her feel like an idiot, but . . .
That was something I liked about her.Now if I can just get her to be a little more self-confident.
