My lips set in a grimace.
“Fuck,” is all I can get out, refusing to feel the full brunt of the pain I know I should be in.
“Sit up—slow, go slow. Christ, Kris, you’re—ah, shite.” Loch’s hand is on my back and he can’t seem to decide which injury to be more horrified by, the cut on my temple or the gash through my shoulder or the burns on my knees where my tights ripped. Everything’s bloody and the cut on my temple leaks down the side of my face.
I’m sitting up, but suddenly the ground seems a little closer than it was before—
“Kris! Stay up, lad—here.” He rips off his beanie and presses it to the cut on my head.
I wince at the sting. “You could have used my beanie.”
Loch goes momentarily stiff. I think he blushes, but his face is already scarlet in the exertion of running.
“Yeah. That woulda made more sense.” He licks his lips. “Here, hold this to your head. C’mon, to your feet. The water table’ll have first aid. Up, now. Slow.”
We’re down the hill where the water table volunteers can’t see us yet. It’s bad enough that Loch bore witness to this obscenely graceful moment, but we get to bring other people into my humiliation now, too. Awesome.
“Oh, the paparazzi will love this,” I say, or more moan, because Loch bodily hauls me to my feet andow.
He loops my free arm over his shoulder, my other one dutifully holding the beanie to my cut.
“Do na worry about that. Come on.”
My mouth opens to say that of course it’s easy forhimto say that, he’s not the one all banged up thanks to his own stupidity—but then Loch bolts his arm around my hips, crushing my body to his.
It’s so he can hold on to me. Keep me standing upright. Because my legs are jelly.
I feel all his muscles that I saw last night. Feel them pressed against me, around me. Straining.
We head up the path, mostly by his support.
My pulse swerves wildly. “Spare Claus Beefs It at Cork Race, Saved by Lucky Charms in Shining Armor.” Do I have a concussion? I think I’m babbling.
I don’tbabble.
Loch gives me an odd look.
“The headline. That the paparazzi will write. When they see us like this.”
“That’s na important right now, Kris. We’re almost there.”
“You’re saying my name a lot.”
“Should I go back to Coffee Shop? Shut up, now.”
We’re both a sweaty mess and my heart is thundering like mad. Loch’s heart is going too, the echoes of it shaking his chest where it’s pressed to me.
“Your heart’s racing,” I hear myself whisper.
We crest the hill and he pauses to readjust his grip on me. Up ahead, I spot flickers on the road. Other racers. The volunteers at the water table can finally see us, and someone calls out; but Loch’s gaze pops down to mine.
I let the beanie drop away from my forehead.
There’s something unendurably intimate about looking into someone else’s eyes within a certain distance.
I have a concussion. I have to have a concussion.
The next words that come out of my mouth are, “There’s a rim of green around your pupils.”
