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One set matches what I had in my apartment.
The other set matches what I use at Leo’s house. The expensive stuff that I won’t buy for myself.
I’m going to use the cheap ones out of spite, but when I reach for one of the bottles, my soul sighs. Why not? If I’ve lost my freedom, I can at least use nice shampoo.
In the shower, it’s harder to deny how I feel.
Which is pissed, for sure. Betrayed. But the way I feel about Emerson is the same way I feel about the ocean. I can’t stop painting it. I can’t stop searching it for answers. I have that same feeling about Emerson, and it goes beyond painting. I don’t want him as a subject. I want to…
Swim in him. It sounds ridiculous in my head. I don’t even want to swim in the ocean. In a way, it’s happening when I paint. I’m under the waves. Consumed by them.
Well. If he can look at me like I’m art in his collection, I can do the same. It’ll occupy my mind until I get out of here.
When the last of the soap is rinsed away, I towel off and go through the drawers. I don’t know what to do with myself. Not really. So I’ll start with drying my hair.
“You’re kidding.” Emerson didn’t even pretend to match the dryer in my apartment bathroom, which cost twenty-five dollars at Duane Reade. This one costs at least four hundred. Eva doesn’t have one like this. She rolled her eyes when an ad came up on her phone during one of our movie nights.
It turns out the expensive hair dryer makes my hair feel nicer. It’s also faster. These are just observations, though. It doesn’t mean I want to like him.
I can be drawn to him. Curious about him. I can even want him. I can do all those things while knowing he’s terrible. The worst.
The flutter in my chest as I march out of the bathroom, dressed and ready for the day, doesn’t feel much like hate.
It feels like a crush.
It’s bullshit, honestly. A crush on a man like Emerson. I’m still horrified that he’s keeping me here. I’m like a canvas with a dark stripe of paint down the middle. On one side, sunlight through the water. Looking up through waves. On the other, a roiling storm. The water beats against that line. All the emotions coming together.
Or I’m just losing it.
Emerson’s not in his bedroom. I go back across to mine and try the door. It’s unlocked. My fingers skim the collar of my shirt. He meant it, then. He’s not actually going to cage me in here.
Just the house.
Which is not better, even though the house is large and beautiful. Is it wrong to get scraps of peace from the little things?
Probably.
I wander down the stairs with my heart in my throat. I don’t want to trip or fall or embarrass myself. A pretty strange fear, given that I’m a prisoner.
On the main floor I find a wide entryway with a dining room on one side and an office on the other. The hall with the stairs leads back into a high-ceilinged living room, but there are other doors, other hallways. I poke my head through one of them. A den. I don’t have the courage to open any of the closed doors. Another hall takes me toward the back of the house. To a big, light-soaked kitchen.
That’s where I find Emerson.
He stands at the stove, cooking something in a frying pan. Eggs. He’s whisking them with a fork. For a moment, he looks far away. His mind is definitely not on the eggs. Toast pops up. Without taking his eyes off the frying pan, he reaches over and grabs it with his fingertips. One piece, then two. Onto a plate. He only abandons the eggs to add pats of butter to the toast. Quickly, like there’s a time limit.
“Do you always make toast like that?” I blurt the question in spite of myself. I shouldn’t care, not at all, how Emerson makes toast and eggs. I should care more that a little of the bite mark I left on his skin last night is visible at his collar.
His expression brightens. “Hello, little painter.”
“Do you?” I take a few steps into the kitchen. He’s scrambling the eggs. That’s how I like them. But we’ve never talked about it. There has never been a relevant time to discuss my egg preferences.
He finishes with the eggs. They go onto the plate, on top of the first slice of toast. He adds a sprinkle of salt, then takes the knife and smooths the melting butter over the second slice. When he’s got the scrambled-egg sandwich together, he cuts it on the diagonal and picks up the plate.
“Emerson.”
“Is there a better way to have toast?”
“You took it out of the toaster when it was too hot.” He arches an eyebrow. “I hate when little pieces of butter refuse to melt. That’s how I make toast. Were you watching me twenty-four hours a day? Everything I did?”
