So I nod, letting my shoulders relax, and wait for his lead.
He slides back onto the bed, watching me intensely as he lowers himself onto his side.I follow, curling onto mine, facing him.
Our hands find each other in the middle, fingers tangling, palms hot with shared pulse.
We don’t speak.His eyes stay on me, hooded but soft, carrying too many memories, too much pain.I hold his gaze, searching the flickers there, mesmerized by how exhaustion stripped away the years, exposing so much of his innocence.
The silence grows heavy, but not oppressive.It’s comfortable, despite all the things neither of us can say.
Are you okay?He’s not okay.
Do you want to talk?He doesn’t want to talk about it.
Did you have sex with Jag?I don’t want to think about it.
I squeeze his hand, and he squeezes back.
This intimacy… I’ve never experienced anything like it with anyone else.Intimacy without sex.Without chatter.Just a deep, cozy closeness between two people content to watch each other, breath syncing in the quiet.
His eyes drift over my face, mine over his, both of us caught in some wordless spell.The world falls away, leaving only the rhythm of our lungs, the warmth of our hands, and the quiet hum of noisy thoughts.
Then, after a long beat, his mouth bounces at the corner.“Have you heard the fairy tale about the drag queen, the heart doctor, and the princess bride?”
“No, but I’d love to hear it.”
“It’s dark.”
“Have you met me?”
“Fair enough.I’ll skip the buildup and start at the good part.”He stretches out his legs, linking them around mine.“The drag queen jumps.Right off the cliff.Sequins, eyeliner, fuck-me boots, the whole shebang.Splat.Right into the icy river, she goes.Drowns, dies, done.Curtain closed.”
“But she didn’t die.”
“Lord knows she almost met him.”He hauls in a long, shaky breath.“But as usual, the Mighty God is a no-show.Instead, she meets the doctor.The white-coat kind that hands out medicine and miracles.He drags the queen out of the water, sews her back together, and saves her life.Sounds like a stand-up guy, right?”
“I feel a twist coming.”
“All the best fairy tales have one.But this one comes with trigger warnings.Can you handle that?”
“I don’t have triggers.”
“We’ll see.As it turns out, the fancy little heart doctor has a few screws loose.But screwdrivers aren’t his specialty.Scalpels are.He loves the way they shine under the fluorescent lights, and for the next ten months, he demonstrates his mad skills.Slice, hack, cut, stab.Anatomy turned into art.”
My hands twitch in the warm clutch of his.He’s telling me how he got the scars, and it wasn’t by the psychopath who raised him.Who the fuck is this doctor?
“The queen learns fast.Learns too much.”He shifts, his eyes losing focus.“One night, the doctor hosts a dinner party and invites all the people he killed and all the people he wants to kill.The lion, the bear, Dorothy, and Rich Daddy… All the queen’s friends are there.”
Wolf’s family.I can gather that much.But the rest?I don’t know.He’s using cryptic symbolism to express his trauma.Maybe it’s the only way he can talk about it.
I won’t question him.I’m just glad he’s talking.
“The doctor raped Dorothy right there on the table.”His voice darkens, making my blood run cold.
Frankie.That kind, gentle woman.The unspeakable hell this family has endured.They’ve suffered too much.
“Too dark?”Wolf searches my eyes.
“Keep going.”
