"Fine—I've had the impulse. And no, I've never acted on it. Because I'm an adult with impulse control."
"In almost every aspect of my life, I possess an iron will." I roll a shoulder. "Kissing you like that was extremely out of character."
"Kissing you back was extremely out of character for me, as well," she says. "I don't even really like kissing all that much, for the most part."
This makes me pull a face. "You don't?"
She shrugs. "No, not really. It's…wet, and weird. It's awkward. My nose gets in the way, and I don’t know what to do with my tongue, and it feels weird when someone tries to French kiss me." A sigh, a shake of her head. "I don't know. I just…I don't know."
"Felt to me like you liked it just fine."
Her cheeks turn red. "It was okay."
Moving slowly and deliberately, I reach out and take her hand. I'm not sure why. Just like when I kissed her, she resists at first, stiff and tense and unyielding. And then, gradually, by degrees, the stiff tension in her hand ebbs, slackens. Her blue-green-brown eyes search mine, flicking and sliding this way and that, hunting, darting, intense.
"Why?" She breathes. "Why mock me like this? I answered the question honestly."
"Mock you?" I echo, frowning. "Who's mocking?"
"Then why?"
"I'm curious," I answer—truthfully, I realize. "I've never held hands before."
Brys snorts. "Oh, bullshit. Everyone holds hands. My first 'boyfriend', and heavy quotes on the term boyfriend there, all we ever did was hold hands. Granted, we were twelve at the time, and it felt pretty daring."
I shake my head. "I never experienced that."
"What, were you super sheltered or something? One of those 'no touching girls till marriage' situations?"
I lick my lips, put the shifter into Drive, and follow traffic forward once more; we are still holding hands. "My upbringing was…nontraditional, at best. And whatever childhood I may have had came to what one might accurately call a rather abrupt halt. I was not a child at the time, technically, but…" I trail off, the rest lodged somewhere between my esophagus and stomach.
Isabel is the only one I have ever told the whole story to, and I just do not know how to put the story out into the world again, how to trust anyone else with the truth. With the sordid reality of who I am—who I've been, perhaps more accurately. I'm losing my sense of self, somehow, lately. If I'm not Caleb Indigo anymore, and I’m not sure who Jakob Kasparek is anymore, then who am I?
Brys stares at me for a moment, then frowns when it becomes clear I'm not offering any further information. "You really aren't going to say anymore?"
I rub my forehead with a fore knuckle. "Sorry, but I'm not exactly raring to divulge my whole life's story to someone I just met."
She wrinkles her nose. "I suppose I can sympathize with that a little. I don't go around telling people all my secrets on the first date either." She winces, eyes widening and darting to me, then away. "Not that this is a date, or anything like it. I just…" She sighs. "Never mind. I'm shutting up before I eat my whole entire foot."
I chuckle. "I know what you meant."
"You're still holding my hand," she points out.
"No,you'restill holdingmyhand." I smirk at her as I say this.
No snarky comeback, just silence. But she also doesn't let go of my hand, and neither do I.
And so we cross the bridge and begin the trek across the outer boroughs in a strange silence—not awkward, entirely, but not easy exactly or companionable either. It's a unique silence, one I've never experienced before. I am comfortable with silences of all kinds. I use them to great effect in interviews, negotiations, and interactions. But this is…different.
I tend to wield silence like a weapon, or perhaps merely a tool. Silence can be a device for eliciting a desired response. It's basic psychology. But with Brys, it's a silence without intent. We are each laden with things to say, but aren't saying them. Yet despite the weight of all the unsaid things, it's bizarrely easy to say nothing. To simply sit beside her and ruminate on all the things I've never told anyone, not Isabel, not Inez—sorry, Sophia—not anyone. It's bizarrely easy to just hold her hand and weave my way through the Bronx northward toward Yonkers, leavingbehind the glass and concrete jungle of Manhattan. It's not silence with a purpose; it's just…silence.
At some point, I realize the silence is because she's fallen asleep.
Yonkers.White Plains. Sleepy Hollow. Ossining. Peekskill. Barely an hour outside the city, but it feels like a different world. For all the years I spent in NYC, I rarely ventured beyond the confines of the five boroughs.
I don't have a destination in mind. I'm just getting out of New York, away from the crowds and surveillance. Out here, I can spot a tail—so far, so good.
I do need a change of clothes—these are crusty and stiff with blood; we also need to switch vehicles. And I need a fucking nap.
