“Hey. No money, no job, a strange guy offering you a place to stay but you’re not sure of the price tag, and a baby kicking you in the belly? You might not be at your best either.”
Nick slapped Charlie’s shoulder. “You’re a better man than I am.”
“Ouch! My shoulder!” Charlie waited a second for Nick to leap into a flustered apology, then added, “No, wait, that was my good one. False alarm.”
Nick shoved him. “You’re a douche.”
Brian asked, “We’re set, right? We can go home now?” He loved Nick, and Lori mattered, and Charlie was a good guy, but he was so, so tired. Every time applications and forms and background checks and rental history came up, he’d felt an icy chill flooding his belly. Nick and Charlie could carry on like everything was normal. Even Lori could at least read the questions. All he could do was shrink into the background and hope nothing on those forms he couldn’t even read would betray them. Hope this could be the clean new start they needed.
“Getting to be dinner time anyway. You hungry?” Nick asked.
Brian shook his head. Nick was sometimes so oblivious. “Just done.” He marched to the car, getting in the back behind Lori. He fit tight in there, but between Lori’s belly, Charlie’s ribs, and Nick driving, he was the logical one to squish in the smallest space. He squeezed in, his knees pressed to the seatback upholstery.
Lori glanced over her shoulder at him. “So, Bry, what d’you think?”
He gritted his teeth at the shortened name, but didn’t bother to complain. “It’ll do. We lived in far worse.”
“That’s for damned sure.” She turned to where Nick and Charlie still stood on the ragged lawn, talking about something. “Quick, before they come back. Do you really trust this Charlie guy? I’m gonna share an apartment with him. What if he ditches me and I owe a bunch of rent money I don’t have?”
He said carefully, “Nick trusts him.” That’s a cop-out answer. “He saved our lives. I figure if we trust him with a gun at our backs, we can trust him with money. I like him.”
“Huh.” She tucked her brown hair behind her ears. “Well, at worst, it’s a fake name. I can duck out and get a new one.”
He couldn’t help a snort.
“I learned from the best.” Lori hesitated. “I wonder where Damon is. I thought he’d be around.” She twisted enough to roll her eyes toward Brian. “Is he? Around?”
“How would I know?”
“You could check.”
“You know it doesn’t work that way.” But he closed his eyes to the outside world anyway, looking inward with his talent. That dark Finding space in his head didn’t hurt as much as it used to and came into focus faster. There was Lori’s green and rose thread, Nick’s comforting amber and wicked steel, and there, there, Damon, black and yellow and sharp and fast… He pulled back and opened his eyes, rubbing his forehead. The sudden disconnect made his stomach roll. “He’s alive. That’s all I get, you know, not distance.”
“I guess that’s something.”
Nick and Charlie came over to the car and got in the other side. Lori immediately looked back to Charlie with a concerned expression. “You’re moving a bit stiff. You should’ve took it easy and let these two inspect their own shacks.”
Charlie smiled easily. “Moving around is good for me. And now we’re done, thanks be to Thor.”
“Thor?”
“I get to pick my gods, and I like the guy with the big… hammer.”
Lori snickered, then rubbed her lips with a fist. “Okaaay. You’re weirder than I thought.”
“Just you wait,” Nick said, pulling out onto the road. “You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.”
Lori settled back into her seat. “Mom once had us in this place where the owner was a hippie pagan. Every couple of weeks, he got up on the roof of the building in the nude and chanted to the moon. I can handle weird when it pays the rent.”
“Ooh. Something to live up to.” Charlie’s tone wasn’t as animated as his words, though. He shifted restlessly. “Can we head back to the motel first, Nicko? I’m gonna bail on dinner and have a date with four ibuprofen and a flat surface.”
“Sure.”
Lori said, “Works for me. I need a bathroom. I swear this little bastard keeps one foot on my bladder at all times.”
Before he could think, Brian said, “You shouldn’t call him that.”