"A little bit."
I’ve never seen a drunk person. My mother always said drunks are loud, violent, and unpredictable. Cole seems slightly clumsy, but otherwise, he acts completely calm. He doesn’t yell or lash out, and it doesn’t seem like he’ll do anything unexpected.
Still, I’m a bit worried. "He’s going to fall down the stairs."
Jules laughs softly. "No worries. He’s nowhere nearthatdrunk."
Reaching the upper floor, Cole heads for the couch, but Jules grabs his hand and drags him to the bed.
I stop at the landing and watch her as she helps him take off his shoes and jeans. Then she slips the leather jacket off his broad shoulders as she speaks softly to him, and he murmurs in reply. Even though I don’t understand the words, the gentle undertone in Jules’s voice warms my heart.
When Cole finally lies down, Jules tucks him in and gives him a kiss on the cheek before returning to me.
"Is he okay?" I whisper as she takes my hand and leads me to the bathroom.
"Yeah. He’s going to regret that he drank so much in the morning, but he’s fine." She tries to hide it with a smile, but I catch the sad undertone.
"Why does he drink so much?"
Jules pulls a wet wipe out of a box and starts rubbing it gently over my face, pressing her lips tightly together, but not answering me.
"Jules?"
Her face turns serious as she lets her hand sink and finally looks at me. "He’s grieving. He’s grieving and incredibly angry with himself. That’s why he drinks so much."
My throat tightens. "But why is he grieving?"
She shakes her head. "He’ll have to tell you himself." Then she takes a new wipe and tells me to close my eyes so she can remove the rest of the makeup.
While she’s doing that, I think about her words and what Cole said to me earlier in the pub.
It drowns the bad thoughts.
How I wish I could get more out of Jules, but I’m afraid she won’t tell me.
She has already fallen asleep after a few minutes, while I still lie awake. Since this room is in the middle of the floor and has no walls facing outside, it has no windows and turned pitch black as soon as Jules switched off the light. I’m not used to sleeping in complete darkness. My curtains at home were never closed. A faint light always filtered in, the colored glow of the traffic light never fading, even in the dead of night. I liked that. Not because I was afraid of the dark but because it reminded me that there was still something outside of the house.
But here, I can’t even see my hand in front of my face, so I feel my way blindly to the door to open it because I have to go to the bathroom.
As I walk through the big room, my gaze lands on Cole lying motionless in his bed, deep asleep. A part of me wants to walk over to him and study him in the warm light of the streetlamp, but it feels wrong, so I head to the bathroom.
On the way back, however, I hear him mutter something and freeze.
"You okay, darling?" His voice is even raspier from the alcohol and fatigue than before, instantly sending goosebumps all over my body.
I make a few tentative steps toward the huge bed and stop beside it, answering him quietly. "I can’t sleep. It’s too dark in there."
Cole lies on his side, right arm curled under his head, left hand resting on the empty space beside him. At my words, he contorts his face slightly. Because I’m afraid he might be worse off than Jules suspected, I bend down a bit and look at him more closely. "Areyouokay?"
He hums softly, opening his eyes just a little, vainly searching for my gaze before letting them fall shut again. Still, his fingers find mine and gently wrap around my hand. "Did you have fun tonight?"
His rough, warm skin and the gentle circles of his thumb on the back of my hand make my heart beat faster, which is why I can only answer with anmm-hmm.
A barely visible smile spreads on his lips before it gradually disappears again, and the movement of his finger also slowly dies. But he does not release me.
I stand next to the bed, not knowing what to do or what to think. Cole seems to have fallen asleep again, and because I don’t want to wake him, I sit down next to him.
In the warm light of the lamp outside, his features look softer, almost vulnerable. I remember Jules’s words and now also recognize the sadness, although it seems so absurd to me that a man like Cole could be sad about anything. He seems too big. Too strong. Too untouchable.
