Page 181 of These Tears

The skin between his brows gathers as he studies me. Then the tension there eases slightly.

‘Or… none at all,’ I add. Give him a moment. ‘We can go back to the cabin.’

He stares at me long enough to make it almost a physical thing. And as I see the shadow on his face retracting by a fraction, my shoulders thaw.

His lips press into a stubborn line. His gaze touches my lips, then returns to my eyes.

‘“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster.”’

I huff a quiet breath. ‘Nietzsche was a dickhead.’

His eyes move from mine.

‘Stop letting him have the last word,’ I put in.

‘It may not be necessary – what you offer,’ he says as he glances towards the bonfire again. ‘I’ll keep away from them.’

‘You think they don’t notice it?’ I ask as we start towards his family. A guitar begins to thrum across the cold white cover, and someone is singing already. ‘You, withdrawing?’

His face hardens. ‘They know I don’t like to be touched.’

‘People forget that kindness can still land like a threat. And though touch can be a comfort,’ I exhale, ‘to some it’s… something else.’

He holds his breath until we reach the crowd. His eyes shift towards the nearest reaching hand, then back to me. Someone calls Jakob’s name. Another voice teases him about us disappearing. By the time we reach the fire, his expression has settled into that practised public blankness.

31

The world finds its pace again as the evening loosens around the fire.

Seemingly.

Until I stop trying to understand it and simply listen.

I keep thinking about the word – choice. How small it can be. A hand offered. A silence allowed. A monster stepping back when every old wound tells him to lunge.

The worst part?

None of it makes me feel safer. It only makes him harder to hate.

Joik spreads across the clearing, the voices rising and falling through the cold until even the snow seems to cradle it. Others move slowly, boots scuffing packed snow as a loose circle begins to form near the fire.

I lift my camera but hesitate.

Sunna catches the movement and gives me a small nod.

Pointing the lens warily to make sure no one else minds it, I steal a glimpse of firelight on wool and a blur of colour turning around the bonfire.

At some point, the cadence gives way to a modern tune, picked out on the guitar in the hands of Markus – Sunna’s youngest. I inch closer to the bench where Elias watches it all from a short distance. Two women break from the circle and start towards him with cheeks flushed from the fire, movement and drink. Their hands reach for Elias, calling him to join.

He goes rigid.

The breath he takes is too quick and his fingers dig into his own leg.

Before I get a chance to argue with myself, I step across their path, putting myself between him and the reaching hands. ‘You can’t have him. I’m afraid I’ve claimed this one.’

Somehow, though, the words turn jagged inside me even as I smile them outwards.

My hand opens behind me, palm turned towards him in an offer I’m not sure he’ll take.