Page 91 of Impossible

26

Muted

Joshua

Indieisareedin the breeze when I pull up outside the Complex. She stands on the curb in front of the admin building, leaning forward on her crutches. I see how tall she is now that she’s not in the chair.

Everything about her is washed out. Her faded jeans and nothing-colored jacket and pallid skin. Only her eyes seem fully present, piercing and intent. Kind of like Hollis’s, I realize.

His scent is all over me. I’ve spent the last two nights sandwiched between him and Leon, waking up to Risk crushing me from above after arriving home from work. I’ve never slept so well. Leon’s broad bulk and Hollis’s scratchy stubble and unguarded, peaceful expression. Risk poured over me like syrup on a short stack. The bond has been filled with my aftershock smiles and Risk’s far more explicit replays. Hollis and Leon have pretended to be irritated, but their self-conscious pleasure burbles in response every time.

Hollis actually called me yesterday from work to shut Risk up during his hundredth or so replay of his kiss with Indie. Hollis would deny it, but I think he nearly lost his cool at his desk. Every time I think of it, his anger darkens the bond in response. He wouldn’t be caught dead in something as coarse as a rut.

I dash out of the car before Indie can take a step.

“Hi,” I grin, suddenly shy. I curse the crutches for keeping me from hugging her. I wonder if her skin is as soft as Risk’s memory of it.

“Hi.” She smiles back. Are those dimples? “Sorry you got stuck on chauffeur duty.”

I laugh. “Stuck?I had to win these keys, gladiator-style. Trials and tribulations for the privilege of your company.”

Her eyes widen before she realizes I’m joking, then narrow. “Oh, shut up.” She rolls her eyes, but she’s smiling.

“So, how do we make this happen?” I ask, looking between her and the Escalade. Hollis got precious about his GT and Risk’s ancient Bronco is somehow evenmorelifted than the SUV, so here we are.

“I don’t know.” Indie looks at the gleaming back car. “I fell asleep on the way back from the hospital. Leon carried me in, I think.”

“Well then, carrying it is,” I smile.

We maneuver together, and when her arms close around my neck so I can lift her to the seat inside, I do my best not to let on how she’s affecting me. She is intoxicating, spicy black tea and sharp citrus and all shyness as she lingers in the embrace a moment too long and lets me go a little too jerkily.

“Oh!” she exclaims once she’s seated and can see the gift on the center console waiting for her. “Is this for me?”

I slide in the driver’s seat before answering. “Yup. From me.”

I wrapped it in light blue paper with a lavender bow. A simple wrapping job, I thought, but the way she’s looking at it, you’d think it was solid gold.

“You didn’t have to do that,” she murmurs, stroking her hand over the paper.

“I wanted to,” I shrug. “Go on now, open it.”

But she isn’t opening it. Her fingers are tracing the bow, the folds of the blue paper, the spots where the corners tuck into themselves. I like to think I am a pretty good gift-wrapper, but this level of adoration seems excessive.

“It’s just so pretty,” she sighs. “Did you wrap it?”

“Yes.” I smile. “I used to love doing origami. And now I think you’re going to like the wrapping more than the gift inside.”

“Sorry,” she says. “I just—I can’t remember the last time I unwrapped a present.”

“What about Christmas gifts? Your birthday?”

She shakes her head mutely and starts unwrapping. Clearly she doesn’t want to talk about it. Did nobody ever give her a gift? I know from what Hollis has told me that her parents aren’t great people but… not even friends?

She tries not to rip the paper. Her fingernails are brittle, and one breaks when she tries to slice through the tape with it. She shakes her head a little—embarrassed or impatient, I can’t tell. Watching her work is hypnotizing. Her dark brown hair will be reddish and glossy when she’s healthy. There’s a little mole on her cheek, the barest freckle on otherwise flawless skin. Her bottom lip is too full, with a scar in a horizontal line across it. I see why after a moment when she digs her teeth into that exact spot. Three little lines appear between her eyebrows when she concentrates. Her fingers seem almost too long for her, unwieldy, fumbling with the tightly pressed creases. I could watch her for days.

“Oh.”

She holds the book in both hands, paper forgotten in her lap, her left thumb grazing over the title:100 Selected Poems, by e.e. cummings. The spine is creased and the corners dented and the cover is peeled back slightly in one spot. I worry for a moment that it’s too tattered for her. Too ruined.

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