Together?
Fuck, that feeling again.
Creeping up. Dancing around in my blind spot.
Walking closer. Those eyes. The book is in his hand, but…
I can't stop looking at him.
I can't deny, I'm terrified of this.
Fear I can understand, fear I can pinpoint—that's just fear. It's nothing to be afraid of itself. It's human. Common.
Like the fear I feel when the client won't leave, or the fear I feel when it starts to hurt.
I know where it begins and I know where it ends. I know everything about it because I can see it, in front of me.
But this feeling, it's not like that.
Because it begins and ends inside me.
The one place I can't watch.
It's not that damn book.
Watching it now, inching closer towards me, Lucas's fingerprints marking its edge,
the fear remains identical.
It doesn't grow, it doesn't shrink.
I want it to be the book. I want to be scared of it so badly, but I think what I'm really scared of is that it isn't.
Something's crawling inside me.
Perhaps the fear of fear itself.
Perhaps fear of an emotion.
Something I can't control.
Something I can't foresee.
Something I can't distract.
Something I can't run from.
Something I'm not sure I want to run from.
"Come over here." He ushers, patting the emptiness beside him, beckoning me over.
"I'm already close enough, don't you think?"
I say, from the other side of the bed, half falling off.
His tone is so sweet compared to mine. It fits so perfectly with the rest of him.
"You won't be able to see the book."
He sighs, a tender smile cosying on his face.
"Fine by me." I huff, my arms knotting.
"You never know." He follows, attempting to achieve some sort of wink.
"Might be some naked lady pictures in here."
I scoff. Wiping the watery snot from my nose with my collarbone.
"Or men?"
He pouts.
I nestle next to him, forgetting myself and my intentions slightly.
But to be clear—
"I'm only here because I had time to rethink while you were mocking me. That okay by you?" My eyes slant as I divert my gaze from him and his stupid cheeky expression.
The pages. They're this gross off-white colour.
"Why are they yellow?" I yell, leaning my head down to sniff them.
"Reckon someone's shot a load in this?"
I bark.
"Best hope not." He says.
He tilts his head, admiring the ends of my overgrown hair.
"But if someone has—" he continues.
"Better to put your hair up so it doesn't get yucky from it."
He twirls off his mother's scrunchie, gathering my hair into one, plaiting it carefully.
"There."
He stretches his legs out in front of him. For a moment I thought he was going to start kicking.
"Some of my best work yet."
"Your hair's so pretty, you know that?"
"Huh…"
I think my vocal cords have fallen out my arse.
Why is this strange man complimenting my rat's nest? Why can't I form a reply?
"It's hair." I reply. The dullest manner and tone I could fathom.
Shit. How come my autopilot team is so fucking boring.
He flicks through the book's pages, glancing down at them—or at least, he's pretending to, because I see his eyes still glaring.
"I can hear you." He gushes.
"What? I didn't say anything?"
He sucks in his cheeks.
I can hear spit swishing around his mouth. Kind of rank, isn't it?
He's got weird habits. Man, why is it kind of endearing? What a thing to be attracted to.
"No. That's what the woman in the book said. That's what Sunny just said to me." He exclaims.
"Have you done this before?" He asks, lifting his fringe from his face once again, making a pathway to see me through.
I pause, lifting my chin in the air, pretending to make an effort to remember.
I don't want him to know how recent I read it. I hate not being the expert, and I'm not taking creepy book lessons from him.
"Loads of times." I lie, confidently. My eyes wrinkled by the over-exaggeration.
"Okay then. So you know that she's a woman called Mable. She's 190 years old and currently resides in the underworld."
My grin remains as my brain tries to recall the entirety of the English language.
"Of course I did!" I snap.
"Yeah?" He laughs, obviously tickled.
"I'm intrigued."
His shoulders drop as he bends under my hanging head to see my eyes.
"Because that was all bullshit. She's a woman called Sunny, 29. She didn't write the book and doesn't live inside it. She actually owns a cake shop a few towns away.
She hears us in her head, we hear her in the book, which she shares a name with by total coincidence, maybe some whitchy woo shit. Got it?
He's defeated me. I underestimated his strength. This man is getting far too comfortable with me.
"Got it." I mumble, looking away. Vanquished I am.
"Men who take me down like that do not get the right to see me in my true form."
I say, yanking the covers back over me, hiding away any… dangly bits.
"Fine by me. No one's looking. I'm reading, and so are you." He shrugs, bending his legs up to support the book.
Bet book lady would appreciate me. Lucas is as unbothered as a dildo in a church.
"Wanna give it a go?" He nudges my arm, looking down at it.
He's probably felt it again—the fragility. I forget my body isn't normal sometimes. Least I can say there's nothing he hasn't seen now.
No more shock surprises.
No more bones.
Well, not on my leg at least.
"Give it here then, she sounds great." I remark, snatching the book from his thigh.
I flick a few pages, landing on one.
Page number 9.
I've always loved the number 9. That age. Before it all went to shit.
I focus myself on the ink, darting my eyes for a random line to scan over.
As I'm looking, unconsciously reading, I hear her.
It's so loud, much louder than my own internal voice, easy to differentiate between words I'm reading and ones she's trying to communicate.
A paragraph.
"This guy who built it for us wasn't happy, but he eventually said 'your opinion is more important.' Which she agreed because of course it is."
I scan the words, picking out the ones Sunny was telling me.
I drag my thumb along the lines.
"This… guy… your… is? The fuck does that mean?" I groan.
"Switch the words around, Seazon. Make them work."
I look to Lucas, back to the book, back to Lucas, then stare at the wall. Pondering.
"Is… this, your guy? Is this your guy?!"
He sits, hand over mouth, choking on his laughter.
"Sorry—" I say.
"Who's your guy?"
He rests his hand on his throat, letting it fall to his chest as he catches his breath.
"I suppose that's you then."
I cough, my spit forming an army of troops to drown me.
"I don't like her, Lucas. She's pissing me off."
I scold, brow raising, turning away in denial of what she just said. What he just said.
I stop for a moment. My mind drifting to a question.
"So she hears us in her head? How does she know what words there are on the page if it's just some random book? How does she know we'll even read the word she wants us to hear?"
He slides the book out of my hands, placing it back on his legs.
"Yeah, I thought that too." He says, scratching the back of his neck.
"You don't have to worry. It tends to take us to the right page. Her vocabulary is pretty similar to what's written."
"Man." I say, trying to sound enthusiastic.
"Thinking about it, English is a pretty tiny, easy language. Or else how would I've learnt it?" I elbow his thigh, giving him the cue to mock me.
Silence.
"You're smart, you know? Stop being so pitiful, Seazon. It's off-putting for the suitors." He giggles.
I've decided. I hate this guy.
If only I could.