Page 17 of Ghoul

17

Hazel

Two months later

If I thought about it, I didn’t know what was important to me anymore. My eyelashes batted as the sun glared down, beams breaking through the leaves in the branches above us that were zooming past. In reality, they weren’t moving it was Ghoul and me on his motorcycle, but it appeared to be the reverse. Life was sort of similar if you used that type of thought process. To one person, everything in the world moved around them, and it was only when we stood still that we discovered an appreciation.

My grip tightened around his waist, and I straightened my back, preparing for the curve ahead. Most people who had never ridden something on two wheels assumed when you were a passenger on a bike, you were to lean into the curves, but you didn’t. You let the person who was driving do the bobbing and weaving, which didn’t come naturally to most. It hadn’t to me when I was younger, and Dad taught me to ride. My life was very much like what was happening right now. Fate was in the driver’s seat, and she knew the precise destination of where my life would end up. It didn’t matter how many theoretical branches or the numerous times I moved back and forth trying to alter the course, it would always travel where it was going in the first place.

Ghoul killed the engine and waited for me to climb off before he did the same.

“Why are we here?” I cocked my head to one side and peered at him through my sunglasses, undoing my helmet and handing it to him.

“We have to eat.” He pointed out an obvious fact. “Well, you don’t have to eat, but I’m going to. Guess you can watch me if you want.” He shoved his hands in his pockets after hanging our helmets on the bars of the motorcycle, his shoulders rising and falling quickly.

“I’m not hungry.” As soon as I said it, my stomach growled at the mention of food.

“You needed some fresh air. You have to breathe, right?” he teased in a knowing voice, a glint of humor behind his statement and smiled.

“Guess so. But why here?” My confusion grew with each passing second as my eyes roamed the outside of the hospital.

“I wanted to do something nice for you but didn’t know what you liked. Figured everybody had to eat.”

“At a hospital? Bleh. Their food is the worst. Have you ever eaten anything from here, Ghoul?” I laughed and bit the corner of my lip as I shook my head in astonishment.

“Nah. Most of the places I used to go to have either closed down or I’d rather not go there anymore. This was the only place I remembered that was still standing. Might have been a diner before I went to prison, might not have. I admit to nothing.” Each day I spent with him, I learned something new. Today it was despite every negative thing I had thought about him, I truly believed he had a lot of good within him. He was trying to make things right with me, which was a hell of a lot more than could be said for a lot of people, unfortunately.

“It was a diner, wasn’t it?”

“It was a diner,” he admitted and walked toward the hospital entrance.

“What are you doing?”

“Apparently getting some shitty hospital food. How about you?”

I had no desire to smell the food this place had to offer, much less put any of it in my mouth, but I couldn’t tell him no either. He’d been extremely thoughtful in addition to being a little protective over me since I showed up unannounced at his door and just kind of stayed. He never asked me to leave and even offered to sleep in an unoccupied room if I wasn’t comfortable with him. I could confess that in the beginning, I wasn’t thrilled to be in the same bedroom as him, that took some getting used to. He must have sensed it, too, because he slept in the recliner in his room when I said I didn’t want him to sleep in another room. In all actuality, I didn’t know how I felt about any of it, but we’d already slept together, so it seemed pretty stupid to make a big deal out of him sleeping in the same room, the one he owned, and I was squatting in.

“Sure.” I tried to genuinely smile and failed miserably. I wasn’t fooling anyone.

He grinned and nodded. “Alright.” He stopped walking and waited for me to catch up with him. “Let’s go eat some shitty hospital food.” He laughed. “I bet it’s one-hundred times better than the shit they served in lock up.”

“What was the worst thing you ate while you were in there?”

He took a few minutes to think it over in silence, and as we reached the automatic opening doors, he waved a hand in front of him. “Beauty before age, Ginger.”

We stopped at the front desk and asked for directions to the cafeteria and carefully followed the instructions we were given. “No idea?” I raised an eyebrow and sideways glanced at him.

“Sure as fuck wasn’t dick, if that’s what you’re getting at,” he stated bluntly, shoving the door open with the palm of his hand.

My face immediately got hot, and my cheeks blushed. “That wasn’t at all what I was thinking,” I blurted and blinked a few times, shocked that he thought I was saying that.

He bent forward and busted out laughing. “Your face is priceless, Ginger. Fucking priceless.”

An older couple passed us, and their jaws clenched together in unison, hearing him openly use profanities without caring what they or anyone else thought of him. That was something I really liked about him. He was who he was. He didn’t try to hide certain parts of his character in fear someone else wouldn’t care for it. In a way, I wished I could be more like him and embrace my insecurities.

Our eyes connected, and I refused to look away. Two could play this game. “Are you sure? That’s not what I heard,” I said in the most serious tone I could muster up.

“Who the fuck told you that?” He cleared his throat and scrubbed his hand over his mouth.

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