My eyes open to dim light, head pounding, room spinning. There’s a ringing in my ears and my heart is racing and I can’t?—
“Fuck.” Marnie’s voice. Thick with pain.
I try to focus. Try to understand what’s happening. She’s sitting up, hand pressed to her face.
My tongue is too thick. “What happened?”
“You were having a nightmare.” Her voice sounds wrong. “It’s okay. You were fighting in your sleep. Go back to sleep.”
But I’m awake enough now to see her hand is covering her cheek. There’s blood on her fingers.
I want to reach for her, want to check if she’s okay, want to?—
But exhaustion and whiskey drag me back under before I can form the words.
Back into darkness.
Time passes.Could be minutes. Could be hours.
I surface enough to hear movement. Water running. The medicine cabinet opening. Marnie moving around the apartment quietly.
Then she’s back, sliding into bed, the mattress dipping under her weight.
I try to reach for her, try to apologize, but my body won’t cooperate. Can’t move. Can’t speak. Just lie there trapped between drunk and sober, between sleep and waking.
Between the nightmare and whatever I’ve done.
The last thing I register before true sleep claims me is her breathing beside me in the dark.
33
MARNIE
The bathroom mirrordoesn’t lie.
The bruise spreading across my cheekbone is spectacular—dark purple bleeding into blue at the edges, the skin swollen and hot. There’s a small cut on the bridge of my nose where his elbow caught me, scabbed over now but still visible. It’s not broken, but it hurts like hell.
I touch it gently and wince. It’s going to look worse before it looks better.
I wash my face carefully, avoiding the bruise, and pull my hair back. The apartment is quiet. Roman’s still asleep, or at least he was when I got up ten minutes ago. I consider trying to cover it up with makeup before he wakes up and sees it.
But first, coffee.
I’m halfway through pouring my second cup when I hear movement from the bedroom. Water running. The bathroom door closing.
Then his footsteps in the hallway. “Marnie?”
His voice is rough. Wrecked. Probably from the whiskey and the nightmare had him thrashing hard enough to hit me.
“Kitchen,” I call back.
He comes around the corner wearing sweatpants and nothing else, hair sticking up, eyes red and swollen. He looks like hell.
“Why is there blood on the pillow?—”
He stops and sees my face.
“Did I do that?”
