When Lochlan leaves the room I am turned back over. Hands hold my face up, strong arms keep me close, and a strong unfamiliar cadence moves us both.
God forgive me, he says to me.
I'm not God, I tell him.
He ducks his nose down against my ear and resumes a stranger's pace as I close my eyes. He smells like cedar and woodsmoke and old leather. His hands are shaking. His breathing is quiet. The pressure on my bones increases incrementally. He's holding me harder and tighter with every passing minute until my bones threaten to break and I am released and then with a lingering kiss he is gone and my heart beats a new rhythm I can't quite keep up with, all of the sudden.
***
Everything is different again. It's weird. Usually everyone gets mad. This time they're afraid. I haven't seen this kind of undercurrent of fear since Jake elbowed his way into the group so many years ago.
God works in mysterious ways.
***
Honesty left me stripped like a tree of its leaves in winter. I'm chilled to the bone, bare and harsh against the clouds, thin and spindly and unable to block the wind that threatens to pull up my roots and blow me over.
What if you fall for him?
I stand up and smooth out my coat underneath me. Then I sit back down. Better. It was all bunched up and I was even warmer than usual. What if I do? I like the fear rolling off him in waves. Truly I do.
You already have, haven't you?
I ignore his observation. Can we just get coffee? The third degree never leave me with an appetite.
Can't you exist without falling in love with every man you come across?
You know what? Thanks for the invite but I'm really not hungry or thirsty anymore.
The truth hurts, doesn't it?
No but I'm guessing the jealousy does?
Touché.
Indeed.
Were you this open with Lochlan when you talked about it?
We don't talk about it.
Maybe you should. He needs to know what he's getting himself into.
He knows me better than anyone.
In this case I'm thinking I'm the only one who realizes just how quickly you fall.
Not that again.
What?
Trying to pretend as if there was something wrong already when you came on the scene and that's why I fell for you.
I'm certain that's what it was.
You're wrong.
You couldn't have possibly known at the time. You were a chi-
A child. Right. I remember.
