When it’s quiet, I can hear my thoughts too loudly.
“Any preference?” I ask Storm as he comes around to the front of the couch.
He neatly kicks off his black and white Adidas and edges them under the coffee table. He has white socks on, and they’re like…super white. I’m kind of impressed as he sits down beside me, but not yet close enough to touch me. Not that he has to, but the scent of him—leather and lightning in a bottle—ishot.
I try not to deeply inhale like a freak.
“No,” he says, his voice low and close in the dark, the only other sound is a car engine revving from outside the apartment. My blinds are closed and the deep indigo curtains are pulled shut on the wall at my side. The view down below is a side street a lot of Ely U students live on. It’s not a direct access to my complex, though, and I like that. Sparse trees, then the road.
I pick something at random; there’s a priest with red eyes on the thumbnail clip. It starts up on a road with yellow and orange leaves kicking across the street, the camera asphalt level.
I lean over and set the remote on the coffee table, wondering if I should grab my phone from my bedroom. I usually check it more than I watch any show I put on for background noise. But Storm doesn’t have his phone out, so I decide to stay where I am.
As the movie’s opening scene rolls out some credits, I can feel Storm watching me in the dark. “How was your date?” he asks. His voice is neutral. I can’t tell if he cares I went on a date or not.
Probably not.
I don’t look at him. “It was good.” He doesn’t need to know anything else. I’m not even sure why he’s asking. I wouldn’t ask him abouthisdates.
“Just good?” he presses, still neutral in his tone.
I turn to him and squint. “Why are you asking me this?” On the TV, it sounds like some teenagers are talking about their weekend plans to get fucked up.
I think of Remi and want to warn them, but…it’s a movie, Sloane, get a grip.Sometimes I think I should’ve done more for her, though. It’s hard to let the regret go.
Storm stares at me, the whites of his eyes magnifying the blue of his irises with no lights on. “I want to know about my competition. Where did he take you?”
Competition. My stomach flutters but I dive my fingers into the softness of my blanket and pull it up to my chin. “Shut up,” I mutter. Then add, “For a drink, then we went for a walk in the park, then we had dinner.”
“At KFC?”
I can’t help it. The way he asks, so deadpan, I laugh out loud. “No, asshole. Not KFC. Sushi.”
“You like sushi?” Still no inflection in his voice.
“Yes. I do.”
“Do you know I’m an excellent cook?”
I’ve smelled the bacon and eggs and biscuits he’s made at Remi’s before. But I just say, “Can you roll sushi?”
He ignores that. “Did he kiss you?”
I roll my eyes as a girl giggles from the movie. “I’m not doing this with you. If you want to interrogate me, you can leave. I’m tired, and my stomach hurts, and you’re annoying me.” I turn away from him and fold my arms over my chest, sinking lower on the couch.
There’s a group of teenagers on a picnic blanket at a cemetery in the dark, a few lanterns around them for light. They’re leaning in close, all six of them, whispering spooky stories to one another. A cooler which must have drinks in it based on their red plastic cups is behind one of the kids, and they seem giddy with nerves and excitement, smiles stretched on their tipsy faces.
But in the middle of one of them telling their story—it sounds a lot like the plot toI Know What You Did Last Summer—a gunshot goes off.
I flinch, but not from the sound.
At my side, Storm is at his feet, and he has a…gunin his fucking hand.
What the fuck?
He’s staring at the TV, but the gun is pointed up, at the ceiling, his tattooed fingers wrapped around the barrel, one light on the trigger.
What. The. Fuck.
