Chapter 13 WAIT! I CAN EXPLAIN
A growl in her stomach woke Melanie as she lay under the warm covers. Still sleeping on her side facing the nightstand, she shifted slightly, only to feel a heavy arm over her lower torso.
Shifting slightly again, she wondered why he was still sleeping up against her back. The room had been cold the night before, but it had warmed up after a few hours to her recollection.
Pulling up a bit she quickly noted the temperature in the room was lower than normal. Looking over her shoulder past him, she located the reason for the chill in the room.
The door to the bedroom was open.
Melanie frowned at it. They never left the bedroom door open. It was far too cold in the outer room. While there was heat in the bedroom, it was only about 65-70 degrees. With the door open, the cold of the outer room would have made the bedroom freezing last night.
Thinking over the situation, Melanie finally decided the door's mechanism must have malfunctioned at some point in the early morning, which explained the bedroom being colder than normal. It also explained why Layton was being more of a bed-hog than usual. Feeling the temperature drop that morning, he had done what he always did, which was immediately seek out the nearest source of warmth.
Her.
She stopped being uncomfortable with the action a long time ago. For the most part, Layton was a perfect gentleman in the bed they shared. He never tried anything, and he always left plenty of leeway for her to refuse anything he did do.
Like how everything had started last night.
She recalled that the temperature in the room had begun to drop early last night after they went to bed. Something that, although still more asleep than awake, Layton had grumbled about as he burrowed deeper under the covers.
"Bennett said something about recharging the batteries tonight." She answered his half asleep grumblings over her shoulder. "It'll only be for a few hours."
She shook her head with a smile as she felt the shifting in the bed behind her. She already knew what was coming.
Within a few moments, the body on the other side had quickly made its way over to her side of the bed amid a lot of tunneling through the heavy covers. Finally making his way to his destination, he carefully snuggled up under the covers against her back, seeking out her body's warmth against the encroaching cold.
She lay there for a moment to see what else he would do. But with an overly dramatic sigh, she turned again to him over her shoulder.
"Oh, go ahead." She whispered. "But you know the penalty if I hear about it from anyone outside this room."
Suddenly an arm quickly wrapped itself over her waist as he pulled himself up against her.
"Head first naked nose dive over the next ravine. Yes, Ma'am." Came the mumbled answer as he settled back down in the bed, a contented sigh following as he drifted off back to sleep.
It wasn't purely altruism on her part that she allowed the close contact. It afforded her extra body heat as well as him. Although she swore his body temperature ran about ten degrees higher than the average person. The man was like a personal heating furnace in the bed.
But at some point during the night the heat had come back on and he chivalrously moved back to his side of the bed, taking one of her pillows with him as she recalled.
But at some point in the morning the door must have opened and let the cold in, causing Layton to seek out her body heat again.
Sighing to herself as she turned back to her side of the bed, she glanced at the clock sitting on her nightstand.
7AM.
She yawned as she carefully extracted herself from Layton's arm and pulled herself up in the bed. Time to start another day. Time to get ready for her shift.
A slight chill wrapped itself about her body.
Turning to the other side of the bed, she noted that Layton had already readjusted himself in the bed to reconcile her not being there anymore, but appearing to still be asleep.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, she watched him for a few moments, thinking of how tired he looked.
He hadn't thought about this part of things, she told herself. He hadn't been ready for it. The near constant barrage of people coming to him now. All wanting him to magically solve their problems. All of them looking to him now to make sure they survived that day.
That they had hope for the next.
Watching him sleep for a few moments, she found herself often wondering what life must have been like for him in the Tail. She rarely went down there herself. Even in the seven years she ran the train. Anything that was needed in that regard Ruth usually took care of.
But she had gone down a few times to check on some mechanical issue. She wondered sometimes if she had seen him then. She thought back over those few times, but she remembered also that she mostly just kept her head down and followed after Bennett and the security personnel escorting them.
She had never really looked at any of them.
She had never wanted to.
It just made everything easier when she didn't put faces to anything.
When he had originally come forward, the first thing she registered about him was that he didn't look like he was starving. Somehow, somewhere in the Tail, he must have gotten food.
But he wasn't the picture of health either. The doctor who checked him confirmed that to her. He was malnourished, under-weight, and likely suffering from underlying conditions associated with those circumstances.
It wasn't until she had started to get to really know the man that she thought back to those words and had tried to convince him several times to go to the medical clinic to get checked over. REALLY checked over. Not the cursorily medical check they had given him when he first came up the train.
But he always refused or brushed it off, saying he was too busy.
"You can't always be too busy to take care of yourself once in awhile, Layton." She had yelled at his back one day when he had refused again to go to the medical clinic.
