“Anytime.” In my distraction, I’ve missed Joss moving closer. He’s on his knees now, one arm slung behind me on the couch. His gaze is open, but hard to decipher, so I don’t try. I take the tea and let my body do what it wants. Let myself lean into him until there’s even less space between us than there was at the front door.
My hair is longer than it’s ever been. Joss tucks it first behind one ear, then the other. He looks like a man with a hundred things to say, but in the end, only four words fall from his lips. “Stay with me tonight?”
17
JOSS AND KAI
JOSS
I take Kai to my bed. There’s no logical reason for sleeping in mine instead of his, except that it gives him room to leave if he needs space.
He doesn’t leave. At least, not until morning when I wake up to find him gone. For the first time, he’s up before me, and it feels horrible enough that I go back to sleep to avoid it.
I miss my morning meds. It’s not a huge deal—they’re slow release—but it’s a kick in the dick to remind me I don’t have time to make a mess of myself. I have a restaurant kitchen to open and twenty-four hours left to get it right.
It requires my full attention. That’s what I tell myself when I emerge from the morning off Tanner forced on me and ignore the fact that the first thing I do is text Kai. I don’t have time to wonder if I’m falling too deep. If he is. I have too much to do.
I’m still flogging that horse when my day is finally over. When the new staff are as trained as they’re going to be, considering I rarely do the same thing the same way more than once, and I’ve told Tanner,again, that the server traffic by the kitchen door is going to be a problem.
I trudge upstairs, out of whack from sleeping late and missing my meds. My body is tired, but I’m off-my-tits awake, a psychosomatic effect of skipping one dose of a medication that takesweeksto build up to a therapeutic level. It’s why I’monthis drug in the first place. So it doesn’t fuck me if I mess up. But guess what? It fucks me anyway because Ithink myselfinto a hyperactive vortex.
I let myself into the apartment, looking for Kai before my conscious self knows I’m doing it, kicking my boots off, heading straight for the couch where he usually is this late on a weeknight.
He’s not there. The couch is empty. And it dawns on me that the apartment is too, dark and still, like it was the first night I came home and the identity of the mysterious Tree Man solidified.
I don’t like it. It’s the first thought that crowds into my brain and I own it. I have to. Cos it’s true. Without Kai, this place is heavy furniture and barren walls. With him, it’s the side tables he made himself and the hidden piles of mountaineering magazines he never reads. It’s home. And Imisshim.
Also, I can’t think for the life of me where he might’ve gone. When he’s not working or hiking, my boy is a hermit. He stays home and…actually, I don’t know what he does when I’m not here. I’ve never asked.
Maybe I should.
Maybe Iwillwhen he comes back.
I take a shower and swallow my evening meds. Immediately, I feel calmer—fucking stupid—and I force myself to crawl into my bed and stay there. Tomorrow is opening night for V&V’s kitchen. I don’t have time to rampage around the apartment creating brand-new messes.
It’s dark in my room, and I like it that way. In this mood, artificial light winds me up. Doesn’t stop me poking at my phone, though. Of course not. I post a photograph of Bowen’s Burger to V&V’s Instagram grid, and a faceless clip Jax filmed of me making it as a story. It takes two minutes of my attention, then I’m instantly lost in the short message thread between me and Kai.
Joss:you’re cute
Kai:so are you. having a good day?
Joss:if you count not breaking anything yet.
Kai:it all counts, bro
That’s it. All we have. But I don’t feel like asking him where the hell he went, so I keep my restless thumbs busy doom-scrolling on Twitter instead. I find the acerbic account of my chef mentor and send him a rude meme, but it’s arse o’clock in London and he doesn’t reply.
Outrageous.I stuff my phone under my pillow and roll onto my belly. My bedroom door is open. From here, I’ll see when Kai comes home. Cos I won’t sleep till he does.
Iwon’t.
But despite the unwelcome energy my nerves create for shits and giggles, I pass out.
I have no clue what time it is when the front door opens and closes sometime later. Just that it’s still dark and my eyeballs feel like sandpaper.
Kai’s footsteps are lighter than light. I barely hear him as he ditches his boots by the door and pads down the hallway to the bathroom. Then it’s quiet. Silent. As if he’s a ghost, which sends my untamable brain down a rabbit hole I’m not in the mood for. I’m at my worst when I should be asleep. Every weird nuance I have comes out to play. Racing thoughts. Misplaced energy. Motor tics I like to pretend don’t happen to me anymore.
Fuck. I close my eyes, straining my ears for the distraction of Kai moving around the apartment, doing whatever he does before he goes to bed.Hisbed, cos it’s not like he’s gonna come to mine and give my sheets a top-up of his scent.He’s not a wolf, dickhead.
