Click.
Another moment, caught in the frame.
I find John and his flask and down a few more spiked mocktails after that. The oldies and I have a great time on the dance floor until one by one, they start sinking into seats and nodding off. The van is called, there are hiccupped goodbyes, and sober Trent drives me and Grandpa home while we sing Crowded House in the back seat. “Four Seasons In One Day!”
“What is this under my butt?”
Grandpa pulls at it and rope uncoils slowly from under me.
“What’s the rope for?” I ask, rubbing the burn Grandpa left behind.
Trent murmurs drily, “Always have rope in the truck. Never know when you might need to tie up some drunken idiots.”
“Quick,” Grandpa says. “Open the window, I’ll toss it.”
The rope gets squished into the back alongside a sleeping bag instead. And then suddenly the door is whipped open, and we’re back home. Just a small hill to climb.
Trent helps Grandpa inside and into bed first, and I become an interior designer in the hall deciding exactly where my photo should go.
Oof. The photos are blurring a bit.
“Here!” I say when Trent’s form appears again in the hall. “I go here.” Hiccup. “Right between this one of Grandpa and yougraduating uni.” I squint at the picture. “You don’t look that much younger than now.”
“Mature student. I quit for a while, then went back at twenty-five.”
I poke the picture. “When’s this?”
“May last year.”
“And a doctorate! So smart.” Instead of the photo, I’m prodding him now, between the buttons of his shirt. “Even smarter in the penguin suit.”
He captures my wrist and holds it still, and I feel the rub of cord and cold fish under his grip. He slowly lowers my hand. “Earlier,” he says. “It felt so genuine. Was that penguin prince story... your story?”
The hallway swims and then I’m laughing again as I push past him towards the kitchen. “Not my story. Beth’s.”
Trent is a sigh right behind me. “Okay, okay. If you say so.”
I lunge for the pantry and swing the doors open with a gust of air. Only to come eye to eye with a chicken on the shelf. Just chilling there in a basket lined with serviettes.
“Trent!”
Trent mutters in disbelief, scoops up the basket and returns it to the pen while I find a pack of cookies and start cramming them into my mouth.
Somehow, I end up sprawled over the counter in a pool of crumbs, my head on my arm as I blow them towards the sink.
Trent returns as a shadow and something that sounds like a snort. He says stuff, but I’m not quite sure, and suddenly, like the chicken, I’m being scooped up and marched to my pen.
A soft, incredulous breath escapes him. Half snort, half sigh. “Okay, okay,” he murmurs, and this time there’s no bite to it. Just low amusement. Familiar. Warm. His hands are on my hips with gentle pressure, steady but unhurried. Not rough, not impatient.
My breath catches a little as I tip onto a bed, the world tilting with it, and I don’t even resist. “This is your bed.”
“I don’t want you getting hurt trying to reach the top bunk. Let’s swap for tonight.”
I don’t argue. I breathe in his scent on the pillow. Sigh.
He pauses, fingers curling tighter into the blanket. Then he resumes, slow and deliberate, tucking it up beneath my chin.
“I’m still in my clothes.”
