Dara’s mouth twisted, like he was going to say something else and then thought better of it. What came out was: “Fine. If you don’t remember who started it, perhaps you remember who continued it.”
Noam wanted to die. “Me.”
The anger was gone, bled out. In its absence Dara was pale and still, his eyes black iron. Noam hadn’t seen Dara wear this mask since ... since before they had sex, when Dara still held him at arm’s length. Seeing Dara slip behind that façade once more was like being stabbed. It hurt. Badly.
“I see,” Dara said. He crossed his arms, tapping his fingers against the opposite bicep. “I think you’d better go.”
Noam stepped toward Dara again, reaching for him—hoping if he touched him, somehow, he could make Dara see ... see what, exactly, he didn’t know, but it didn’t matter. Dara knocked Noam’s hands away with a quick stroke of his wrist.
“Leave.”
“I can explain—”
“I don’t think you can.” Dara strode across the narrow room to open the door and glare at Noam through narrowed eyes. “I don’t even want to look at you. You need to leave.”
Dara looked more than willing to enforce that using his fists.
Noam felt sick, the kind of sickness that fermented in his marrow and poisoned his blood. “Okay. Okay.” He couldn’t meet Dara’s gaze as he slipped into the hall, though he passed close enough to smell the cigarette smoke clinging to Dara’s clothes. He turned, hoping to say something—I’m sorry,maybe, orCan I come back later,but Dara slammed the door in his face. A beat later, Noam felt the twist of a metal latch.
He didn’t hear footsteps. Dara stood right there on the other side of the door. If Noam tried, perhaps he could have sensed the heat of Dara’s skin against his clothes, the movement of his blood. He could have used magic to unlock that door and shoulder his way back inside andmakeDara listen.
He did none of those things.
Instead he went down the narrow stairs, caught the bus at the corner, and returned to Lehrer’s apartment. He made it back a scant five minutes before Lehrer arrived in his slim chancellor’s suit to kiss Noam’s temple and ask if Gisela had been by with the groceries, thankfully oblivious to where Noam had been. Noam begged off dinner pretending to have a headache and lay alone in the darkened bedroom with Dara’s words replaying themselves in his head, long past when Lehrer went to sleep himself. When the first gray light of dawn finally crept through the cracks between the blinds, Noam knew it was already too late to repair his mistakes. Whatever he and Dara had was broken now. And it was no one’s fault but his own.
Noam dreamed he stood at the entrance of Dara’s bedroom. Not the barracks. And not the room as it was in the apartment now—barren of personality, empty of anything to suggest a boy had ever lived and grown up there.
No. This room had an occupant. An IV pole stood next to the nightstand, its bag filled with a clear fluid. The curtains were drawn. A clock ticked on the wall, counting down the days.
On the bed, a figure curled up beneath the covers. Dara’s black hair flared against the white pillowcase. Even bundled up in blankets, it was clear he was too thin. Breakable.
The IV line snaked down from the pole, vanishing under the duvet. Its contents kept Dara alive, but they also kept him powerless.
Noam opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out. Dara shifted, shivered, the duvet slipping off one shoulder; sweaty skin glinted in the dim light.He’s dying.
He’s dying.
It’s my fault.
Someone was standing right behind him.
“Dara,” Lehrer’s voice murmured in Noam’s ear, his breath hot on Noam’s nape. “It’s time to wake up now.”
Noam lurched upright, his throat burning and someone’s hands gripping his arms, Lehrer’s hands—Lehrer, restraining him—
“You’re okay—”
“Don’t touch me,” Noam gasped, swatting at those arms and shoving at the mattress with both heels. “Don’t touch me!”
“Jesus—okay, sorry.” The hands let go.
Noam sucked in another agonized breath, and the room slid into focus. Not Lehrer’s room. Not Lehrer’s hands.
Taye sat at the foot of Noam’s bed, eyes wide and gleaming in the darkness.
Right. Noam wasn’t at Lehrer’s anymore—it was Thursday night. He was in the barracks. Lehrer was nowhere near him.
He was fine.
