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“You scared the crap out of me!” she yelled back. “Go away!”
“You were supposed to stay out of the sun,” I reminded her.
“I wanted to try to…clean up a little.” She looked up at me with narrowed eyes, and then cocked her head to one side. “You shaved.”
“I figured I was overdue,” I said.
“I didn’t recognize you,” she said.
“There isn’t anybody here but me, babe.” I laughed again, but the look on her face silenced me fairly quickly. She was biting into her lower lip, but not in the inquisitive, shy way I was used to seeing. She blinked her eyes a few times.
“I wasn’t sure…I mean…” She stopped talking and tilted her head down towards the water. Her breathing was faster. I had the feeling her heart rate was probably up, too.
“I didn’t mean to scare you,” I said, and it was sort of true. Startle with the hopes of maybe getting a better look at her naked body, yes, but not actually scare. “Who did you think I was?”
“I didn’t know at first,” she said, and tears suddenly burst out.
“Shit, Raine,” I said as I stood up, but then I didn’t know what to do. If I went out to her…well, she was still naked and obviously a little upset about that, too. If I took her clothes out to her, they’d get wet, which also wasn’t a good idea, and now that she was crying, all I wanted to do was hug her. I growled at myself, took a few steps away, and then turned my back to the water.
“Get out of the water and put your clothes on,” I told her. I heard the water splash as she hurried out, still crying. Finally, she said okay, and I figured I was good to turn around. I took half a dozen steps to reach her and wrapped my arms around her waist. “Why are you crying?”
“I really didn’t know who you were at first,” she sniffled. “Just for a second, but I was…naked...and then I thought I didn’t know where you were. What would I do if you weren’t close by? And I got scared…and then I realized it was you…”
She sobbed again, and I held her tighter, not knowing what else to do.
“Come on back to the shelter,” I said softly. “You really need to be out of the sun.”
She didn’t move, so I picked her up, held her up to my chest, and walked back up the dune to the shelter. Raine wrapped her arms around my neck and held on to me tightly, still crying and getting my shoulder all wet. I wanted to be pissed off about it, but I wasn’t. I just didn’t want her to be so upset.
“Raine, please stop,” I said when I reached the lean-to. I didn’t know if I should put her down or not, so I just held on to her and stood there like an idiot. “I don’t know why the fuck you’re crying anyway!”
“I don’t know either!” she sobbed.
How the fuck was I supposed to deal with that? I turned around and ducked through the entrance backwards, and then sat with Raine in my lap. I moved my hand to the back of her head and held her against my shoulder. It’s not like it could get any wetter at this point.
“Please stop,” I said softly. “We may have more water here, but that doesn’t mean you should waste it on crying.”
“I c-c-can’t hel-help it!”
“Take a deep breath,” I told her. I felt her chest rise and fall a couple of times. Slowly, she began to relax against me, the shock wearing off. “Better?”
“A little,” she confirmed. “You shouldn’t have done that.”
As if I was really trying to frighten her. What the fuck? Did she think I would really do that? Well, yeah, she might. It’s not like I’d shown her anything other than the jackass I could be. I took a deep breath and huffed it right back out.
“I was only playing with you,” I finally said under my breath. “I didn’t know you were going to get scared. I kind of forgot I shaved at all when I realized you were out there in the buff.”
“You could at least say you’re sorry,” Raine grumbled.
“I never say ‘sorry,’” I reminded her. “It’s completely meaningless, and it doesn’t change anything.”
“It would mean something to me,” I heard her whisper under her breath.
I started to shake my head and considered telling her the five thousand reasons apologies were completely pointless. Those words didn’t change anything. You can’t take back something you’ve said or done, and throwing a couple more words onto the end of it didn’t erase what had occurred. I could tell her I was sorry, but it wouldn’t change the fact that I had scared her and made her cry. I couldn’t stop that from happening now because time just didn’t flow that way.
In my mind, I heard the sound of shattered glass.
“You stupid, stupid fuck!” The tall man with dark hair on his face screamed, and I tried to get out of the kitchen chair faster than he could reach me. I failed and he grabbed me by my ankle, pulling me off the chair and letting me fall to the floor. A piece of shattered glass embedded itself in the palm of my hand.
