“I’m good,” Mina whispered, too scared to say anything more to the perfect boy in front of her.
The tension that was evident in Brody’s entire body evaporated at her words. “Good, I’m glad.” He looked down at his hands and put them in his jean pockets. Mina wondered vaguely if they were six hundred dollar jeans.
He continued to look down at his feet, afraid to look her in the eye, when he asked the next question. “Why?...Why did you call out his name?”
“Who-what?” Mina stumbled over her words, shocked at what she was hearing.
Brody’s eyes shot up from the ground to look her in the eyes, daring her to look away.
“I’m sorry. This is not how I planned to ask you. Are you two dating? Seeing each other?” He looked hurt, confused.
Mina felt like a stone plummeted to the bottom of her stomach, taking all of her bravery with it. “I don’t know what you are talking about,” she fumbled back.
“You said his name. I heard it, clear as day, on the news. I even recorded it and watched it over and over again. What I want to know is why?”
Mina’s hands started to shake, she closed her eyes and turned away, unwilling to look at him. Unable to tell him what she knew, and unable to lie about her feelings, it became too much and one silent tear slid unbidden down her cheek.
Brody stepped back in shock from her tear, before moving forward and closing the distance between them. He began to reach for her hand but pulled back, unsure of what to do. “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to upset you. I’m just confused by what has happened lately. And it seems to be a lot, and I can’t seem to control my emotions.”
Mina tried to form a coherent thought and sentence, but it hurt so much to be so near him and not be able to tell him how she felt.
“No one believes me, but I’m cursed.” She hadn’t meant to say it, but it came rushing out without a thought.
He looked relieved when she was able to speak. “Hey, you’re not cursed. You’re alive, right? I would say that makes you extremely lucky, not cursed.” He became eerily quiet.
Brody pulled over a hospital chair so that it was next to her bed, and he relaxed into the seat. He grabbed a magazine that Nan had left and began to thumb through it, without really looking at it.
“Why are you here?” Mina asked him, confused by his casual demeanor and willingness to sit in someone’s hospital room.
Brody’s finger caught in a page, and he closed the magazine and locked eyes with her. “I don’t know? I was hoping you could tell me.”
Mina shook her head in confusion. “You’re the one who drove to the hospital, got in past security and the nurses, which I’m still not sure how you did it, and walked into my room, not the other way around. You should know your reason for being here, not me?”
Brody smirked in the familiar way that made Mina’s heart melt. “But here I am.” He held up his arms in a casual way. “You are someone I barely know, and yet, when I heard you had gone missing, I felt as if my whole world turned upside down. It has been haunting me for two nights straight. I can barely eat, sleep, think and finally I came to the conclusion that you would know why? Do you have a spell on me?”
“I think you must have read one too many fairy tales,” Mina answered quickly, blushing. Immediately, she regretted her choice of words.
Brody shook his head. “This girl from my school, who obviously is strong enough to survive on her own out in the wilderness, miraculously gets saved and the one name she calls out to in her time of need, happens to be the only guy in school that, for some crazy reason, I absolutely hate!”
Brody’s body tensed up, and he slowly frowned at her. “I don’t consider myself a jealous person, but I barely know Jared, and I really, really don’t like him. And the thought of you and him together makes me want to punch something. Especially when I have no right to feel that way about Jared, or you. It’s as if we met somewhere…” he trailed off.
“No, it’s not what you think,” Mina rushed out in defense.
“How do you know what I’m thinking?” Brody stood up, walked over to Mina, and leaned down, placing both hands on either side of her body, he pinned her between his muscled arms. He was so close Mina could smell his familiar aftershave.
She looked up at his jaw line and swallowed before turning her head away from him and playing with the seam on the blanket, trying anything to appear more interested in the hospital blanket, than his closeness, his jaw, his lips.
“Tell me why do I have this sudden urge to hold you, to kiss you, when I barely know you?” Brody pulled away in disgust. “What’s wrong with me? You must think I’m some kind of crazed psychopath talking like this. I come into your room unasked and start to demand answers to some crazy questions that I’d hoped you would have answers too. I can’t help but think something is wrong with me, that I really am going crazy.” He turned his back on her and ran his hands through his hair again in frustration.
Mina licked her lips nervously. “Maybe you’re cursed too?”
Brody sighed heavily and looked over his shoulder at her. “I must be, why else would I be here?”
Those words drove straight to Mina’s heart like a wooden stake. They hurt, but there was truth in those words. Brody could be being manipulated by the Story once again. It made Mina angry. Angry at the world, at the Fae, at how unfair everything was for a sixteen-year-old girl in love. He began to move toward to door.
“Brody, wait!” she called out.
Brody froze, his hand on the door, his back stiff, waiting for the ball to drop.