“Funny. When you decided to take Quin to your bed, you just told me. After you got pissed at me and decided to look around and took Bolson into your bed, you announced that with great fanfare and possibly multicolored streamers. I was a little bitter over that one, so I might be exaggerating.”
“I’m not going to feel guilty for being sexual,” Allie warned him.
“What? No. I don’t want you to.”
When she looked up, Shank was standing at the end of the couch.
“You can bed who you like, whether that includes me or not, but my point is that you were always one to talk about what you’re doing. I mean, I’m the one with emotional constipation.”
“You’re good with emotions. You talked to Jacqs when he was all confused about his sexuality. I really can’t believe he got all the way into adulthood, and no one had talked to him about sexual identity.” Allie snorted. The man was ignorant, and that was the nice way of phrasing it.
“Actually,” Shank said, his sheepish look in place, “we mostly talked about why we didn’t understand why you were making us talk.” He shrugged.
“You didn’t.” Allie closed her eyes in frustration. She couldn’t exchange words with Jacqs for two minutes without starting a fight, so sending Shank to talk to him had been her peace offering, her way of helping Jacqs when clearly every teacher he’d had since puberty had horribly failed to give him any sort of education, and his parents hadn’t managed any better.
Shank gave her an apologetic grin. “I did. On the good side, Jacqs really didn’t need to discuss his feelings. I know it’s a stereotype, but usually guys don’t.”
“But you want to now,” Allie said, poking him with her words. The guilt set in two seconds later.
“I want to know why you feel like you’re dying. I want to make things better,” Shanks said.
Allie stared at the screen and tried to sort the mess of emotions that pressed against her ribs. “Can you make the war vanish and the batface army go away?”
“The war pretty much took care of itself,” Shank pointed out, “and the batface army is less of an obstacle than you might think if you don’t poke them and then stir the stick around until they all get angry. So what’s next on the agenda?”
“Don’t die,” Allie suggested.
Shank let out a breath in a long sigh as he sat on the couch. “Being human, that’s going to be a problem.”
“Yeah.” Allie pulled her foot up under her and curled her arms around her knee. “Every time I look at you, I just think, ‘What if he dies? What if he goes out tomorrow, and he gets killed, and I’m alone?’ Therapy might be an option.”
“If we stop seeing each other, you’re just alone a little sooner.”
“And again, therapy is an option,” Allie said, nodding. She knew all the reasons why she was being illogical, but that didn’t change anything. It didn’t change the way her heart ached and her skin crawled as tiny fear feet marched their way up her spine. “I grew up on Eridani Main. The war was something that happened somewhere else. I never... And now I don’t know how to stop being afraid.”
Shank reached for her, his fingers skating across her arm.
“I’m losing it,” Allie said miserably. “I don’t handle failure well, and I’m pretty much failing here.”
“No, you aren’t.”
Allie wiped her eyes angrily. “I’m sorry, but have you looked at me lately?”
“We just came through a Security Central mission. We got irradiated in friendly fire. We nearly got blown up, so don’t act like a little panic is surprising. I’d be more shocked if you weren’t feeling something.”
“You don’t.” Allie looked over at him, but he had those emotional shutters down again. His dark eyes stared at nothing for a long time. She might have accused him of falling asleep with his eyes open, but he twisted his fingers around the bottom of his shirt.
“I gave up,” Shank finally said, whispering so soft it barely crossed the distance between them. “I thought I saw Jacqs killed. I watched the others...” His voice broke, and he had to clear his throat. “When Lieutenant Taylor was hit, I wanted to stay with him, but he was making that death rattle as the blood filled his lungs, and so I went out and I played duck and dodge through the rocks as I waited for one of the marines to get a shot at me. I just wanted it over quick.”
“Oh, Shank.” Allie reached out and caught his hand, saving his shirt from any further mauling. He lowered his head, his braids swaying with the motion.
“When Jacqs showed up, I felt like I’d been reborn. I was saved. I had grieved for my own death, only to find my death was not as close as I had imagined.”
“And here I am obsessed with worrying about you dying.” Allie sighed. “That story should not have made me feel better.”
“Did it?” Shank wrapped his fingers around her hand.
“Weirdly, yes.” Up until now, she’d harbored this fear that she’d exaggerated the whole thing and that she was the only one falling apart. Now she knew she had someone with her in the misery. And that made her feel like an absolute bitch who wanted other people miserable, but she didn’t. She honestly didn’t. “That’s probably another vote in the ‘Allie needs therapy’ column, though. Hearing about you nearly dying—”
