“That’s the plan, yeah.” I let myself get more comfortable, leaning into the couch and draping my arm across the top.
Her eyes roll, and she selects the horror genre through one of the many streaming services I have. “Okay, this is how it’s going to work. We are going to close our eyes, and I’m going to slide my thumb down the circle thingy?—”
“Circle thingy?” I interrupt.
“I don’t know what this thing is called. This is like a futuristic remote.”
I nod. “Okay, you’ll slide your thumb down on the circle thingy.”
“And then you’ll say stop, and I’ll pause the scroll. Whatever it lands on, that’s what we’ll watch. Sounds like a plan?”
“I don’t know if I trust this process, but fine.”
“What’s not to trust?” Ellie looks away from me, closes her eyes, and scrolls.
I count to three and say stop. I open my eyes but look at Ellie first, and she still has her eyes closed.
“Are you going to open your eyes?” I ask.
“I’m scared. What if it lands on areallybad movie?”
“Then we can laugh at the really bad movie.” I gently put my hand on her leg, making her jump just the tiniest bit. “Sorry.”
“You can’t do that when I have my eyes closed, and we’re choosing a horror movie.”
“Sorry, sorry. Are you going to open your eyes, or are you going to make me tell you?”
“Okay, okay.” She peeks with one eye and then opens the other. Ellie starts to shake her head and looks at me. “I’m not watchingThe Conjuring. No way.”
“Hey, you’re the one that did this. It was your idea. Now we need to stick to it.”
I get up from the couch and walk toward the front of the living room.
“Where are you going?” she asks.
“I’m turning off the lights,” I say without looking back at her.
“No, we are not turning off the lights.”
“It wouldn’t be a true horror movie if we watched it with lights on, now, would it?” I flip the switch and walk back toward the couch.
She looks up at me with a worried expression because the movie that it landed on is a movie she is terrified of.
Again, she did this.
“I’ll stay close to you and protect you. I promise.” I sit down next to her and take the remote from her, hitting play.
Ellie groans and pulls one of the throw pillows on the couch to her chest, clutching onto it.
“You’ll be fine.” I wrap an arm around her shoulder casually while she whines into the pillow.
I smile at her, wondering if she will, in fact, get scared to the point that she wraps her arms around me. She shouldn’t have asked me to choose the genre. That was her first mistake.
twenty-nine
ELLIE
“I hate this part,”I say, still clutching the pillow to me.
