When he suddenly stalked toward me, I actually jumped. He reached down grabbing the bullet like thing off the floor, and as he was standing back up, he looked toward me and caught sight of the strand of balls sitting beside me on the bed. He grabbed that as well, turned the vibrating bullet off, and chucked both into the small garbage can that sat beside the nightstand. He slammed the nightstand drawer in, and when he righted his posture, he glared down at me.
But he crossed his arms, tucking his hands under them.
“What are those things?” My voice was too quiet.
His brow flinched, and he looked away. “They belonged to a woman I was seeing.”
“Lisa?” I hated that I felt jealous of a married woman who’d been having an extramarital affair on a man I respected with the man I was sleeping with. There was something horribly fucked up about that.
“No,” he whispered. “Another…” But he trailed off as he looked away again.
It was silent as I sat rigidly on the side of the bed, and he towered above me. But he wasn’t angry. The cross of his arms said it clearly enough to me. It was vulnerability. He was afraid.
“You didn’t answer me.” I forced myself to look up at him, but he couldn’t seem to hold the eye contact.
“Anal beads and a vibrator,” he finally responded, and when my focus hit the floor between us as that bit of information sank in, he dropped to his knees in front of me. “I don’t need that from you.”
I glanced at him. He was searching my eyes, but as I stared back unable to figure out how to respond, his focus started shifting around the room in a panic. His eyes searched the space around us, and his jaw was tight. I tried to lock onto what exactly I was feeling. I almost hated that he’d said he didn’t need that from me. I also knew he’d said it for my benefit to reassure me, and feeling pathetic as a result wasn’t the right response. So why did I feel so fucking pathetic and naive all of a sudden?
I reached for his hand, refusing to let my thoughts get away from me. His eyes darted back to me, finally holding the eye contact.
“Why don’t I go with you?” I stared at him. I was desperate to move on from this. I didn’t want to go back to the two days prior and try to wrap my head around who he was before this. “We can just go to my house until we have to go to Hilde’s tomorrow,” I suggested. “I mean, unless you’re working here today.”
He finally smiled. “Seeing as I slept through half the day, I’m writing this one off.” He nodded. “Do you just want to take your car?”
“Yeah.”
We dressed, and I watched him tuck some clean clothes into a small worn rucksack, and before we left the room, he grabbed the small garbage can, carrying it with him. He dumped it into the larger one in the kitchen, and then pulled the overly-large nearly full garbage bag from the barrel. I followed him out, taking the rucksack from him as he tossed the garbage bag into the tow away dumpster that was sitting off to the side of the house, and when he returned to me, he pushed me up against the driver’s door, kissing me as he fumbled with my hand and took the keys from me.
I smiled against his lips, laughing even as he still kissed me. He drove us toward town. The route, as it always had, took us down that same stretch of highway past the place the old gas station used to be. It was nothing but an empty gravel lot now, cut into the side of the road and surrounded by tall mature trees, but it didn’t take much imagination to remember exactly how the run down building used to look.
I hated driving by that place still, and as my eyes drifted off to the lot, Kane reached for my hand, taking it and enfolding my fingers within his. I glanced at him, and I tried to smile, but I couldn’t manage it any more than he seemed able to.
The now defunct Sleepaway was another half a mile farther down, and it was an eerie deserted old place now, overgrown with bushes, most of the windows boarded over, and the sign a worn and weathered nearly illegible thing. I looked over at the place, catching Kane’s own attention already glued to the same spot. He exhaled deeply, and I tightened my hand on his. Soon we were back in town, and he dropped me off at my place first, before running out to pick up the cupboard pulls and lunch.
I showered while he was gone, and when he returned, we ate while we watched T.V. I spent a while working on my dissertation with my laptop on my lap and my legs stretched out on the couch. Kane read the entire time, sitting at the opposite end of the couch with his legs tangled up with mine.
“How is it coming along?” he asked when I closed my laptop to take a break and pushed my reading glasses up to the top of my head.
I sighed, shaking my head. “I don’t know. I’m missing the mark. I know that much.”
He scowled for a second. “What makes you think that?”
“Because … I’m writing a damn good research paper, but that’s all I’m doing. It’s research, it’s rehashing someone else’s ideas, theories. There’s nothing original about it.”