I moved my gaze to the window, where the light was turning purple and gold. “In some ways I wished I could have, I don’t know, fought for you. Brought you back. Faced him, you know? Then maybe I could figure out what this was all about. Maybe I’d know it was over instead of still going.” I carefully brought my eyes back to his. “You feel that, right?”
“That it’s not over?”
“Yeah.”
He eased himself up, propping himself on his elbows. I sat up, bringing the sheet over my hips and stomach, still self-conscious at times despite everything.
He pursed his lips. “I know Ginger Balls is sticking around for a reason. I may not agree with his mere existence on this planet, but I have to admit his intuition is pretty spot-on sometimes.”
“And your intuition? What is it saying?”
He raised his brow. “That I’m supposed to remember something really fucking important and the fact that I can’t recall anything except this vague idea of his face and voice is making me feel like I’ve fallen down the shitter and I can’t get out. It’s dark and it smells and I want to scream but I can’t because if I do, I’m getting shit in my mouth.”
“That’s a hell of analogy.”
He shrugged. “It’s a hell of a feeling.”
I couldn’t help but smile. He grinned right back and I felt a rush down my spine, that butterfly feeling that I still got when he smiled at me. I couldn’t love this guy more.
Then his smile fell a bit and something dark came across his face. “Perry,” he said.
I stiffened, wondering what was next. “Yeah?”
“You know I didn’t keep all that Maximus stuff from you because I was ashamed or I didn’t want you to be in the loop. I always want you in the loop, kiddo. You are my loop.”
“I know, I get it.”
“It was more that I couldn’t think of the right time,” he continued. “And I couldn’t imagine it would ever be relevant. Sometimes…the heavier and more crazy the subject, the harder it is to bring up. You know how that is.”
I frowned at him. What was he getting out now? “I do…”
He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. “So, it’s not a matter of keeping stuff from you. It’s a matter of deciding how and when to talk about it. In this exact case, I just didn’t know when it would be a good time.”
“And I’m sure it didn’t help that it wasn’t your secret to tell,” I said, trying to alleviate some of the burden he suddenly seemed to bring on himself. “It didn’t really involve me. It was about you guys.”
“Yeah,” he said but his voice wavered. I stared at him for a moment, wondering what else was on his mind, until I noticed a trickle a blood coming out from his nose.
I jerked back. “Oh god, Dex, your nose.”
He sat up straighter and ran his fingers underneath his nose. He stared down at them, shiny and red with blood. “Huh,” he said, staring at it in awe. “That’s weird.”
I scrunched up my face. “Totally weird. You don’t normally get them, do you?”
He shook his head and the blood poured out harder, spraying onto the sheets. He let out a gruff cry and I shot out of bed, grabbing the nearest box of tissue paper and bringing it over to him.
I scrunched up a wad and shoved it under his nose. “Easy now,” he said, his voice nasally. “I’m all you for playing nurse and all, but you know you have to wear the uniform.”
“I’m naked, what more do you want?”
He grinned and I put my hand behind his head, holding him in place as I tried to stop the bleeding. He eyed me. “You know, if you had told me that Michael was an alien, this would make a lot more sense. Alien abduction victims are always complaining about nosebleeds and lost time.”
“Don’t you dare even mention aliens,” I warned him.
He smiled and I only pressed the tissue harder. “Aliens? You have a problem with them, Scully?”
“Yes, Fox Mulder,” I told him earnestly. “I do. They freak the hell out of me. I can’t even.”
“So all this time, you brush off ghosts and demons and sasquatch but it’s aliens that really get under your skin, huh?” When I didn’t say anything, he clicked his tongue. “Well, you learn something new every day.”
“And I’m learning that you have an awful lot of blood up your nose,” I told him, tossing the blood-soaked wad aside and applying fresh new ones. “Good thing you don’t seem to be squeamish, or I’d say when I get pregnant, you should definitely avoid the delivery room.”
The air around us seemed to still. Dex sucked in his breath through his teeth and his eyes immediately left mine, focusing on a bloody spot on the sheets. I immediately felt a bit stupid for mentioning the pregnancy thing. I wasn’t sure why. I mean, we were getting married. It was pretty much a given that at some point in our marriage, I would be pregnant, or would at least be trying to be. Maybe not in the immediate future – I was still young and my biological clock wasn’t really kicking me yet – but it wasn’t unreasonable to start planning on it.
“Sorry,” I said awkwardly. “Aliens and babies are touchy subjects for us. They even look the same.”
At that, there was a knock at our door. Normally I would have been annoyed considering I was naked and Dex’s blood was in my hands, but I was eager to leave that conversation behind.
“Just a minute,” I said loudly and placed Dex’s hand over the tissues, motioning for him to keep applying pressure. I quickly grabbed a cushy robe from the closet and wrapped it around me before answering the door.
