Chapter Ten

When my eyes opened the next morning, my first response to the warm body breathing next to me was panic. And then the pain hit me.

My wrist throbbed with my pulse, and the bandage wrapped around it, holding my skin together, was stained rusty with dried blood. It was a dull, deep ache that burned and pulled whenever I moved my arm.

"Have to change that."

My eyes flicked up to meet Fang's. He had pillow lines on his face, and he looked warm and sleepy. I squinted at the clock on his bedside table: it was only seven in the morning. Monday. School day. Ugh.

I pushed myself up into a sitting position and cleared my throat. My face was tinged pink with shame. "I'm sorry about last night. You shouldn't have seen that."

"If I hadn't, you may not be here."

I rolled my eyes, my blush deepening. "Don't be so dramatic." I crawled over his legs before he could respond, climbing down from his bed. "I'm going to get dressed for school."

"Max."

I froze in the doorway, shivering, an early morning chill settling under my skin. "What?"

"Let me come with you."

I turned to look at him over my shoulder, one hand on the door frame, my brows knitting together in confusion. "What?" I asked again.

"Let me come with you. To New York."

"Why would I do that?"

He sat up, the blanket falling to pool around his waist. His dark hair was sticking up in every direction. He rubbed at his eyes, looking much younger than he really was with the pillow lines creasing his face.

"Want to see if I can track down some of Ella's friends. I just want some closure. Figure some stuff out."

My face softened, and I bit down on the inside of my cheek. His face was guarded, but I could still see the hopeful glint in his eye.

"And I don't think you should go alone." He shrugged

On the one hand, I wanted to run screaming. Being alone in the city, in a hotel room, with a boy that I only kind of knew? On the other hand, he made me feel safe, which I didn't entirely understand. And it might be better to get a feel for the city with someone else on my side.

I crossed my arms and stared at him, my eyes hard and my mouth a flat line. "Why should I let you?"

"I'll pay for everything."

Well. That changed things.

I faltered, then nodded. "Okay, fine. We leave Friday afternoon, after school ends for winter break."

He gave me half a smile and nodded back. "Deal."

Somehow, it didn't feel like a mistake.

We left a note for Fang's step mom. She wouldn't find it until she got off work and picked up Angel. Fang figured it would be easier this way. I thought it seemed a little cruel, but it wasn't my decision.

We also decided it would be easier to drive than to try and buy another bus ticket for Fang. Although, I was pissed because I spent all that money on a ticket that I didn't even use but. I digressed. The drive was short enough that it wasn't that big of a deal. We left right after school on Friday and hit the city at almost six in the evening.

"Traffic sucks," Fang said, the sound of several honking horns echoing around us.

I grimaced and said, "Yeah, just a bit."

"I booked a hotel. Nothing fancy, but it's not a total crap hole."

I hummed and didn't respond.

He was right.

It wasn't a total crap hole. It was actually pretty okay. It smelled nice and clean, and had crisp white sheets and no bugs that I could see.

"This is nicer than my last foster home," I said, dropping my duffel bag onto the full sized bed closest to the bathroom, leaving the one closer to the window for Fang. I moved to the window and threw the curtains open, then pressed my nose to the glass and watched all of the cars and people moving below me. "Where'd you get the money for this?"

"My dad left me enough when he died that I could go to college and be comfortable. He never thought I'd be using it like this, I guess."

I was quiet, digesting that information, for a while when he spoke again.

"You been in the city before?" Fang asked. I turned and looked over my shoulder at him; he was digging around in his suitcase.

"Once. I was little, like ten or so."

I just remember liking how the city seemed to breathe on its own. I had always wanted to make a trip back, but we never really got around to it. And then life happened.

I heard a buzzing noise, and then Fang was digging around in his pocket. He pulled out his phone, and his face paled. "My mom."

"Answer it," I urged, moving over to stand by his side and peek at the screen. My heart was beating faster for some reason; it wasn't like I was going to get into trouble.

He tapped the screen and cleared his throat. "Hello?"

Mrs. Fremont's voice came through on the other end, tinny and loud and pissed. "New York? Nicholas Fremont, you get your ass home right this instant!"

"I can't do that. I'm sorry," Fang murmured, holding the phone away from his ear and twisting his face up in a grimace. "I need to take care of some things here. I'm safe, and I'm not alone. I'll be home before Christmas."

Christmas was in a week. I wasn't sure how much ground he would be able to cover in seven days, but I kept my mouth shut.

Mrs. Fremont started to say something on the other line, but Fang cut her off. "I love you, and I'll call if I need anything. Bye."

He hung up and threw the phone on the bed, covering his face with both hands. "I hated that."

"I'm sorry. If you're going to be in too much trouble, you could just go home?"

Part of me regretted even suggesting that. Now that he was here, I didn't want him to leave. I didn't want to be alone.

"Already in trouble. May as well make the most of it. You hungry?"

Relief flooded my chest as I smiled. "Yeah. Starving."

I sipped dark, full espresso out of a tiny cup with a chipped handle and laughed at the joke Fang was telling. We were sitting in a small bistro, somewhere I couldn't pronounce the name of. I was wearing the soft green sweater he'd picked out for me, and I had make up on and looked almost nice. The food was amazing and the night was stretching out in front of me, long and full of possibilities.

I was a normal girl in a normal café with no demons in her head or nightmares behind her eyes.

I was waiting for the other shoe to drop.

"Were you a space kid or a dinosaur kid?" I asked, a smile pulling at my lips as I traced the rim of my tiny mug with a fingertip, eyes cast down and following the line of the flowers embroidered into the tablecloth.

