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MAL
Feels Like – Gracie Abrams
Her hair was a blaze of fire across the pillow, breathing steady and even, though her sleep had been anything but. She’d tossed and turned for hours, burrowing closer in the circle of my arms only to draw away again. And with every shift, I resisted the urge to trap her to me, to hold her as tightly as I could, while I still could. Every soft exhale was like sand slipping through an hourglass. Every twitch of her eyelids a knife in my gut.
I was a riot of anxiety, my brain riddled with intrusive thoughts that had become impossible to slow as the hours ticked away. My father. Callum. Kier. April. It was all too much. I tried to even my breathing, isolate every emotion and trace it back to the source. What stood out the most was the guilt. My chest burned with it. I’d failed everyone who’d ever needed me. April most of all.
All this time, she hadn’t only been carrying the weight of her own worries on her shoulders, but the weight of Kier’s, and inadvertently mine. All night, our early interactions had projected through my mind like a movie on repeat. Every moment of cruelty and accusation. I’d basically called her a gold digger,and she’d absorbed every blow, carrying the burden so I didn’t have to.
She shifted again, sheet slipping enticingly over the curve of her shoulder as she reached for me, a silky leg sliding between my bigger ones. How had there ever been a time I didn’t love this woman? That man felt so far away from me now, I knew I would never be him again.Good.The only thing that mattered now was making her happy.
I wanted to beg her on my knees to stay. But what she’d revealed about Kier and his debt, it felt too big. I didn’t know how to begin to solve it. I wished for an evil to vanquish. A dragon to slay. A physical challenge I needed to overcome to save the day like a hero in a movie. All I had wasme.
I couldn’t stand to gaze at a future I couldn’t have for a minute longer, so I kissed her temple, traced the silky spiral of a single curl, and slipped from the bed. Dudley remained tucked into the crook of April’s lap, but Boy lifted his head as soon as I shoved my feet into my boots, faithfully following me into the morning sun.
We walked up the bank, sea and salt and heather and that indescribable feeling of home drifting over me.Would it ever feel this way again once she left?I knew it wouldn’t. I was like one of my bloody puzzles. April had disassembled my entire life in a matter of weeks and pieced me back together in a way that the old meno longer fit. I’d been irrevocably changed, but maybe, just maybe, a part of her had changed along the way too.“You have to fight for something eventually, Mal,” I whispered, rocking back onto my heels. Boy gave a solid bark of agreement.
And it was there, staring out at the sunrise that reminded me of that god-awful dressing gown she loved so much, I made the decision. Perhaps I couldn’t give her a reason to stay, but you could be damn sure I’d offer her a home to come back to.
34
APRIL
I GUESS I’M IN LOVE – Clinton Kane
“Where have they disappeared to?” I asked Dudley, who at some point had wormed his way beneath the bed sheets and stolen Mal’s pillow. My dog yawned, his entire body trembling as he stretched all three paws, performing a deep backbend that would make even the most talented of yogis weep with envy. Then he looked at me as if to say,I don’t know, woman, I was sleeping, same as you.
“Luckily I didn’t adopt you for protection,” I muttered, lifting him down from the bed because his paws weren’t yet steady on the cottage’s hardwood flooring. I pulled on one of Mal’s shirts and a pair of his thick socks I’d essentially adopted as my own and slipped out the front door to find them.
I heard Mal before I saw him.
“Motherfucking useless arsehole!” he roared.“Why won’t you bloody work?” I spied him bent over something on the bank, about a foot back from the cliff edge. Boy hopped about at his side, his every bark magnified by the whipping wind.
“Mal?” I said, drawing nearer. The grass was damp, soaking through my socks and turning my feet numb.“What are you doing?” He still wore his navy pyjama bottoms, the hems stuffed into black boots. I could tell by the brutal red of his hands and cheeks he’d been out here a while.
He leapt to his feet, whirling and throwing his hands out wide as if to block the semi-constructed wood form behind him.“You weren’t supposed to see this yet,” he said, but I was too busy staring at the trail of blood trickling down his wrist.
“You’ve hurt yourself.”
He swallowed, tucking his hand behind him.“I was trying to do something for you, but apparently I’m not even capable of basic woodwork.”
“I don’t care about that. Let me clean your hand.” I reached for him and he backed up a step, holding me off. His entire body shook.
“Wait… just, let me say what I need to say.”
The wind was cold, moulding his shirt to my body, drawing goose bumps all along my skin. But it was fear, not the cold, that had me shivering.
“Okay.” I nodded, arms tightening around myself. He was so agitated I wanted to run to him. I forced myself to do as he asked and held myself still.
A trembling hand passed over his face.“I’ve been awake all night trying to figure this out and… I have nothing, princess, absolutely nothing to offer you, except this—” He stepped aside, revealing what I assumed was supposed to be a bench. One leg was shorter than the other three and it looked like one stiff breeze might tear it apart. Tears gathered in my eyes.“It’s terrible. A monstrosity! It turns out I can’t make a bench to save my bloody life and I love you!” He practically shouted it at me.
I held myself tighter. I could tell his jaw was tight beneath the scruff of hair, like the words had slipped free before he could stop them.“You love me, or you’re in love with me?”
“The bench—”
I shook my head.“Mal, I don’t care about the bench. Are you in love with me?”
All his breath exhaled in a single puff and he drew closer until all I could see was him.“Desperately.” He looked defeated.“I’m not Tom Hanks, I don’t have the words you deserve. I can’t meet you at the top of the Empire State Building.” He started to run his hand through his hair, realised it still bled, and dropped it to his side.“Youneedto leave and I won’t ever try to hold you back. But how about this… when you go, what if I just keep on loving you. For the rest of my life. Would that be okay?” I had no words. His declaration had carved its way inside my chest and stolen everything I’d been dying to tell him all these weeks.“I get that this isn’t the most healthy declaration of love,” he continued,“but you literally brought me back to life and made me believe in myself like no one else ever has. I wanted to give you something in return. I wanted you to know you’ll always have a place in the world where someone adores you, a place where someone is wondering where you are and if you’re okay. A place where you’ll be safe if you ever feel like coming back. Ahome.”
