The Host (The Host 1)

He drops his arm around my shoulders and tucks me against his side. I scoot closer, though the heat of touching him has my heart aching again.

"Why the frown?" he asks.

"When will you. . . when will we have to leave again?"

He shrugs. "We scavenged enough on our way up that we're set for a few months. I can do a few short raids if you want to stay in one place for a while. I'm sure you're tired of running. "

"Yes, I am," I agree. I take a deep breath to make me brave. "But if you go, I go. "

He hugs me tighter. "I'll admit, I prefer it that way. The thought of being separated from you. . . " He laughs quietly. "Does it sound crazy to say that I'd rather die? Too melodramatic?"

"No, I know what you mean. "

He must feel the same way I do. Would he say these things if he thought of me as just another human, and not as a woman?

I realize that this is the first time we've ever been really alone since the night we met-the first time there's been a door to close between a sleeping Jamie and the two of us. So many nights we've stayed awake, talking in whispers, telling all of our stories, the happy stories and the horror stories, always with Jamie's head cradled on my lap. It makes my breath come faster, that simple closed door.

"I don't think you need to find a cot, not yet. "

I feel his eyes on me, questioning, but I can't meet them. I'm embarrassed now, too late. The words are out.

"We'll stay here until the food is gone, don't worry. I've slept on worse things than this couch. "

"That's not what I mean," I say, still looking down.

"You get the bed, Mel. I'm not budging on that. "

"That's not what I mean, either. " It's barely a whisper. "I meant the couch is plenty big for Jamie. He won't outgrow it for a long time. I could share the bed with. . . you. "

There is a pause. I want to look up, to read the expression on his face, but I'm too mortified. What if he is disgusted? How will I st

and it? Will he make me go away?

His warm, callused fingers tug my chin up. My heart throbs when our eyes meet.

"Mel, I. . . " His face, for once, has no smile.

I try to look away, but he holds my chin so that my gaze can't escape his. Does he not feel the fire between his body and mine? Is that all me? How can it all be me? It feels like a flat sun trapped between us-pressed like a flower between the pages of a thick book, burning the paper. Does it feel like something else to him? Something bad?

After a moment, his head turns; he's the one looking away now, still keeping his grip on my chin. His voice is quiet. "You don't owe me that, Melanie. You don't owe me anything at all. "

It's hard for me to swallow. "I'm not saying. . . I didn't mean that I felt obligated. And. . . you shouldn't, either. Forget I said anything. "

"Not likely, Mel. "

He sighs, and I want to disappear. Give up-lose my mind to the invaders if that's what it takes to erase this huge blunder. Trade the future to blot out the last two minutes of the past. Anything.

Jared takes a deep breath. He squints at the floor, his eyes and jaw tight. "Mel, it doesn't have to be like that. Just because we're together, just because we're the last man and woman on Earth. . . " He struggles for words, something I don't think I've ever seen him do before. "That doesn't mean you have to do anything you don't want to. I'm not the kind of man who would expect. . . You don't have to. . . "

He looks so upset, still frowning away, that I find myself speaking, though I know it's a mistake before I start. "That's not what I mean," I mutter. "??Have to' is not what I'm talking about, and I don't think you're ??that kind of man. ' No. Of course not. It's just that -"

Just that I love him. I grit my teeth together before I can humiliate myself more. I should bite my tongue off right now before it ruins anything else.

"Just that. . . ?" he asks.

I try to shake my head, but he's still holding my chin tight between his fingers.

"Mel?"

I yank free and shake my head fiercely.

He leans closer to me, and his face is different suddenly. There's a new conflict I don't recognize in his expression, and even though I don't understand it completely, it erases the feeling of rejection that's making my eyes sting.

"Will you talk to me? Please?" he murmurs. I can feel his breath on my cheek, and it's a few seconds before I can think at all.

His eyes make me forget that I am mortified, that I wanted to never speak again.

