Before & After - Nazarea Andrews Page 0,12

to clear the room.

“I wasn’t thinking,” I mutter.

“No, but going without sex will fuck with anyone’s head. And Siren looks like she was into it.”

“Quit calling her that. Her name is Peyton.”

He glances at her from the corner of his eye. Peyton is settling into her booth in the corner of the bar, opening her computer and going to work like I didn’t just molest her onstage.

For the first time, my heartbeat settles.

She wanted it just as bad as I did.

“Of course she did, you fucktard. You might be horny but you don’t fucking assault girls. Just keep that shit off the stage—we’ve got people coming in.” He says, answering the thought I didn’t realize I’d voiced.

I glance at him and nod. He point at the back bathroom and I follow his wordless directive.

It’s tiny and stinks and I close the door behind me, leaning on it.

I can fucking smell her on my skin, and I groan.

Because I’m fucking hard. Again.

Chapter 6: After

I want to peel back

The cryptic smile and the

Quiet logic, the cynical amused

Faces that you show the world.

(Rike’s poems to Peyton)

“I think I need to see her.”

Rike glances at me. We’re in the hospital cafeteria, sitting across from each other in a booth. He’s been sketching for almost an hour while I journal. But I haven’t really written anything. It’s been over a week since I woke up, and my days have a pattern. Morning physical therapy and counseling. Texting with Rike. Afternoons spent playing card games and listening to ridiculous jokes while he stares at me with cloudy blue eyes that are full of secrets.

I wish I knew why he was here. I wish I didn’t feel like he was hiding something from me. And I wish I was brave enough to demand to know what it was.

But I’m not. And fighting with my doctors and psychiatrist about my insistence to keep my family at a distance has been consuming me.

Rike looks distant, nibbling at his lip in a way that is way too fucking distracting.

“Who?”

“Lindsay,” I say. We came in together. Maybe I know her. It makes sense. And what if she’s all alone like I am?”

His eyebrows go up. “I didn't think you were alone,” he says.

I flush. “You know what I mean.”

Rike sighs and put his pencil aside, giving me his full attention. “I do know what you mean but I need you to hear me. You aren't alone. I'm here. I’m not going away.”

We sit in silence for a long moment staring at each other and then, “But I don't understand why,” I say.

He smiles, that mysterious smile I adore and stands up, “You don't have to understand why. Come on. You’re right: seeing her will do you some good.”

He helps me into my wheelchair—the doctors want me in it until the casts come off my leg and arm—and tucks a blanket around me, always with that careful caution that I'm coming to expect.

He treats me with such reverent care, like a strong wind will shatter me. And it might. I know nothing about who I am—sometimes, it feels like he is all that holds me together.

I catch his hand as he straightens and his eyes flash to mine. Hungry and questioning and so intense it takes my breath away for a moment.

I want to kiss him. I don't know why, but I do, and I think he can see that desire my eyes. He leans into me, his forehead against mine. "You’re making this so hard, Peyton," he murmurs.

"Sorry," I say faintly, and his lips twitch a little.

"No, you aren’t."

I grin. I’m really not. I fucking love that I’m affecting him.

Rike sighs, and straightens. “Behave.”

“You don’t really want me to,” I sass, and he barks a laugh as he pushes me through the cafeteria and into the halls of the hospital.

The playful mood slips away as we get closer to the ICU. I’m nervous, suddenly, as the doors swing open and the sterile environment stares back at me.

A nurse offers me and me—Rike, especially—a friendly smile, but he ignores it as he steers me deeper into the unit. Until we come to a stop at unit seventeen.

There is a steady beeping, the constant hum of machines, and it’s comforting. It means life—maybe broken, but still life.

Rike pulls open the door and maneuvers me in deftly, and the door swings shut behind me.

I barely notice. My entire being is focused on the girl in the bed.

Her hair is chopped brutally short, almost shaved,