"Definitely a dinosaur kid." Fang laughed, and it sounded so pretty I looked up through my lashes to see if it looked at bright as it I thought it would.

It did.

"I was a space kid. Did you know there's a planet where it constantly rains glass? Amazing," I said, eyes going wide with wonder. My head felt soft around the edges, as if my thoughts had dulled themselves for this moment. It was like my brain was gifting me this snapshot of a memory, to pull out and look at when things got too bad. "There's something entirely unsettling and yet very satisfying about all of that empty space."

"But it's not empty." Fang lifted his latte to his mouth and took a long drink. He swallowed and studied me, narrowing his eyes. "There's a lot out there. Just because we don't know about it or can't fathom it doesn't displace its existence."

"Very deep, Nicholas," I responded, his full name fitting in my mouth a bit awkwardly as I tested it out. I decided I liked the way it felt between my teeth, rolling off my tongue. "Very deep indeed."

He laughed again and sat back in his chair, rolling his neck. It was about nine. The bistro was still pretty busy, the sound of chattering people and clattering plates and silverware murmuring quietly around us. It was like a different kind of symphony, where there was no sheet music and yet everyone was in time and in tune. I felt high. I felt like I could be any person I wanted because nobody knew me.

Except Fang.

"You do believe in aliens, don't you?" he asked. There was a playful edge to his voice that I had never really heard before, and it was lovely. I forgot to be afraid, in that moment. It was lovelier.

"Of course I do. How selfish would it be if I believed we were the only planet with life on it in the entire universe? What a waste." I downed the rest of my espresso shots and wiped my mouth with a cloth (cloth!) napkin. "I want to believe in something being out there. I have to."

"It's kind of comforting, to me." A small smile played at the corner of his lips. "To know we aren't alone out here."

"Yeah, I guess when you put it that way. It is kind of comforting." I pushed some crumbs around with my fingertip and scanned the restaurant, taking in all of the colors and sounds and smells and trying to commit them to memory. My eyes came to rest on Fang, cataloguing the way his hair fell into his eyes from under his beanie, the length of his fingers wrapped around his mug, the way his arms looked so strong and tan, the sleeves of his dark blue sweater pushed up to his elbows. I looked up and saw that he was watching me, face open and warm. He had flecks of gold in his eyes, or maybe that was just the candle light, but either way it was beautiful.

"What do you want to be when you grow up?" Fang asked, abruptly changing the subject.

"We are grown up," I said wryly.

"You know what I mean."

I rolled my eyes and took a deep breath, slanting my gaze up at the exposed beams in the ceiling, thinking. "I don't know. I don't know if I want to be anything."

"What do you mean?"

I bit my lip and met his gaze for a few fleeting moments before my eyes skirted away again. "I don't know. It's hard to think of myself as an actual person sometimes." I shook my head, my short hair tickling my jawline. "Sorry. That probably made no sense."

He furrowed his brown and thumbed the edge of the saucer his mug sat on. "No. I think it made more sense than you think it did."

"I just—I just feel like sometimes I'm not even in my own head." My voice was soft and trembling, like the flame of the candle on the table between us. "It's like I come away from my body and I'm watching it from somebody else's perspective. And the idea of being a real person, with a family and friends—I can remember what that feels like, but I remember it as an idea and not really as a memory. I don't know. It's stupid."

"It's not." Fang shook his head. "It's not."

I swallowed and stared at him, shadows lurking under his eyes and in the downturned curve of his lips as he frowned at the tablecloth, and it was like I was seeing him for the first time. He understood my weird musings; I had never said those words to anyone out loud before because I was afraid nobody would understand but he did. He does.

"I used to want to be an astronaut." I can barely hear him; he's practically whispering. "I lied. I was totally a space kid. But my mom told me I could never do that; that I would never be that talented or special." He barked a laugh. "She was pretty fucked up."

I reached across the table, and it was like we were both holding our breath as my hand hovered over his. The bandage around my wrist was bulky and the way I was holding my arm out made the skin pull, which hurt like a mother. We both breathed out in unison as I let my fingers rest on the back of his hand.

"That is fucked up," I said, my voice serious. "Like, really fucked up."

We just looked at each other for a second before totally cracking up, snorting and gasping and generally making a racket. People turned in their chairs to glare at us but I cared so little it was almost sad.

"Jesus," I said, wiping tears from my eyes, still giggling. "We shouldn't be laughing. It really is fucked up."

"I know. It's just so ridiculous. Who says that to a kid?" He shook his head, still smiling, and rubbed his brow with the knuckles of his left hand. He flipped his other hand over, so both of our palms were pressed against the tablecloth, and laced our fingers together. His eyes watched me closely, his grip light as a feather in case I wanted to pull away.

I didn't want to.

"I'm glad you came with me," I said, and it was the truth. I didn't know what I would be doing right now if he hadn't. I didn't have a penny to my name; I would probably have been sleeping in the streets. But I was grateful past the money aspect; his company was calming to me, and I still couldn't figure that out. He had proven to me, time and time again, that I could trust him. And I was starting to. I didn't have a reason not to.

Besides the fact that this was me we were talking about and of course something had to go wrong. It always did.

He just smiled, the candle light dancing in the reflection of his impossibly dark eyes, unreadable as always, and sipped his latte.

A/N Hey guys! Sorry to leave you all without any new content and no explanation for a few weeks. I was working as a camp counselor at a camp where they don't allow any technology, but then I got really sick so they sent me home. Expect regular updates from here on out! Hope you enjoyed :)