"You have a—" I blinked. My tongue felt slightly approximate. "You have a couch. I should be on the couch. This is your—"
"The couch doesn't recline correctly. Elevation matters with a head injury." A pause.
I opened my mouth.
"Don't argue with me about this," he said. "You'll lose, and it'll take longer than you have the energy for."
That was—
He wasn't wrong. I didn't have the energy for it. I could feel the absence of energy, very specifically, like a checking of pockets and finding them all empty. My head was a seven, maybe still a seven, and my stomach was composing a formal letter, and I was sitting on Cross's bed being looked at by Cross at whatever time it was past midnight, and none of my systems were firing at the required capacity to do anything about any of it.
"Fine," I said.
I meant to say something else after fine. Something that reestablished the order of things, something with an edge to it that meant I was here on my own terms and not because the evening had just happened to me.
Instead my stomach sent the letter.
The apartment was very quiet. My head felt, paradoxically, slightly clearer, the way it sometimes did after, like the pressure had somewhere to go now.
"Cross," I said to the floor.
"Mm."
"I threw up on your shoes."
"Yes," he said. "You did."
6
Idid not look up.
Looking up was not something I was going to do for a while.
"I'm sorry," I said. "That was—" I stopped. There wasn't a word for what that was. "I'm so sorry."
Cross didn't say anything. I heard movement, and then his shoes were in my peripheral vision, and he stepped out of them with the same economy he did everything, and set them aside, and that was that. No sigh. No noise of any kind. Just problem identified, problem removed from the immediate situation.
"Stay seated," he said.
"I can help clean—"
"Stay seated."
He left the room. I heard a cabinet somewhere. Water running. I stayed seated because my body had taken the vote and the vote was unanimous and humiliating.
The floor continued to exist in front of me. I continued to exist above it. The bedroom was quiet except for the distant sound of Cross solving the problem I had created, practically andwithout commentary, which was somehow worse than if he'd said something.
He came back with towels and a trash can, which he positioned next to me without ceremony, and then he did what he'd come back to do. He cleaned the floor. Wiped the cabinet where the cabinet had needed wiping. Moved efficiently and without visible distaste, like this was a task on a list of tasks and the task was being completed.
I watched. There was nothing else to do.
"You don't have to—"
"I actually do," he said.
"Cross—"
"You can help," he said, "by staying seated and not making it worse."
