Page 67 of Close Quarters

“You’re not going to drop me,” I told him confidently.

“I suppose it would look bad if I dragged you back with two broken ankles,” he said with a sigh that bordered on regret. “And after they trusted us to be out here by ourselves. Yeah, you’re right.”

“And that’s the only reason?” I asked, still hanging over the drop and not allowing any fear to show. “Not you know, something else maybe?”

“That fine ass we talked about?” he asked with a grin.

“I didn’t know you had a list of reasons. Do tell.”

“Who said there was a list?”

“Reno,” I pleaded gently, finally giving in and hoping he would hear what I wanted out of him. I knew I wasn’t exactly the model, uh, boyfriend? Fuck buddy? Friend with benefits? It’s not like we were the type of couple to sit down and have a heart-to-heart about what we meant to one another or what we even were.

It wasn’t like I needed him to say I was the love of his life, that I completed him, or he never wanted to see me go. None of that cheesy shit because even I would have felt a weird discomfort hearing those things. Not just because this was Reno, and hearing something like that from him would have been just plain weird, but because I wasn’t exactly the sentimental type either.

But it would be nice to know that I mattered, that I counted for something…that I was important.

His mouth spasmed, and he drew me back, his eyes darting to our feet. “Alright, fine. I would probably miss you.”

“You really know how to make a guy feel special,” I said in my normal teasing voice, even as my heart sank. “It’s what I always say about you.”

It was admittedly stupid of me to expect anything else. As I’d just got done reminding myself, it wasn’t like we were…well, anything. Just two guys pushed together so the ranch could try to save Reno from himself. I still didn’t quite get the logic behind it, but other than it affecting Reno like they’d been looking for, it wasn’t like I should be hoping for anything else.

We were just…two different people, and who knew what our lives had waiting for us in the future? It was pretty stupid on my part to think this was anything more than convenient for us. Reno would eventually have to return to his life. He’d mentioned a couple of times he might stay with his little sister while he got back on his feet. That would be good for him. I was happy he had something like that.

I…didn’t have anything like that to look forward to when I left. There was my dad, of course, but that wasn’t going to happen. The few times I tried to visit him before I’d got my ass in trouble were some of the most miserable experiences. It was like walking through a mausoleum, where one of the corpses was still up and walking around, capable of life but not living.

But, hey, there was still a chance of something in my future, right? I had done well enough to land in the program even if it first required me to go to prison, so that had to count for something. This place was supposed to be where I could find a way to turn my life around, do something other than all the stupid, crazy shit I had been doing. No more stupid dares or breaking into someone’s house in the hopes they weren’t home to snag a few things that weren’t worth shit, just for the thrills.

So yeah, I hadn’t found Mr. Right, but…well, at least he wasn’t Mr. Wrong. He had his fair share of issues and a lot on his plate dealing with them. It was stupid of me to push for anything else, especially when I didn’t even have the courage to say what I wanted out loud.

“Elliot?” Reno asked, his face pinched in concern. “Look?—”

I waited for him to say whatever was bubbling away in his head, but I wasn’t surprised when he grunted and let me go. It was confirmation of what I’d already known. Reno could still be special to me, a marker of a good thing at a time when things were getting better for me. Maybe one day, I would look back on this time of my life and feel a wave of happiness and hope that wherever Reno was, he was doing better than ever.

“I…” Reno began and then stopped, cocking his head. “Do you hear that?”

It took me a moment but finally, I heard it, the soft bleat of sheep. It was close, probably under one of the overhangs of rock, and didn’t sound upset, just…confused. I felt for the little guys, with their big eyes and absolutely no brain cells operating behind them, their trusting, if still somewhat stubborn natures.

“Let’s go find them,” I said with a nod in the direction I’d heard the sound. The sooner we got to the sheep, the sooner we could focus on the already awkward and painful conversation.

One day, it might be something that would make me smile, but for now, I just had to live with it stinging.

Shifting in my bed, I finally cracked open my eyes and frowned at the shaft of moonlight that had taken residence on my face. Since Reno and I had gone on our successful excursion to retrieve the wandering sheep almost a week ago, sleep had been more elusive than usual.

Not that sleep wasn’t normally elusive. For as long as I could remember, getting to sleep was one of those struggles that seemed perfectly normal. I’d always puzzled at people who could fall asleep within minutes of lying down. Every time I tried it, my mind insisted on running over everything it could get its grubby little gremlin claws on. Those thoughts didn’t have to be about something that bothered me, they could be any number of things, from wondering if sheep dreamed to wondering when it would stop bothering me that Reno and I just…were.

I could already feel I wouldn’t get to sleep anytime soon, so I rolled over and hung my legs off the edge of the bed. A faint grogginess hung around my head, which told me I’d managed to drift off at some point without realizing it. Which meant something had woken me up, though I couldn’t remember what, it had disappeared along with whatever hazy thoughts and dreams I was having in that drifting state.

Reno was on his side, facing away from me, and covered in a thin sheet. He was stretched out on the bed rather than curled up, which meant his dreams were probably giving him some peace tonight. I hated seeing him curl into a ball, trying to defend himself against things I would never see or understand. At the very least, he allowed me to help him now and again whenever I knew his nightmares were plaguing him, so maybe I could settle for that.

There wasn’t much to occupy myself with, but there was the desk between our beds. The journal and pencils they’d let me have after being here a few weeks and proving I wouldn’t try to stab people were still in the middle of the desk. Reno liked to read in his downtime, but he generally did that sitting or lying on his bed. Which allowed me to use the desk as I saw fit for the most part. It was just one of those little ways we managed to work together without attention being drawn to it.

I was getting sentimental, which was a surefire way to make sure I was miserable. Rather than stew in my thoughts, I pushed off my bed and sat at the desk. I switched on the small lamp, making sure to angle my body so it blocked the light from Reno while he slept, and then opened the notebook. Drawing, or ‘doodling’ as my teachers had called it, was always a way to focus when I needed to sit still and be quiet. Considering how much I’d been forced to do it, I’d eventually got quite good at drawing.

Even now, it was easy to get into the flow of things, opening to the last drawing I’d started. The scratch of the pencil against the paper was soft and still heard over the rustling of a loose roof shingle in the wind. I could have been there for several minutes or just a few, depending on how well I zoned out, before I finally noticed the deep, steady breathing that signaled Reno’s peaceful sleep was gone.

I turned, arm seizing in surprise, when I found him sitting on the edge of his bed, peering over my shoulder from a safe distance. “Jesus! How the fuck did you move without me noticing?”

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