In Love and Diplomacy

Chapter Twenty-Five: A Body on the Floor

"Didn't they tell us don't rush into things?
Didn't you flash your green eyes at me?
Haven't you heard what becomes of curious minds?
Ooh, didn't it all seem new and exciting?
I felt your arms twisting around me,
I should've slept with one eye open at night"

- Taylor Swift, "Wonderland"

Chapter Twenty-Five

If the shooter came back, gun to my head, and shouted interrogations on my time with Reed – I think I'd die.

Some things weren't meant to be shared. Others weren't meant to be known.

For example, the answer to which of us pulled away first. The truth fell into one of those two categories, but either way, the answer wasn't mine to share.

I couldn't tell how we'd ended up back on the highway, both of us raw from the day. From the confessions. From the touches.

Other things were lost in a haze. I didn't know what point I'd curled up in the seat, or when exhaustion had outweighed the pain to pull me under the surface. I didn't know when his hand had found its way to the space between us, or when his fingertips brushed against my skin. I didn't know how or when I'd ended up in the hard bed of a small motel.

And the next morning, I woke with more questions than answers.

The sheets were rough. The blanket was itchy on one side, but plasticky on the other, and it taunted my injured skin. I was splayed on my back; someone had taken great care to tuck my aching body between blankets. A lump of a pillow was folded to lift my knee off the bed.

Exhaustion still puffed its smoke in my brain. I slid my hand over the sheets, searching, but I gripped nothing but blanket. A pang of nausea-inducing panic struck with the same accuracy as the pain in my knee. My eyes struggled and blinked as I feared what I wouldn't find.

It was only when my head frantically turned that I could breathe again. The armchair in the corner looked as uncomfortable as any armchair could be, but it was a welcome sight.

Or rather, the sight of him was.

Reed's long frame was collapsed in the chair. His usually strict stance had been replaced by a fatigued slump; one elbow was propped on the armrest as his fist pressed against his forehead, supporting his head as he slept.

I was quiet as I surveyed the scene. His brow was creased ever so slightly. The smallest of frowns graced his lips; they were slightly parted as he breathed slowly. I watched the rise and fall of his chest. I marveled how the sun shoved its way through flimsy curtains to find his cheeks, and tickle his lashes. He was surely exhausted.

My head fell back on the pillow as I wracked my brain for how we'd ended up there. All I could grasp was a vague, fuzzy memory that didn't feel quite real.

How I'd shivered even in the warm summer night when Reed had carefully picked me up, cradling me as he carried me into the motel room. How he'd laid me down so gently, and covered me with the blanket, coaxing me to take pain meds even as I flirted with sleep. How it'd all felt like a dream even then, too deeply entangled in the trenches of exhaustion to fully wake in his arms.

I didn't remember Reed getting the motel room, or how we'd ended up in a room with one bed. I didn't remember Reed sitting in the chair, or putting the pillow under my knee. But I wondered how long he'd slept; if he'd forced himself to sit watch until necessity ordered him to sleep, too.

I didn't know. I also didn't know how I'd get up.

My body felt heavy. An invisible weight kneeled on each of my limbs and my joints rattled with pain. Every muscle felt simultaneously loose and tight; a rubber band pulled past its limit and released to snap back. Having lost too much elasticity on the pull, I'd been left with rubbery, misshaped tissue, still unsure how to revert back. My skin shrieked in disapproval when my scraped wounds pulled taut with movement. I was grateful Reed had insisted on pain meds the night before. I didn't want to think of how much pain I'd be feeling if he hadn't.