Ada was standing on the other side. She looked a bit wary but the minute she saw my blood-stained hands, her eyes widened maniacally. “Oh my god,” she said. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, yeah,” I told her and looked over my shoulder to make sure Dex was decent before inviting her inside. He tugged the sheets higher over him and then gave Ada a wave. “He just has a nosebleed.”
“Ew,” she said, looking totally disgusted. “There was this kid in grade school who kept getting nosebleeds all the time. Aynsley I think her name was. Totally gross. They said she couldn’t keep her finger out of there.”
“I don’t think this has anything to do with Dex’s finger,” I told her.
“It’s true!” Dex shouted. “My finger prefers other holes.”
Now Ada really looked like she wanted to vomit. “Ugh, okay I’m going to go.”
I reached out and grabbed her arm before she could turn away. “Seriously, what’s up? How are you feeling? I know you must be all sorts of messed up because of the Veil.”
She stared down at her fingernails, seeming to examine them, something she tended to do when she was trying to appear blasé. “Yeah, I definitely don’t feel one hundred percent. I feel really spacey, like I’m drunk or high but it’s not as comforting.”
“It will pass,” I told her, though I honestly didn’t know if or when it would. I could only hope.
She cocked her head to the side. “Will it? Because it’s not just feeling like I’m walking on the frigging moon without moonboots.”
“What do you mean?”
She sighed and looked over my shoulder. “Should I come back at some other time? I don’t want to interrupt your bloodplay.”
“Ada,” I reproached her. “He has a bloody nose. And how do you know about bloodplay?”
“I read kinkier books than you do,” she said simply. “Actually, I’m just going to go back up to my room. I want to hit the hay before Maximus starts snoring.”
I squeezed her arm harder, my eyes searching her face. She’d already taken off her makeup, which normally made her look more innocent but that wasn’t the case here. There was a weighty quality behind her eyes, like she was beyond tired. Maybe sleep would be best for everyone, even though it was still early and we were in Manhattan of all places.
“What did you want to talk about?” I asked her.
She shook her head. “It can wait.” She shot me a quick smile and when I wouldn’t let go of her, she rolled her eyes and gave out a heavy sigh. There was the Ada I knew. I released her and she started down the hallway toward the elevators and stairwell.
She paused a few steps away and looked over her shoulder at me. “I’ll talk to you in the morning. Oh, and by the way, stay away from the sixth floor. There seems to be a demon down there. I’d take the stairs from now on, if I were you.”
And then she disappeared around the corner.
I stared at the empty hallway and shivered. Okay, there was definitely something to talk about. I turned back to the room and Dex was now standing by the window and looking outside of it, completely naked. While I spent a second admiring his ass, there was something about the sight that brought the shiver back down my spine.
“Are you okay?” I asked, stepping back into the room and closing the door behind me.
He didn’t say anything, didn’t move. His hands were down at his side and the tissues were still on the bed. A drop of blood fell to the floor.
I breathed in deeply, trying to shake off the unease and walked over to him.
“Dex,” I said gently, afraid to touch him, as if he were a sleepwalker.
I stood behind him for a moment. Finally he seemed to notice my presence and turned around. A congealed river of blood had formed beneath his nose. His eyes were dark as coal and strangely blank. He blinked a few times and then said, “Sorry, were you saying something?”
“Not really,” I told him with a nervous smile. “I was just talking to Ada. What are you doing, trying to give the neighbors a peep show?”
He looked down at his dick and then let out a laugh. It sounded hollow. “I guess so, huh,” he said. He then stretched, his arms above his head and let out a yawn. “I think I’m going to turn in.”
“Your nose is still a bit bloody, by the way,” I said to him as he brushed past me and headed right for the bed.
“I’ll deal,” he said, getting under the sheets. “I’m sure it’s nothing.”
Didn’t you hear what me and Ada were talking about? I wanted to ask him. Demons on the sixth floor? That doesn’t interest you at all?
But then again, this wasn’t Experiment in Terror. That baby had been put to sleep and bringing up demons and weird shit at a time like this probably wasn’t the best idea. Tomorrow I’d talk to Ada properly and get Dex checked out and hopefully this whole maddening event could be put behind us.
Besides, my parents were coming in the morning. Every single one of us needed our strength for that. Oh, the horror, the horror.
I crawled into bed beside Dex and turned out the lights. The sky outside the window was now the darkest indigo, lit by orange neon lampposts. It was more comforting to have that light from the inside seeping in, to know that the world outside was carrying on as usual, even if our lives were anything but.
Still, I didn’t fall asleep for the longest time and when I finally did, my dreams were filled with things that would make the lightest nights seem black.
I dreamed that the man I was lying beside, the man I was set to marry, the love of my life, was not that man at all.
But I didn’t know who he was.