He looked down at his feet as they squeaked across the floor. “Why is there plastic on your carpet?”
“My mother doesn’t like dirty feet in the house, so she put plastic down over the places people walk.”
Gavin didn’t say anything else, but his grip tightened until they reached the stairs, and he climbed up behind her as she grew hyperaware of the cloying scent: floral air freshener, cleaning chemicals, the plastic on the carpet.
Her bedroom was essentially the same as every ten-year-old girl’s room anywhere, Delilah thought. Why had her parents never updated it between her visits home? It seemed funny that they should ignore Delilah’s growth as much as Gavin’s house seemed to ignore his.
She closed the door behind them, and his long, dark form shadowed the entire room. It seemed like there was hardly space for them to move independently around each other.
“You make my room look tiny,” she said, stepping up behind him. His attention moved away from her tiny bed and seemed to linger on a collection of ceramic unicorns on a shelf on the wall. The room was cluttered with her little-girl stuff, and she wondered if, for Gavin, it felt somehow both too dull in personality and too bright in color.
Delilah thought of all the nights she’d stared at the ceiling lately, waiting for the thoughts of him to slip away so she could sleep. She’d spent so many nights in the dorms or at Nonna’s that even after being home for three months, she still felt like she was sleeping in someone else’s house.
She didn’t realize she’d been staring at her bed until Gavin said, “I don’t think I’d be able to sleep here.”
“Well, no. My father would kill you, for one, and we both wouldn’t—”
“Not what I meant,” he cut in, sounding embarrassed. “I mean, it’s just so different. At school or work it’s easy to handle being in flat, inanimate spaces. But this room feels like it should be alive. . . and it isn’t.”
“Most bedrooms aren’t alive. Someday when we’re older and we have—”
“It’s okay,” he interrupted her, shaking his head quickly. “It’ll just take some getting used to when I’m over here.”
Her brow furrowed, but she forced a small smile. The truth was, she knew it wouldn’t be easy for Gavin to ever live anywhere else, but someday he would. Whether he or the house knew it. “You know I’ll just drag you with me anyway,” she said, grinning, “so you may as well get used to houses being both this purple and this boring.”
“Delilah,” he whispered harshly, stepping close enough for her to feel the vibration of his voice in his chest. “You can’t say things like that. I know it sounds crazy, but what if it can somehow hear you even here? I don’t want it to have any reason to freak out on you again.”
She studied him, hating how dark and anxious his eyes had become. “I think you’re being paranoid.” But deep down, she didn’t. Not really. What she’d wanted was for him to agree with her, to tell her not to worry, that away from the house, they would be safe.
Gavin shrugged, but he also seemed unconvinced. “Maybe.”
Suddenly the room felt too small and colorful, as if they were standing in the heart of a wilting wildflower. She took his hand and led him back out of the house, needing air and not wanting to be home yet.
“I want to walk some more with you.” She wanted another question from him at the end of the walk, something about kissing her, or leaving this town together, or what kind of house they’d agree on. Definitely not a question about her parents’ whereabouts.