Page 34 of Shame

He doesn’t say anything, just gets up like a robot and walks by me, down the hall. I follow him to his room and help him change into his pajamas. Something that used to be weird for me, but now I’m used to. He gets into bed without an argument, and I pull the covers up to his chin, tucking him in and kissing his forehead. Same way he used to do to me when I was a little girl. I fight tears as I turn on the monitor and shut off the light.

“Night, Dad,” I croak out.

“Night, honey,” he mutters, already half asleep.

None of this is his fault, I know that, but sometimes the whiplash from him is worse than anything else. Acting crazy one minute and then completely fine the next. It’s hard to wrap my head around. It’s hard to keep my emotions out of it and not take it personally some days.

When I leave his room, I find Shark in the kitchen, washing his hands. I lean against the wall and just watch him, in awe of how he’s even real. The craziest part is I don’t even know him—not really. I saw him in the diner often, always thought he was hot. He asked me for my number, and I acted like a fool. Yet he didn’t give up and has done nothing but help me since I opened myself up to him a little.

Though, I guess that’s what he does, huh? He helps people. The Merciless Few help this town, and Shark is part of that. Maybe even though I thought he was going to shove Norman onto the grill earlier, and leave him with some nasty scars, he’s a good person. Good people do bad things. We all know that. I can accept that sort of thing, I think. I mean, it’s not like I’m trying to marry Shark or anything, but if we can keep doing this? Whatever this is that we’re doing—friends? Dating?—then that’s great. I like it. I likethis. I like having someone I can talk to who isn’t a nurse. Someone who looks at me for a reason other than needing something from me. Looking at me because they want to and not because they have to. Someone I look forward to seeing. Someone who doesn’t just look at me butseesme.

Dad looks at me like I’m a bug half the time. The customers hardly look at me at all, too worried with their food, which I can’t get upset about since that’s why they’re there. I don’t have any friends to speak of. I lost contact with everyone when Dad starting showing symptoms. My fault, because I cut them all out. I panicked and devoted all my time to Dad. I don’t regret it, though. I’m not sure any of those friends would have understood anyway.

Shark turns, pausing when he sees me, and he smiles. “He all good?”

I nod. “Thank you for that.”

“I ain’t done yet,” he says. “I wasn’t sure where the towels were to soak up the water and didn’t want to go digging through your things. I also need another vase to put those flowers in, unless you’d rather throw them away.”

“Of course, I don’t want to throw them away.”

He smirks. “I’ll get you new ones.”

“I still don’t want to throw them away.”

I walk over, moving by him to open the cabinet under the sink, but before I pull it open, I turn back to him. He’s watching me carefully. I slide my hands up his chest and around his neck before leaning up. Shark leans down, his lips meeting mine. His arm is around my waist, pulling me against him, and god, his arms are huge too. His hand curls all the way around my opposite side, holding onto me for dear life. Like maybe there’s something about me he likes just as much as I like about him. But what could that possibly be? It’s hard to know what he likesabout me when I don’t know what to like about me… when I don’t know who I am. I pull away, resting flat on my feet but keeping my hands on his chest. His heart beats strong and rhythmically behind my hands.

“Tell me about yourself,” I say to him.

He chuckles, running a hand through his dark hair.

“Not what I thought you’d say, but yeah, okay. I can do that.”

“What did you think I was going to say?” I ask, getting the vase out from the cabinet.

“Something X-Rated.”

I laugh as I go into the bathroom off the kitchen to grab a couple of towels from the shelf. Shark takes them from me when I reach him.

“I have to sweep in here, so be careful. There’s still some glass around.”

I’m glad the glass broke on the wood and not on the throw rug, which makes it easier to clean up.

I pick up the flowers and put them into the vase while he soaks up the water on the rug. I don’t get them in the way they were before, so it doesn’t look as nice as it did. Some stems are bent and a few are missing petals, and the vase is much wider so they flop all over, but I don’t want them just because they’re pretty.

I situate it onto the coffee table and pick up the photo that fluttered to the ground. It’s one of me when I was a baby, about a year old. I put it in the coffee table drawer because I don’t have extra picture frames. They’re one thing Dad goes after often,and I’d considered taking them all down, but I don’t like the thought of bare walls in the house. He hung these photos, and they all hold memories. I like looking at them, like remembering.

“You got cable or something?” Shark asks. The man is literally on his hands and knees, using all his weight to press the towel to the carpet to soak up the water. Looks like he could break a hole through the floor with those muscles. I practically drool at how they bulge as he does it. “Cora?”

“Hm?” I jerk my head up, meeting his eyes. He gives me a smug smile. My cheeks flush, knowing I just got caught.

“Find a movie for us to watch.”

“Right, yeah. Okay.”

I grab the remote and go to the streaming app to start looking.

“You want me to put these in the washer?” He holds up the towels.

---