Author's note: peeps be asking for new chapter but moving my left arm makes my stomach try to empty itself so just a quickie. Biopsy blues. Reviews make me flail. Don't make me flail.
Regular updates resumed as soon as my chest stops having feelings.
Chapter 14: And the rest of it all
You wake up and find Kate's already left; apparently the world outside your room no longer scares her. You're relieved but you already miss being able to protect her. Your shift doesn't start for a while so you roll back over, pleased to have your bed back to yourself, to not have to worry about your subconscious reaction to the other body that had been occupying it.
When you wake up again, Kate's sitting in the chair by the door; her gaze is fixed on you. You rub your eyes and look at your clock. You're going to have to hurry now.
"You going to hide out in here?" You ask Kate as you fling your street clothes on. She's already dressed. She nods and you grunt, grab your key and your smokes. She grabs your wrist as you're reaching for the door.
"You would really go to jail for me?" she asks quietly. You thought you covered this last night.
"Probably not jail. Show a judge your back, no one would convict me." Kate obviously hasn't thought of this.
"Oh," she says, equally quietly. "But you'd risk it? The judge not taking your word for it? He was a preacher, after all. No one else knew what he was like. Those scars could have got there any number of ways." You look at her like she's slow.
"Yeah. I'd risk it. The way I see it, you just got out. I'm not letting you go back in, Kate." She smiles at you, and her other hand sneaks into your other hand and there's something in it and it's a full pack of Lucky Strikes and that's where she must have been when you woke up and she wasn't there. She was out on the street buying you cigarettes.
You're pretty sure this is a gesture that means something else but by now you're going to have to run to catch the streetcar and you'll be lucky to make it on time. You free your hand from hers, run it through her hair.
"Thanks, Kate," you tell her. Then you run.