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“Okay. If you change your mind, we’ll probably be there most of the night.”
“Will do. Have fun.”
A little while later, I headed into the bathroom to splash some water on my face, grimacing at the redness around my eyes. Then, I made my way downstairs.
The house was silent, empty. In the kitchen, I spooned yesterday’s leftover pasta into a bowl and dumped it in the microwave to warm through.
If I’d known what was coming, I would’ve just eaten it cold.
There was a loud crack, and everything went off. The microwave, the fridge, the lights…everything.
“Fuck!” I shouted. Fumbling for my phone, I hit the button to turn the torch on, then uselessly pressed the kitchen light switch a few times in case it magically decided to work again. What was I supposed to do?
I sent a text to Travis.
Me:Are you home? Power went off
He replied almost instantly, to my relief.
Travis:Not home but power is dodgy sometimes. Flip the trip switches on the circuit breaker and it’ll come back on
Me:Where’s that?
After waiting for a few minutes with no reply, I decided to go on a hunt. I could deal with this. I hadn’t actually touched a circuit breaker before, but I had Google. I knew the one at my parents’ house was in the cupboard under the stairs, so I turned on my phone torch and made my way into the hallway, holding my phone up in front of me.
I crashed straight into Liam. He was moving so fast, and I was so unprepared, I staggered back, losing my balance and smacking into the wall behind me. My head hit the plaster with a painful thump, and my phone dropped to the floor. We were suddenly surrounded by darkness.
“Watch where you’re fucking going,” I hissed, my earlier anger towards him coming back in a rush.
“Same to you,” he snapped. I could barely make him out in the dark hallway.
“Wanker,” I muttered.
“What did you call me?” He was suddenly up in front of me, all tense and riled up. It was too much to deal with. I shoved against him, moving out of his space. My hand went to the back of my head, and I stifled a pained groan as I felt the sore spot that was already forming there.
Instead of replying to his question and getting into yet another argument, I concentrated on the task at hand. “Do you know where the circuit breaker is?”
“Yes.”
It sounded like he was speaking through gritted teeth. His breath was coming in short gasps, and I’d bet anything he was right on the edge of completely losing his temper, if our previous encounters were anything to go by.
“Do you know what to do?”
“Yes,” he said again, and this time, his voice was much closer. I raised my hand, and it landed on solid muscle. His chest? I left it there for a heartbeat, hearing his sharp intake of breath.What the fuck am I doing?I yanked it away.
“Can you—” I licked my lips. “Can you show me what to do? Please?”
“I suppose so.” His voice had a huskiness that wasn’t normally there, and it sent heat curling through me. Doing my best to ignore it, I carefully felt around on the floor with my foot until it hit the edge of my phone, then swiped it from the floor. The tiny beam of light from the torch was welcome, but I kept it pointed down so it didn’t blind us. And maybe I didn’t want to see Liam’s face either.
He fished his own phone out of his pocket and turned on his torch, and I followed him, not towards the understairs cupboard, where I’d been heading, but into the room that Travis had all his media stuff in. Mounted on the wall, next to the door, there was a large box I hadn’t noticed.
“This switch is for the lighting circuit.” Liam shone his torch at the row of switches, focusing on the one on the far right. I stepped closer to him so I could see better. He angled the beam. “There’s the downstairs electric, and the upstairs is on that one.”
“What do we do?”
For some reason, both of us were speaking in whispers. Maybe it was because we were in the dark and the house was so silent. Without realising it, I’d stepped so close to him that our shoulders were brushing against each other’s.
“Noah.”