He had turned to her over his shoulder. "I can when the nearly 3000 people on this train all need me to be somewhere else."
Melanie had stood looking like she was ready to try and just slap some sense into him.
"You know what your problem is?" She seethed at him. "You care too much about everyone but yourself."
The smile he gave her in return nearly got him that slap, but for a different reason now. "Well," He answered her, "I guess we have that much in common."
Her anger had dissipated into worry as soon as he stepped out the door.
Was that what she had been like, she wondered. Working so hard to run the train that she never saw herself in it all. Bennett had told her many times she needed to pull back a little. Give herself a little free time to do something other than worry about the train.
Now she was looking from the outside in, and she could see all the same warning signs. He was losing a little of himself every day. The slightest failure he took personally. Even if at the root cause of it he had had nothing to do with it.
"How did you manage to come this far?" She quietly whispered to him.
How indeed.
A few months ago he had just been as insignificant as anyone else in the Tail. Now he was clean, presentable, leading the train, and sleeping in the bed of the woman who not so long ago he had held a scalpel to the throat of and threatened to kill.
Now they would sit at the table in their cabin at night, sharing an evening meal as they discussed the events of the day. Underneath the casual meal she knew it was his way to make sure she ate enough. Not that it was hard to do. Most of what he made was absolutely delicious.
But she knew the game. And on the other side of the table, she was doing much the same thing. Making sure he ate. That he didn't come into the cabin at night and out of sheer exhaustion, head straight for bed. Some times she would even resort to blackmail, insisting she wouldn't eat anything unless he did.
She reached over and brushed a stray strand of hair back from his face.
He had a handsome enough face, she decided. And he was starting to put on at least some weight.
His body was also getting stronger and more toned. In addition to getting regular meals, when he first came up the train, one of the things Layton had quickly discovered was one of the train's gym cars. It soon became a second home to him. The gym, he had said once, was a place for him to think.
She quickly noted he seemed to do a lot of thinking, since he spent a great deal of time there.
She had tried to join him a few times. Engage him in some small talk while she tried to figure him out. But he mostly did everything but ignore her. Not that he was necessarily being rude to her. But she soon learned that when he was trying to figure something out, he shut the world out. Focusing solely on the problem, not the distraction. Much as she did herself.
But sometimes he was pleasant to her.
Cautiously pleasant.
The body in the bed next to her stretched, then rolled over as Layton sought out his favorite article and wrapped it in a tight embrace even as he relaxed into it. Watching him, Melanie suddenly realized that the pillow he had was once again one of her's.
'Pillow thief." She lightly chide him.
In those earlier days, he looked at her the same way he looked at so many others in the front of the train. With suspicion and ample amounts of mistrust.
Some days, back then, she found herself actually wishing he didn't look at her that way. That he would look at her more like...
'Like what?', she asked herself. 'Like a friend?'
She had doubted then they would ever be that. To many burned bridges.
She remembered the look in his eyes the night she had invited him to have a drink with her to celebrate. It was the first time she remembered that he didn't look at her with that suspicion. She tried to remember what she had done to break through that wall of mistrust of his.
He had been relaxed that night. Calm.
Trusting.
He had taken the drink without hesitation. Drank it watching her over the rim with a smile that she had returned.
Melanie quietly shook her head at the memory.
It was an act of pure betrayal.
Maybe she could have chosen a different path. Maybe they could have talked about it instead. She could have tried to explain to him what things were. The delicate balance she tried to maintain.
No.
She wasn't ready to admit even to herself then that things were coming apart. The murders themselves should have been proof enough to her that control was slipping from her grasp.
Or maybe she did see it and that was what drove her.
Maybe she should have listened to him more. They had discussed the train many times. Layton had tried to tell her of the unrest she never saw. He tried to make her see another way.
She just didn't want to. She was too settled. Too comfortable in the way things were.
And so she had taken that desperate step.
She remembered that look more than anything else of that day. The pure fear in his eyes. It was the only time she ever remembered seeing him afraid.
Afraid of her.
Afraid because he had let his guard down, and she had betrayed that trust.
But she had followed her instincts. You have a problem, you get rid of it.
She had consigned him to a drawer.
She didn't see it as a bad choice. She actually liked what her solution gave her in return. Her problem of how to keep him quiet was solved. And as a side bonus, she knew exactly where he was at all times. And since no one else knew, he was perfectly safe. Completely under her control.
Under her care.
Melanie shook her head again as her stomach growled louder.
'How far we have come, you and I.' she silently mused to herself.
She sighed as her stomach growled again.
