Page 87 of Walking Wounded

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He dreams of Sadie again. The white-gray pallor of her face, the cataract blue of her eyes staring, sightless, at the fickle smear of cloud across the evening sky. More often than not, when she haunts his dreams, she truly haunts them; if only he could dream of her alive, and laughing, but it’s always her dead face that greets him. Dead arms bent out at impossible angles; a dozen bones broken in the tumble down the hill to her final resting place. The dump site.

But unlike most mornings of this occurrence, he wakes to the weight of Hal mostly on top of him. The alarm bleats through the dark room and Hal’s beefy arm tightens once, reflexively, around Luke’s waist before he mumbles a protest and rolls away to shut off the clock. Afterward, he rolls back, face pressing into the side of Luke’s head, snuffling like a bear.

“So that’s your deep dark secret,” Luke says.

Hal grunts a question.

“You’re actually not a morning person.”

“Need five minutes,” Hal says. At least that’s what it sounds like he says.

Luke runs a hand through his hair in the dark. “Five minutes is good,” he says, the rest of his jokes lost somewhere between his brain and his tongue.

The nightmare lifts away slowly, chased by the warmth of Hal’s body draped across his, the gentle susurrus of his breathing, like the movements of the tide. Steady. Sure.

“Hal,” he says, voice too loud in the dark.

“Hmm?”

“Last night. I didn’t dream it, did I?” Because that would be the sort of story he made up to comfort himself in the midst of a drunken stupor.

Hal’s answer is to skim his hand up his chest and throat, and cup his face, fingers warm, and strong, and gentle where they curve around his jaw.

~*~

“Thought you were gonna be here in the afternoon,” Will grumbles on the other side of the breakfast table.

“I forgot about the damn running,” Luke says, because he had, groaning earlier when Hal came out of the bathroom in sweats. How could he forget the damn running? “Don’t sound so disappointed to see me.”

“I’m not,” Will says, scowling down at his plate. “What is this?”

“Grapefruit,” Sandy says from the counter. “It’s got Vitamin C. Eat it.” She makes the order sound like the kindest of suggestions.

“Hmph.”

Luke expected it to be awkward this morning. By the time Hal pulled up to the Maddox house, he’d wanted a smoke so bad his hands were shaking.

“Relax,” Hal said, glancing at him across the console. “Nobody’s mad at you.”

“Wrong. Nobody’s mad atyou. You’re Prince Charming. I, on the other hand, am the screw-up she actually invited. I am not princely in any way. They’ll be mad at me.”

Hal gave him a patient look. “Matt and Sandy aren’t like that.”

“All parents are like that. Why blame their kid when they could blame someone else?”

Even now, he has no idea why he was so thoroughly rattled. He suspects it has something to do with Hal tilting his entire world on its axis last night.Loveandwantand the best damn make out session of his life. Last night, his perception was proven wrong. So now, what if he’s misjudged the Maddoxes yet again? He wanted to hate them, at first, but then he couldn’t…but maybe he should have all along.

But Sandy greeted them brightly at the door, and then hugged Luke. “Thanks for looking out for my baby,” she said, patting him on the cheek as she withdrew.

He can’t fathom anyone having that kind of trust in him. Thinking the best of him.

Sandy joins them, her own plate loaded with a halved grapefruit and a dollop of plain yogurt. “Will, has Luke told you he’s going to work with Matt today?”

“Yeah.” The old man jabs at his grapefruit with the end of his spoon, frown deepening.

“I think it’s really exciting he’ll get to see him in action.” She shoots a wink across the table at Luke.

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