And—oh, it smells nice. Sharp and woodsy with a hint of smoke, or leather, or tobacco, or something. One of those scents that they put in fancy candles that sounds gross and then smells good.
“Are you huffing my sweater?” he asks, lowering himself to the floor again.
“No,” I say, inhaling with the neck of his sweater pressed to my nose. “It smells like expensive candles and fancy playgrounds after it rains.”
Gideon stares at me for a moment.
“What,” he says.
“Expensive candles,” I repeat. “And theniceplaygrounds in the swanky—”
“It’s wool. I keep it in a cedar chest so the moths won’t eat it,” he says, still staring.
“Oh,” I say. “It smells like cedar chest, then,” I finish, and he’s still giving me this look like he’s regretting every moment of this borrow-a-sweater deal, and also like I’m suddenly speaking in a foreign language, andalsolike I’m a small child who needs to be dealt with delicately lest I have a sudden meltdown.
It smells like him, I guess, but it also doesn’t. I can’t quite say what Gideon smells like in my memories of him, but his cedar-chest-and-nice-candles sweater isn’t unlocking anything in my brain the way scents sometimes can. It’s brand new, and the wool is already warm from my body heat, and the shoulders are too wide and the sleeves are too long, and it smellsnewand really, really good, and I’m having a confusing time.
Gideon watching me like I’m television isn’t helping.
“It’s my turn, right?” I finally ask, and he nods.
* * *
Because Gideon is,at heart, a gentleman, he lets me take my sponge bath and brush my teeth first that night. The sponge bath is actually a pretty decent way to get clean—it’s soap and water, after all—but my hair is currently hopeless. My plan is to keep it in a braid until I can finally take a glorious, glorious shower when I get home tomorrow.
Because I’m a stubborn asshole, I take up residence on the couch while he’s taking his own sponge bath and brushing his teeth. He’s consistently refused to either a) just sleep in the other twin bed in the bedroom, or b) let me sleep on the couch, so I have no choice but to take matters into my own hands.
I’m snuggled deep in my sleeping bag, almost comfortable, and readingTender is the Stormwhen Gideon walks through the door, stops, and frowns.
“Your face is gonna get stuck that way,” I tell him without looking up.
“Why are you on the couch?”
“Because I’m going to sleep here,” I say, turning the page. I didn’t finish reading it and I’m gonna have to go back, but I like the dramatic effect. “Your sleeping bag is in the bedroom, on an actual bed.”
“Andi,” he says with exaggerated patience, a mood I recognize from watching him deal with small children for many years.
“Gideon,” I say, finally looking at him over the top of my book.
He crosses his arms over his chest and tries to look… stern, or intimidating, or grouchy, or something, I guess. I grin and wave.
“This isn’t over,” he grumbles, then walks into the bedroom. There’s some rustling, and I go back to my book, unconcerned.
There’s a small, reasonable part of me that knows I shouldn’t be pushing it like this. Gideon and I used to know each other; we don’t, anymore. Our truce—our friendship?—feels fragile and sticky as spiderwebs, and I should be gently building trust and establishing rapport or whatever people do in these situations.
But there’s this face Gideon makes when he pretends to be annoyed with me but isn’t, or at least when he’s not as annoyed as he’s pretending to be, and that face delights me like little else.
Some of it is pure, giddy relief. Some is cabin fever and boredom. Some is pure, simple enjoyment at getting a reaction out of him, and I’ve chosen not to examine that last thing too closely. He was the closest thing I had to a sibling when I was a kid, sonoticinghow he looks in sweaters and well-fitting hiking pants feels a little odd and uncomfortable, like I’m some Jezebellian pervert and he’s still the church-going innocent he once was.
Though I’m pretty sure he doesn’t go to church anymore, and I can only assume that in the last twenty years he’s gotten up to some perversion of his own. Which is another very impolite thought, Jesus, I’m done with that now.
Also, he won’t even sleep in the same room as me, which suggests that he probably feels the same way as far as appropriate thoughts are concerned.
“Off,” he says, walking back into the main room, carrying his own sleeping bag and pillow. He stops by the side of the couch, looming over me, and in the low light of the wood stove, two oil lamps, and the headlamp I’m using to read, it’s actually a little intimidating.
“No,” I say anyway.
“Andi,” he says. “We’ve already established a precedent here. I sleep on the couch, you sleep on a bed.”
