Page 91 of Beyond The Maples
Again, this seems to encourage him, so he flattens his palm, his fingers heavy around the base of my neck. He tightens ever so slightly, so that the pressure consumes my thoughts. My breath hitches, turning shallow for an entirely different reason. Electricity tingles along my skin, spreading almost painfully to my fingertips.
"You know…" he begins, his voice a soothing rumble, "some of the most brilliant engineers built these pods. They used this special kind of plastic that can float in almost anything. It was a huge breakthrough when they discovered it. But when they first put them in the dunes, they sank a little too far. They couldn't get out with the heavy silt on top."
I hold my breath. Is this supposed to calm me down?
"That is, until they changed the shape. The boxes got caught easily under everything, but as soon as they turned them into cylinders. Poof. Only a certain amount of dust or sand canstay on top of them."
His thumb moves at the base of my neck, andgods, I hope he can't feel my pulse stuttering, or how hot my face has become, because it would betray just how affected I am by him.
The silence stretches, but he doesn't remove his hand. He continues making idle circles around my pulse. His hand is an anchor, holding my ever-busy brain firmly in place. It's almost peaceful.
I'm not sure how much time passes like that, but once my breath is even, and my body relaxes, he pulls his hand away. I miss its steady weight immediately. I don't know what that was, but I know I've never felt it before. I expect him to move back, to inch his body away, but he doesn't. He stays close and something must be wrong with me because I'm grateful.
"Thank you," I whisper, tears stinging my eyes for reasons I don't understand.
"You're welcome." He takes a hesitant breath before asking, "How long has that been happening?"
The absolute darkness must make me either brave or stupid, because I answer honestly.
"Started around the time my mom died. It comes and goes, depending on how things are."
"You were young?" he asks.
"Oh, like you haven't already read everything in my file?" I accuse with a laugh that sounds a little bitter. Silence greets me, so I say, "Yeah, I was young. But it wasn't so much her death that made me panic, it was the weight of everything in her absence."
It's more honesty than I meant to offer.
He hums softly. "Right. Two younger siblings to look after."
"See, I knew you read my file."
"I read everyone's files," he says, a little too quickly.
"What about you, parents? Siblings? Or were you created in a lab?" I joke, but I'm genuinely dying to know. Tane seems so... other.
This earns me a small chuckle.
"Parents are dead, no siblings." His voice is neutral.
"I'm sorry. For how long?" I ask cautiously.
"It's fine, I was little," he says quietly, and I'm silent, hoping he'll share more. Desperate for this not to be so one-sided.
"I grew up with my grandmother. She was great," he offers.
I recognize it for what it is. He's not willing to give away more. Fine then. "So youwerecreated in a lab then," I tease.
"You are such a..."
I cut him off before he says something rude and ruins the moment.
"Fantastic cadet? Sensational friend? Hilarious human?" I sing-song back to him lightly, but I’m cut off when I feel his lips near my ear.
"A littlemenace,Maple. You are an insufferable, chaotic, infinitely distractinglittle menace." He grinds out the last bit through shallow breaths, like it pains him to admit that he notices me.
A shiver goes up my spine and cascades through my body. Tane doesn't pull away. He invades my space and my senses until I no longer care that I'm buried underground, waiting for a storm to pass, so I can head back to base and undoubtedly be disciplined for letting our hostages go.
All I can think about is every single place our bodies meet, and every spot they don't. I'm overwhelmed by his scent, the warm earthy one I can't quite place but thatdraws me in, soothing something inside me that I can't even identify. Or maybe I just don't want to.