"If I got to pick anyone, anyone at all, to be stranded on a deserted planet with, it would be you," I whisper. The sun between us burns hotter. "I always want to be with you. And not just. . . not just to talk to. When you touch me. . . " I dare to let my fingers brush lightly along the warm skin of his arm, and it feels like the flames are flowing from their tips now. His arm tightens around me. Does he feel the fire? "I don't want you to stop. " I want to be more exact, but I can't find the words. That's fine. It's bad enough having admitted this much. "If you don't feel the same way, I understand. Maybe it isn't the same for you. That's okay. " Lies.

"Oh, Mel," he sighs in my ear, and pulls my face around to meet his.

More flames in his lips, fiercer than the others, blistering. I don't know what I'm doing, but it doesn't seem to matter. His hands are in my hair, and my heart is about to combust. I can't breathe. I don't want to breathe.

But his lips move to my ear, and he holds my face when I try to find them again.

"It was a miracle-more than a miracle-when I found you, Melanie. Right now, if I was given the choice between having the world back and having you, I wouldn't be able to give you up. Not to save five billion lives. "

"That's wrong. "

"Very wrong but very true. "

"Jared," I breathe. I try to reach for his lips again. He pulls away, looking like he has something to say. What more can there be?

"But. . . "

"But?" How can there be a but? What could possibly follow all this fire that starts with a but?

"But you're seventeen, Melanie. And I'm twenty-six. "

"What's that got to do with anything?"

He doesn't answer. His hands stroke my arms slowly, painting them with fire.

"You've got to be kidding me. " I lean back to search his face. "You're going to worry about conventions when we're past the end of the world?"

He swallows loudly before he speaks. "Most conventions exist for a reason, Mel. I would feel like a bad person, like I was taking advantage. You're very young. "

"No one's young anymore. Anyone who's survived this long is ancient. "

There's a smile pulling up one corner of his mouth. "Maybe you're right. But this isn't something we need to rush. "

"What is there to wait for?" I demand.

He hesitates for a long moment, thinking.

"Well, for one thing, there are some. . . practical matters to consider. "

I wonder if he is just searching for a distraction, trying to stall. That's what it feels like. I raise one eyebrow. I can't believe the turn this conversation has taken. If he really does want me, this is senseless.

"See," he explains, hesitating. Under the deep golden tan of his skin, it looks like he might be blushing. "When I was stocking this place, I wasn't much planning for. . . guests. What I mean is. . . " The rest comes out in a rush. "Birth control was pretty much the last thing on my mind. "

I feel my forehead crease. "Oh. "

The smile is gone from his face, and for one short second there is a flash of anger I've never seen there before. It makes him look dangerous in a way I hadn't imagined he could. "This isn't the kind of world I'd want to bring a child into. "

The words sink in, and I cringe at the thought of a tiny, innocent baby opening his eyes to this place. It's bad enough to watch Jamie's eyes, to know what this life will bring him, even in the best possible circumstances.

Jared is suddenly Jared again. The skin around his eyes crinkles. "Besides, we've got plenty of time to. . . think about this. " Stalling again, I suspect. "Do you realize how very, very little time we've been together so far? It's been just four weeks since we found each other. "

This floors me. "That can't be. "

"Twenty-nine days. I'm counting. "

I think back. It's not possible that it has been only twenty-nine days since Jared changed our lives. It seems like Jamie and I have been with Jared every bit as long as we were alone. Two or three years, maybe.

"We've got time," Jared says again.

An abrupt panic, like a warning premonition, makes it impossible for me to speak for a long moment. He watches the change on my face with worried eyes.

"You don't know that. " The despair that softened when he found me strikes like the lash of a whip. "You can't know how much time we'll have. You don't know if we should be counting in months or days or hours. "

He laughs a warm laugh, touching his lips to the tense place where my eyebrows pull together. "Don't worry, Mel. Miracles don't work that way. I'll never lose you. I'll never let you get away from me. "

She brought me back to the present-to the thin ribbon of the highway winding through the Arizona wasteland, baking under the fierce noon sun-without my choosing to return. I stared at the empty place ahead and felt the empty place inside.

Her thought sighed faintly in my head: You never know how much time you'll have.

The tears I was crying belonged to both of us.