Seems Tree Man is as practical as he is pretty. “Thanks.”
He gives me another sweet smile. “You looked like your brain was about to explode.”
Okay. Make thatperceptive, practical, and pretty. Three P’s of perfection. Or is it four? I picture a square with this dude’s face in every corner. It takes me down a rabbit hole I don’t have time for, but the meds I took on the plane help me pull myself back. “What would you want to eat in a Burlington wine bar?”
He frowns. “I don’t drink wine.”
Me neither. But I saw plenty of patrons drinking beer before I stumbled upon Tree Man and his great legs, and it’s all the same, right? Pub food? I mean, I can do posh, but I’d rather not. That shit sucks the joy out of my day, and life is too damn short.
I feel Tree Man retreat. Hear him pick up his tools and go back to whatever I interrupted. The urge to spin round and watch him work is hard to resist, but I’m medicated. I got this. Ifocusand scribble enough notes in my borrowed notebook to give myself a migraine later, only stopping when my legs cramp from being squatted down so long.
Time is a strange concept to a brain empowered by the same things that make me feel weak. I come upright, acutely aware that however long I’ve been hyper-focused on the best use for the magic drawers, a bomb could’ve detonated and I wouldn’t have noticed. Five minutes, five hours, it’s all the same to me.
I even forgot about Tree Man.
Give him his pencil back.His notebook is a lost cause.
I turn to tell him so, bracing myself for another hit of his rugged beauty, but…he’s not there. While I’ve been muttering to myself and mutilating his notebook, Tree Man has left the building.
Or, at the very least, the kitchen he built for me with his strong and capable hands.
4
KAI
I can’t fuckin’ sleep. My heart pounds as I stare at the ceiling. Sweat that has nothing to do with the early summer heat trickles down my temple, and I clench and unclench my fists so many times my knuckles click and crack.
Close your eyes. Take deep breaths. Stop worrying about nightmares you might not have.
It’s like stepping in front of a tank and choosing if it guns you down or runs you over.
Think about something else.Molly’s date springs to mind, but not for long. The kid was nice enough, but he had the personality of a dustpan—yeah, I checked before quitting civilization for the night. Tanner and Jax weren’t back yet, and the last boy she brought to the bar stole her cell phone.
Swapping rage for anxiety isn’t quite what I had in mind, but it’ll do. Until it won’t and the burning in my gut morphs back into the sensations that keep me awake every night that I don’t rot my insides with a fuckin’ Xanax.
Go me. Any other night I’d have quit this shit hours ago. Abandoned my empty apartment and crept across the hall to hide from myself on Tanner’s couch. But life is different now. My apartment isn’t empty, and I don’t feel like flaying myself open to my new roomie just yet, especially as the only encounter I’ve had with him I forgot to tell him my name.
Or that we’re roommates.
Gome.
Man, I feel sick. Maybe I should take the Xanax. It can’t make me feel worse, right?
Wrong. You didn’t eat.Damn it. I sit up and drive the heels of my hands into my eyes. A tension headache throbs in my temple, but I don’t mind it. Physical pain makes sense. The cacophony of bullshit in my brain doesn’t. It’s not fair. I did everything right. I filled in the forms, attended the mandatory counseling sessions and a bunch of extras. I wasfine. And yet here I am, nine months later, ranting at the ceiling in the middle of the night cos my fuckin’ heart won’t shut the hell up.
Fuck this.
I need to move. I need to do something—anything—to calm down before I angst myself into a stroke.
There’s a pair of drawstring pants on the dresser. I drag them on and pull a T-shirt over my heated skin. My hands fuckin’ shake, but I know how to slap a Band-Aid on that.
Do something.
Resolved, I book it out of my room, nearly tripping my damn self up as I lurch into the hall. My new roommate’s bedroom door is closed like it was when I came upstairs a few hours ago. I can only assumeJossis sleeping. It is nighttime after all. Even Church Street is quiet. Just me and the cats prowling around.
As if you’re that subtle.
I wish. Instead, I’m an over-anxious, under-medicated jackass and clumsy as hell. I bang my knee on the doorframe. Grit down on a curse, gaze flying to Joss’s closed bedroom door.
