“I’d like to see more of the monster.”
“You surely do not.”
“Just because I’m human you don’t believe my words?”
His fingers flex, drawing my attention to the hairpin I made, still clasped in his hand.
Merciless, I demand, “What would you do, right now, if you let go of your restraint?”
His lip quivers, and then he sniffles, and then he says, “Openly sob.”
Oh. Well.
My crossed arms loosen. “I don’t…” My brow furrows. “That’s not very monstrous, is it?”
Homeboy’s lips part again, but no answer comes as he draws my gift to his chest, curling around it as though it is the last bastion of his sanity and strength.
I find myself slipping from the arms of my teddy bear and wrapping Castor up. The way my heart eases as my body comes into contact with him lulls me toward a sensation of peace unlike anything I have ever experienced before. My eyes close. I comb my fingers through his hair. The strands slip silkily against my skin, and I find myself content with the idea of staying here, on the hard tile floor, for as long as I can.
Our soul bond is a drug in my system, dancing across the code of my cells.
The idea that I can sense his emotions from second to second has me starstruck.
No guessing. No worries. I can read his anger like his sorrow. I can read him.
And he can read me.
And when he does? He doesn’t abuse what he reads. He chooses to drop to his knees in response to my pain when he very well could have wallowed in his own emotions instead. Within minutes, he apologized for hurting me.
In all my life, I don’t think I’ve ever heard my mother apologize to me—not once. Andshecould have lied her way through it.
Brushing my lips against Castor’s forehead, I communicate, because I can, because he lets me. “I want to be strong. I want to be a force of nature. I do not want to need anyone ever again. I want to find stability in myself. I want to be capable of the independence I was running toward when I left home. Because, right now, Frel not being here feels like a reminder that I can’t rely on anyone. She helped me out of my mother’s house. She felt like a friend. But here I am, not even two weeks into a new and frightening life, and she found other things to occupy herself with. People are flimsy. I’m done using them as my foundation for anything.”
“You are supposed to be able to rely on me,” Castor whispers. “Being your stability is my position—myhonoras your soulmate.” His head drops. “And, yet, I have already failed.”
“I don’t know if you’vefailed, exactly. I think you’ve just been…” Human. But he’s not human. Even if he is flawed, and imperfect, and rife with emotions that I’ve consideredhumanfor my entire life. Finally, I decide to say, “Relatable.”
A cracking laugh leaves him. “Relatable?”
“I think so. You let your feelings carry you away. That’s the most relatable thing ever.”
“Danielle.”
I don’t know why, but I think I like the way he says my name. There’s an edge to it, a sweetness, a lacing of ages andsupplication. He says my name like a prayer, like I am worthy of reverence. “Yes?”
“I am scared.”
“Youare?” I let my mouth fall open, aghast from this revelation, which no one could have predicted nor decoded.
That is to say, he is trembling in my arms, fighting for breath, and kneeling. But even if I didn’t have all those incredibly obvious clues, I can feel his terror like a bass chord. His emotions make music between us, creating a symphony of dedication. And it is beautiful. So unbelievably beautiful.
Wry, his lips curve in a self-deprecating smile. “Cruelty is lovely on you, my feather. Mock me more. I know my fear is pathetic, and humiliation is no less than I deserve.”
“I don’t mean to mock you. It’s just I didn’t know that monsters could be scared. Don’t they normally do the scaring?”
His smile tilts and slips. “In my experience…monsters are often scared of the loneliness they inflict on themselves.”
“Then…don’t inflict it?” Behold, another revelation of remarkable magnitude.
