Page 97 of Defended By Love

It’s funny how much the collapse has lost its awe-factor for me. Seeing it through the girl’s eyes is captivating, in a macabre sort of way. I send out a silent prayer of gratitude to whatever being is responsible for this that she’s seeing it for the first time.

Sometimes the greatest gift you can receive is that of forgetting.

Suddenly, the girl flinches.

“What is it?”

She looks to me with such horror in her eyes, that I can’t help but think the worst: she remembers.

“I left your umbrella in there,” she says finally.

Maybe Grant’s inappropriate laughter is rubbing off on me, but I laugh. I also forget everything I’ve learned from Dr. Debbie and pull her into a hug.

“You’re okay. That’s all that matters,” I say. And I mean it.

While in this time loop, I’ve experienced a lot. I’ve had my world crumble, I’ve had mind-blowing orgasms, I found friendship and love, I’ve learned to have fun, and I learned to face my fears. Nothing, though, compares to saving her.

“We need to keep moving—” I start, pulling out of the hug and beginning to turn towards the street.

I stop when I see the girl’s face. Tears brim in her downturned eyes.

“What is it?” I ask.

The girl shrugs, wiping her nose against her sleeve that’s soaked through from the rain. The rain continues to pound down, the only bits of noise as the tower slumbers.

“We need to get going,” Grant reminds us gently.

I nod. “Let’s get you somewhere safe.”

The girl rips her arm out of mine from where I’m touching her elbow. “I’m not going to the shelter tonight.”

Her words echo in my mind. Isn’t that what she told me earlier (technically) tonight? And what did I do? I gave her my umbrella. In the middle of a storm in the middle of the night, I gave her my umbrella and patted myself on the back for my good deed.

“We can take her to my mom’s house,” Grant says in a more pressing voice. “We just need to—”

The tower cries out into the night and we all take off running before Grant’s power scoops us up into the sky and away from danger.

The girl pushes some sopping wet hair out of her eyes and looks over at the two of us in the sky. To her credit, she handles being airborne much better than I did. I mentally pencil in a breakdown for her later, once she’s dry and processes this all.

“This is shaping up to be a really weird day,” she mutters.

I smile. “You have no idea.”

* * *

We’re debating logistics when Grant’s mom pads down from the top floor to the main kitchen. She’s wearing a pink, puffy bathrobe and slippers. Even though her eyebrows aren’t drawn on super high since she was dead asleep in the middle of the night, she still looks super surprised.

Rightly so.

Her son, who’s wearing a red spandex suit with a cape, is standing in the kitchen with two women she’s never seen before. We’re all drenched from the rain.

Her eyes narrow as I, for some unknown reason, decide to wave.

Oh, please don’t let this be the first impression that sticks.

“Grant, what’s going—” She pauses. “Do I know you?”

My heart stutters. Has she remembered me from before the reset? Except, she’s not looking at me. She’s looking at the girl.

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