Page 6 of Them Bones

“I have an angry face?”

“Angry facemuscles.”

“How can face muscles beangry.”

“Want a mirror?”

He blinked at her, his expression unreadable again, and she was struck with the strangest urge to punch him back. Instead, she said “You have a condom on your shoe.”

SHANE

Shane wasn’t entirely sure how he had ended up in the girl’s house. For a tiny, barely-five-foot rake of a girl, she was a force of freakin’ nature. She’d argued with him for what felt like an eternity, until his nerves were simply so worn down to the nub that he’d found himself nodding his head in agreement and walking beside her, eyeing her warily, as she stalked down the street in a haughty silence.

She had short blonde hair, almost like a boy’s but… not. It was thick, and wavy, and curled around her ears and the nape of her neck which was peeking out from under her oversized puffy coat. Her features were angular but soft, somehow... like a razor blade wrapped in cotton candy. Her pale skin was marred only by the blossoming redness across her cheek. He’d chewed his lip the whole walk, acutely conscious of her sharp green eye watching him out of her peripheral vision even as it swelled shut.

They stepped into the split-entry bungalow, the faint smell of cat piss tingling in his nose, where she kicked off her boots and dropped her coat on the ground in one swift motion as she disappeared up the stairs and around the corner, the tan paint fraying on the wall’s sharp edge, peeling away to reveal an ugly yellowish-green colour beneath.

He hesitated, not sure if he was supposed to follow, but after a few moments he toed off each shoe and trailed her in.

She was standing at the end of the hallway, drowning in a fadedBoyz II Ment-shirt with her hands on her hips and an impressive glower. She looked even shorter without her boots but somehow managed to take up the entire hallway, filling up every particle of space with her mismatched socks, chipped navy-blue nail polish, and pouty lower lip. She could have been thirteen or she could have been thirty, he had no idea.

“In,” she said, gesturing to the open bathroom, steam billowing out behind her. “Now.”

Her tone was so inarguably final that he found his feet marching independently inside. He paused awkwardly, and reached for the door but she blocked it with her foot.

“Can you like… leave? I know how to take a shower.”

She eyed him. “Doesn’t look like it.”

He felt like he’d been kicked in the nuts, and his jaw clenched with a combination of anger and shame.

“Sorry,” she sighed, sounding tired. “Just… toss your shit in the hall and I’ll put it in the washer, okay?”

He nodded once and waited for her to leave, but she didn’t, and the silence seemed to fill the room as much as the steam.

“Are you going to leave or are you staying for the show?” he finally gritted out.

She shrugged. “You worth staying for?”

He wasn’t sure how someone so tiny could be soincrediblyirritating, but he was cold, and tired, and his knuckles were throbbing –don’t think about how her face must feel, don’t think about how her face must feel –and he really,reallywanted that shower. So he yanked his hoodie and t-shirt up over his head and hurled them at her. She stumbled back a step as she caught the bundle of clothing.

“You tell me,” he challenged, looking her right in the eye, nostrils flaring with annoyance.

She dropped her eyes to his bare chest and cocked her head, which is precisely when he realized that he was – in fact – bare chested. In the bathroom. With an extremely frustrating, albeit intriguingly intimidating girl whose name he didn’t even know.

She was staring at him.

He wasn’t sure what he expected. Insults? Likely. A change of topic? Maybe. Silence? A magic trick? He really didn’t know. But what he did not – under any circumstances – expect, was for her to step towards him and press her palms to his hollow stomach, her fingers flexing against his muscles, and to press a soft kiss to his sternum.

Something seized in his brain. He became a diesel engine full of gas and just entirelyceasedbeing a functioning human being for that whole moment in existence where all he felt was her fingers on his abs and her warm breath on his chest. She peered up at him, her one eye completely swollen shut now, the other sparkling with something that made his blood feel too thick for his veins.

“Well?” he finally snapped, sniffing to hide an oddly tight, ragged breath that seemed to have clawed its way into his chest.

“I’d take a punch for you,” she said, before spinning on her Christmas sock and walking away, shutting the door firmly behind her.

And for the second time in as many minutes, he felt like he’d been kicked in the nuts.

DUSTIN

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