Page 92 of Fangs with Benefits

‘I thought you were having a good time,’ she says.

‘I was,’ I whisper. I don’t say that it was too good. That, had I stayed longer, I would have kissed her long and held her close and maybe told her that the feelings I have are too big and frightening to fit in these old bones. I would have admitted that I’ve fallen completely for her, and that I’m terrified she’ll die and I’ll be left here forever.

I was afraid I would try to make her mine if I had to watch her under the blue and pink lights, smiling and dancing and singing, making it feel like it was just us, two imperfect beings who found their way to each other.

‘Sometimes I get overwhelmed. All those people, all that blood.’ My mouth feels like sandpaper on the lies, but she nods against my chest and lets me hold her while we both pretend this is less than it is, that we’re just friends, that we could ever be just friends.

‘I hate that you had to see Mark,’ I say.

‘Matt,’ she reminds, and pinches my side, but I hear a smile in her voice, so I may never call him by his right name again.

I rub my hand up and down her spine. She takes a deep breath.

‘You smell nice,’ she murmurs.

‘You do too.’ She always does. It’s that citrus smell that was so diverting to me when I met her. She reminds me of warmth and sunshine, like sitting beneath a tree eating fresh fruit, the juice dripping down my chin. She’s so perfectly alive.

I can’t stop myself from offering a small piece of the truth, like it will burn me from the inside out if I don’t release some of the steam that is building up. ‘I like-like you too.’

‘Will you stay?’ she asks. I imagine she means for more than just tonight.

I kiss the top of her head. ‘Course. We can get bagels in the morning.’

‘Pull the curtains,’ she says. ‘It’s going to be sunny tomorrow.’

I do as she says, chest aching. I’m pre-emptively grieving the inevitable loss of Molly June Mason. I might not survive it. I hope I won’t.

By the time I’m done, she’s tucked beneath her comforter, Gemma back in her place next to Molly’s shins.

I leave my clothes folded on a chair before climbing into her bed behind her. I don’t sleep, but I do close my eyes and listen to her heartbeat, feel her breath move her body beneath my arm, matching my breath to hers until the sun rises.

Chapter 32

Molly

Elijah’s been strange all morning. Quiet and pensive, melancholy even. He snuck out before the sun was too high and returned in a fresh outfit with two toasted bagels, both for me. I ate them at the table, and he sat across from me watching without speaking.

Whatever is wrong must be residual from what was wrong last night. It makes me uneasy not knowing what’s on his mind, but I don’t pry, afraid of what I’ll find if I do. Instead, I shower, clean my kitchen, change my sheets, make him help me carry my laundry to the basement. He says less than a dozen words through all of this, and the sense of impending doom grows heavy over my head.

When I finish making my bed, he sits on the couch, eyes unfocused as he stares at the coffee table where a stack of books we’ve shared sits next to a half-eaten bag of Skittles he brought me last week.

‘I’m leaving New York,’ he tells me, the first words he’s spoken in an hour.

My stomach and heart seem to drop completely.

‘Why?’

‘I can’t stay here.’

My face freezes as I figure out the right question to ask. Why not? What do you mean? When? Why, why, why?

I settle on, ‘What happened?’ I’m staring at his face, searching for insight and answers, a hint that he feels anguish about this, but he won’t look at me.

‘I can’t do this,’ he says.

It’s so vague I want to scream. Can’t do the human reintegration thing? The soulless corporate job? The mess of a situationship we’ve found ourselves in?

‘Explain,’ I command, and my stupid voice wobbles. I should be cool, should feel casual displeasure at the news of my coworker-turned-friend leaving the city–I shouldn’t have a storm of anger and desperation boiling over in me.