Page 109 of Malice and Surrender
“What in the ever-loving fuck!” I swore as I jumped to my feet.
My eyes searched the darkness behind me, and a shiver raced down my spine as Wilder stepped away from the wall a few feet away. My hand clenched into a fist on instinct before I could draw a decent breath. I grabbed at my chest.
“I swear your goal is to give me a fucking heart attack. You’d think I’d be used to this by now,” I grumbled.
“Why would I want to give you a heart attack?” he asked as I stomped past him to the kitchen to clean off the whiskey that had spilled all over my hand and arm. “There are far easier ways to kill someone. I could’ve slit your throat or shot you in the head. I guess if I wanted it to be slow, I could poison you by slipping something in your drink,” he said.
I stared at the bottle and then down the hall where I’d left Wilder.
“Yeah, definitely not finishing that now,” I mumbled, and turned the bottle upside down in the sink before washing my hands.
I went back into the living room and used some rags to mop up what I’d spilled. Despite the house falling down around me, I liked to keep it neat and orderly. Some habits died harder than others, and the ones from prison hardly faded.
“What are you doing in here, Wilder?”
He didn’t answer, just sat down in the recliner and stared out the window.
“Why are you sad?” he asked, and I glared at him. “You are sad, aren’t you? Or do I have the emotion wrong?”
I cocked my head and stared into Wilder’s eyes. Even though he had black and grey makeup on, like he was trying to blend in with the concrete and asphalt, I could see the confusion in his eyes. I’d always wondered why Wilder was so strange and why he asked the most fucked up questions, but a light had just gone on. He didn’t have the same emotions as the rest of us. That was why he was always so curious. He was some kind of path. My best guess was psychopath, and I was suddenly more relieved than ever that Wilder didn’t want to slit my throat, as he put it. He could’ve done it a hundred times by now, and I would never have felt a thing.
“Yes, the emotion was sorta sad,” I said, flopping down on the couch. It was going to reek like whiskey in here for days.
“What do you mean by sorta?”
I rubbed my face and tried to put into words what I had going on inside of me. “It’s hard to explain. There are things I wish for that can never be,” I finally said. “Some of those things make me sad, others angry and frustrated.”
Wilder rubbed at his chin. “Can you fix what is making you sad?”
“I don’t know. Maybe, no, yes, it’s hard to know. I kinda fucked up, and I’m not sure I want to fix it.”
“But you can’t stop thinking about it and wondering if you should fix it,” Wilder asked.
“What the fuck, Wilder? Are you trying to be my shrink or what?” I growled and crossed my arms.
“Do you need a shrink?” he asked.
“I may need one shortly.” His brow furrowed, and I knew he didn’t understand my sarcasm. “Okay, yes. I may want to somehow repair what I fucked up,” I said, hating that he’d gotten me to admit out loud that I still wanted Raine. Even after all these years of anger and hatred, she could stir up so much emotion with a single look. I wanted her. The thought of her moving on with the guy from the bar had my blood boiling.
“Then, if you want my opinion, you should fix it.” Wilder nodded and resumed looking outside.
“Can I ask you a question?”
“Yeah, why couldn’t you ask me a question?”
I wanted to smack my hand to my forehead. This guy made my brain feel like it was trying to walk along the floor of a fun house as it moved around.
“Why do you always dress like this?” I asked.
Wilder looked down at the matching black and grey camo fatigues he was wearing. “Why not?”
“‘Cause it’s not exactly normal. Do you see me or anyone else walking down the street dressed in camo or like a swamp thing or a garbage bin dude?” If he were going to kill me for insulting him, at least I’d see him coming.
“I don’t wear this out,” he finally said. “Well, I do, but only when I need to.”
I wish I hadn’t dumped out the rest of my whiskey. I’d rather take my chances with the possible poison. “Fine. Why are you wearing it now?”
Wilder leaned forward, his arms resting on his thighs. “To blend in. I thought that would be obvious.”
