Page 15 of Strangers in Love

His smile seemed to tighten, but he was still polite. “You have all night to do that, don’t you?”

Dammit. I didn’t want to let him down when all he wanted was someone to talk to while he ate, but Freedom and I did have to make some adjustments for our lessons.

“Let me go see if she minds pushing our plans back a bit. She might even want to join us.” As I turned to leave, I caught a glimpse of something dark on Serle’s face, but when I glanced back to get a better look, I just found him wearing a bland expression with the same normal smile he usually possessed. “I’ll be right back.”

Technically, we could have worked in the kitchen at the table there, but Freedom didn’t like being interrupted when we were working. She’d given that same reason when I’d suggested we use the ‘living room’ that Neutral Ground had set up for all of us as well. So, we worked in our room, Freedom sitting on her bunk and me sitting on the lone chair. She was already in place when I walked into the room.

“Serle asked if I’d mind sitting with him while he eats.” I managed to keep any irritation from my tone. “I told him we had some work to do, but it won’t take very long. We could even start out there while we keep him company.”

I hadn’t really expected her to be excited by my suggestion, but I hadn’t thought she’d be as annoyed as she looked either. The sigh she gave before she even said a single word clearly said she wasn’t about to go along with this.

“We have too much to do to be distracted by Serle.” She stood up. “You stay here and get your things organized. I’ll suggest to Serle that he ask someone else to join him for dinner.”

I wanted to argue with her, tell her that we had no reason to be rude, that we could take twenty or thirty minutes for another volunteer who just didn’t want to eat alone, but she was up and gone before I could get a word out. I hated when she did stuff like that. Acted like she knew exactly what I should do and didn’t bother asking my opinion about any of it.

Before I realized what I was doing, I was out the door and walking down the corridor again, heading back to the kitchen. Just because she didn’t want to delay our work session didn’t mean that I had to be rude about it. At the very least, Serle deserved to hear it from me. I didn’t need Freedom to deliver a message like we were in elementary school.

I was just outside the doorway when I picked up on the last of what Freedom was saying.

“…you stick with the work you’re here to do and leave my sister alone. She’s not going to eat with you or date you or fuck you.”

My jaw dropped. Yes, Freedom and I swore on rare occasions, but I’d never heard her usefuckthat way before. What had gotten into her?

“I don’t know what–”

“You knowexactlywhat I’m talking about.” Freedom’s voice was harsh. “Stalk someone else.”

She was back in the hall before I could decide if I should leave or not.

“That was rude.” The words left my mouth before I could stop them.

She rolled her eyes. “Leave it alone, Aline. And stay away from him.”

A flare of anger flickered. “I’m an adult, Freedom. I can take care of myself.”

Her eyes narrowed, and for a moment, I thought she was going to yell at me, but then she seemed to gather herself and smiled. It was a tight smile, nothing like the real one I’d seen my whole life.

“We came here to work, to make a difference in the lives of the kids here. Let’s focus on that.”

With a haughty lift of her chin, she moved past me. After a moment’s hesitation, I followed her. She was right about the reason why we were here. As much as I didn’t like how she’d handled the situation with Serle, the truth was, he was an adult and not the focus of this trip. We weren’t here to make friends, as bad as that sounded. I needed to get my head on straight and do what I’d come here to do.

Twelve

Eoin

I toweledoff my hair and avoided looking in the bathroom mirror, still not ready to see my reflection. I’d tried lying to myself before, saying that I didn’t want to see how out of shape I was, but I couldn’t really use that as an excuse anymore. It’d only been a few days since I’d started working out again, but I could already feel the difference, even if I wasn’t sure I could see it. Still, it felt good to be physical again.

None of that meant I wanted to compare what I used to look like to what my reflection would show now.

And it wasn’t just the scars either.

About two weeks after I’d gone to see Israel and Nana Naz, I’d gone to a local tattoo place. It’d taken everything I had to do it, but I’d forced myself to follow through. I’d checked it to make sure it healed correctly, but I hadn’t been able to bring myself to actually look at it since then.

The tattoo of Leo’s dog tags, with the chain looped around the scar from the bullet I’d taken in the shoulder, was a constant reminder of the best friend I’d lost. I’d meant for it to be that, but I still wasn’t at a place where I actually needed something to keep him in my mind. Hell, I still caught myself talking to him all the time. I’d known him so well that, sometimes, I could even ‘hear’ him answer.

Today was one of those days.

I’d gotten off my ass five days ago and committed to getting back in shape as well as I could, but that’d been as far as my ambition had made it. No one in my family had pushed for me to make plans, get a job, basically stop moping around and feeling sorry for myself, so the memory of Leo had done it for them. He never would’ve let me get away with this shit for as long as I had. Sure, I still had nightmares and sometimes even flashbacks, but they weren’t debilitating. I could’ve been doing a lot more than just not making a mess for Mom to clean up.

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