Silas
Kat is insufferable.She’s prickly. She’s haughty. She won’t give an inch on anything, ever.
And the sundress she’s wearing takes up most of the available real estate in my brain. It’s green and soft, ends right above her knees, leaves her upper back bare except for a lattice of crisscrossing straps that might as well be a net to catch any thoughts I manage to have.
“There’s not that much upside-down time,” she’s saying, her eyes on an abomination called The Zipper. Its acrobatics make me feel a little lightheaded. “And the restraints hardly ever come undone.”
“You’re more than welcome to go by yourself,” I point out for at least the third time. “I’ll be down here so someone can call 911 when the whole thing walks away or topples over.”
“It’s no fun to scream alone,” she says. Her hand’s in mine, and she tightens her grip on it as she looks up at me through her glasses and blinks.
Is she… batting her lashes at me? Suddenly, the ground feels less stable under my feet. First the sundress, and now this.
“I need a big, strong boyfriend there to… scream next to,” she says. The end of the sentence has considerably less bravado and volume than the beginning.
“And you were being so normal.”
“Shut up,” she mutters, but her mouth quirks like it does when she’s trying not to laugh.
“You didn’t even mention my strapping abilities of very manly protection,” I go on. “Or the very affectionate affections I might bestow upon a terrified girlfriend.”
“Okay, okay,” she says. “Look. I tried something, it didn’t work.”
“How about the haunted house ride?” I go on, cheerfully ignoring her. “Right before the end you can pretend to swoon into my arms and I’ll carry you out of there like I rescued you from King Kong my own self.”
Kat glances around quickly, her dark braid sliding over her shoulder, then flips me off. I laugh. Her lips quirk again, the corners of her eyes lifting with the smile stuck behind them.
I’m not even surprised that I’m having a good time. This time last week I would have been surprised by that but Kat, for all her over-acted prickliness and staged grumpiness, is the best date I’ve had in years, probably because she cuts me no slack whatsoever.
Truth is, I can get away with most things from most people. It’s not as if I’ve tried to charm my way out of a murder, but parking tickets? Sheila at the County Courthouse is married to my high school football coach and has, more than once, discharged fines while telling me about her grandchildren.
I’ve never gotten away with a single thing from Kat, who seems equally immune to flattery and goodwill, and who seems to consist entirely of knowing, sharp looks. Kat, who’s been harassing me for the past five minutes about my dislike of carnival rides but who seems to think nothing of the breakdown I had the night before last.
She’s humoring you, that old, ugly voice whispers. Now that she knows how easy you are to break, she’s handling you with kid gloves and waiting for the month to be over.
“What about a Ferris wheel?” she asks, looking up at it, twin circles of light reflecting on her glasses. “Is that also a death trap, or is it not fast or spinny enough?”
That gaze slides over to me yet again, because for all my claiming that my dislike is a safety issue, she saw right through it.
I sigh, pushing my hand through my hair, tangled with dried sweat from the day. With the sun down it’s just cool enough that I only feel like I’m in a swamp, not a sauna.
“I’ll go on a Ferris wheel for you, babe,” I say a little too loudly as we keep strolling, hand in hand. “If that’s what you want.”
“I love the way you humor me,” she says, and she glances up at me but then something else catches her attention. It catches it so much that she turns her head and keeps watching it behind me, and something clenches behind my lungs.
Meckler?
But I follow her gaze and don’t see him. I don’t see anything besides the slow-moving flow of people down the midway, strolling between flashing lights and carnival barkers. I look back at her and follow it again, then frown.
Then I do it again.
“The bear?” I finally ask, looking one last time because I’d bet a thousand bucks she’s staring at a man carrying a pink teddy bear the size of a small horse on his shoulders.
“What? No,” she says, and snorts.
“You want a giant bear.”
Now she’s trying a how could you even think that look on me, and it’s not working.