Glancing over to the side, she nudged the body on the other side of the bed.
"You asleep?" She asked.
Layton sighed as he hugged her pillow tighter. "Seriously?" He grumbled in a half-asleep voice. "Who can sleep with all the noise you're making?"
"Noise?"
Layton slowly rolled back over to face her. "Lady, your stomach has been growling for at least the last few minutes that I know of."
Melanie smiled slightly, then pulled out of the bed and grabbed her robe as she headed for the front room.
She intended to call down to the dining car to see what was on the menu that morning. Possibly saving her having to think of what to eat. But she stopped at the bedroom door as the reason her stomach had been growling became more apparent. Standing in the bedroom doorway, the smell of bacon fully filled her senses now.
Heading down the short hallway, she quickly found the source of the tantalizing smell.
Sitting on the table in the main room was a large silver tray with a cover over it.
Walking over to it, she found a note tucked half way under the tray. She picked it up with a smile as she recognized Bennett's handwriting. But as she read the note, her smile changed to a deep frown.
'Brought you breakfast. But didn't want to wake either of you up. Hope you both enjoy it.'
The note wasn't written casually, but in anger. There was no doubt in her mind about that. The letters looked like they could have cut through the paper they were written with such force.
Turning around, still holding the note as she puzzled over it, Melanie chanced to look up.
And nearly dropped the note.
Standing where she was, she reasoned she would have been exactly where Bennett was standing when he brought the tray in and sat it on the table.
A placement that would have given him a clear view of the open bedroom door.
A clear view of the bed.
Dropping the note back on the table, Melanie went into panic mode. She could barely get her brain to formulate what Bennett must have thought as he stood there.
He had always had been able to enter the cabin freely. So he must have come into the cabin planning for them to have breakfast together. When he didn't see Layton anywhere about, he must have assumed he had already left.
The breakfast was likely his form of an apology. They had had a small fight the other day. First she had shown up the day after Ruth and several members of First Class had tried to execute her, which he had actually been irate about. Then, the next morning, trying to smooth the waters with her, he had suggested wanting to spend time with her. But she had told him she had promised Layton she would come back to the cabin.
He had probably thought they could sit down to a quiet breakfast and plan her next move. THEIR next move. Just like they had always done.
Instead he had come in and found...
But her brain stopped there.
Rushing back into the bedroom, she made a panicked search for her shoes. She didn't care what she was wearing, she just needed shoes.
She needed to get to Bennett.
She needed to explain.
Laying still in the bed, now on his back, Layton watched her with a slightly bemused, if not curious stare. The woman had the oddest way of going from 0 to 60 faster than anyone he knew.
"What's up?" He asked, watching her mad search.
"I have to go!" Was the only answer he got as she found the elusive pair of shoes.
As she raced around the end of the bed Layton began to see the genuine panic in her and quickly pulled out of the bed, just managing to catch up to her at the table as she stopped to try and put on her shoes.
Grabbing her by the arms, he turned her to him, steadying her as she fought with one shoe.
"Hey, hey, hey." He stated quickly. "Slow down. Where's the fire?"
"Bennett brought us breakfast." She quickly answered as she grabbed the note and handed it to him.
Layton quickly read it, then turned back to her, failing to see what had her so upset.
"OK. That was nice of him." He stated. "Now, why are you in such a panic?"
Grabbing his arms, Melanie turned him sharply about so he now stood as she had been when she figured it out.
Layton gave his sleep fogged brain credit for catching on that fast.
"Uh-oh."
Getting her shoes finally on, Melanie headed for the cabin door.
"I have to go talk to him." She stated in a rush. "I have to explain..."
But Layton just managed to stop her at the door, pulling her back around to face him as he held her firmly by the shoulders.
"Melanie! Stop!" He stated with just enough force to get her attention. He leaned down a little to look her in the eyes. "He doesn't want to hear it right now. Trust me on this one."
Melanie pulled against his hold on her. "Why? Because you know him so well?" She asked with a touch of sarcasm.
Layton held firm. "No. Because I'm a man. And if I came into a room in the early morning and saw my...saw someone I cared about in a bed with someone else, I would NOT want to sit down and talk about it at any point in that day."
"You don't know him!" Melanie protested. "Bennett...he's logical. He'll listen to reason."
Layton held on. "He's a man, Melanie. He just saw you...in bed...with me. He is NOT going to be very logical about that right now. Believe me."
But Melanie determinately pulled free and rushed out the door without another word.
Sighing to himself, Layton was grateful he had been too tired to change out of his shirt and pants the night before as he grabbed his jacket by the door and rushed after her.
This was not how he envisioned his morning would start.