“Thank you? Cole? You really don’t sound okay.”
The more panicked Cole sounds, the more my hand shakes. I don’t want to face him yet, but something in my heart yells at me I have to make sure he’s okay.
“Cole? Can I come in?”
There’s a long-defeated sigh. “Fine. But you can’t laugh.”
“Why would I?—”
The doorknob turns. The door swings open. My gaze sweeps from his thermal-socked feet, up his faded jeans, to the emerald green half-zip on his top half, then freezes on his face.
Thin, gold-framed glasses sit perched on his nose.
Not just any thin, gold-framed glasses.
Butthegold-framed glasses Caden wore when I first met him, a pair I’ve never actually seen on Caden. I assumed it was because he quickly got thick black frames and just didn’t wear them. Or maybe they were his shower glasses and I’ve never been creepy enough to watch him shower but…
“Caden took my contacts with him and left his. His prescription is a lot stronger than mine, though.” Cole has the audacity to look sheepish, like this is a funny little mix-up and not the full-body identity crisis it is for me.
Because one: those glasses are the stuff slutty little glasses dreams are made of. And I’m having feelings and thoughts. Big. Ones.
And two. My brain is unraveling a very specific memory about the last time I saw those glasses, and currently screaming.
“And those areyourglasses?” I ask, trying to sound casual, while somewhere deep in the recesses of my hollow meme-filled brain everything goes up in flames. It’s the “This is fine” dog in a burning room setting himself on fire, while Michael Scott screams “Oh my god, it’s happening.”
He tilts his head and looks at me like I’ve lost my mind. And honestly fair, because I clearly have. “Uh…yeah? I just don’t wear them much since I can’t wear them on the rink.”
“Right. But you’re wearing them now. So… they’reyours? Your glasses. The glasses you wear…on your face.”
“Yes?”
“Cool. Cool. Cool. And they’ve always been yours?”
Cole takes them off to look at them. In a reverse Superman/Clark Kent situation, he transforms to the person I instinctively loathe. True, I don’t know why I hate him anymore, but my body is accustomed to reacting negatively towards him.
“Yeah, these have always been mine. Are you okay?”
“Super!” I say, as he slides them back up his nose and is suddenly transformed into the man I once swore was fate. The man I wanted to love so desperately when I first met him.
Someone my body is instantly reacting to like he still is.
He scratches his head and crosses his arms. “Okay?” The word draws out between us.
When I saw Caden a few days after my initial run in with A Sinclair Brother, the possibility that the guy in the bathroom had an identical twin never crossed my mind. And then I never thought someone would be a sociopath and pretend we had already met if we hadn’t. Or keep the lie and accept the praise for so long.
And Cole? He’s possibly kept silent this whole time and let Caden take the credit for saving me. Why wouldn’t he say something? Was my dad right? Was I that much of a trainwreck that night he had to run away, and this was the easiest solution for him?
But if that’s the reason, why is he here now? My head throbs from all the beer and Bailey’s, and the world’s shittiest conundrum.
“Bacon!” I yell, regretting my high-pitch screech immediately. “Yes. I need bacon.”
Something warm and firm grips my hand, squeezing tighter until it’s restricting circulation to my fingers. My body propels further in the warmth blanketing my side. A car horn blares nearby, slicing through my cozy haze. Jolting awake, I pop my eyes open to a world spinning out of control. Outside our car, swirling snowflakes and muted lights appear in a dizzying display. My pulse thuds in my ears until we finally come to ahalt. A collective sigh of relief ripples from my parents in the front seats to Cole and I in the back. Snow crunches, and the car starts lurching forward again.
“What happened?” I ask, a panicked edge to my voice, but I can’t bring myself to sit upright, or properly react. I’m nestled somewhere safe and comfy. After suffering for more than three hours in the car with a migraine and nausea, this waking sleep has been appreciated.
“We just had a little spin-out but we’re fine. You can go back to sleep,” a soothing voice whispers and presses a kiss to the top of my head.
It’s Cole.
