THE BEAST ─ five hargreeves

[ 061 ] stupid, stupid, stupid teenage hormones

LXI.

s t u p i d ,
s t u p i d,   s t u p i d
t e e n a g e   h o r m o n e s

—THOSE WERE THE best kisses of Zara's life, and never forgotten: the gentle heaviness of the Dallas heat, the strong feeling of him pressed up against her, the smell of the retreating rain clouds and the way his mouth moved against her own, urgent and not shy in the least.

She was vaguely aware of movement. They were not on the fire escape now, but were in a dark room, her back against the wall. She held him, and the world spun. There seemed to be only this boy, this place, this moment. She had no past—no future—only this very present.

Then, as quickly as it began, everything stopped.

Blue light flooded her vision. The warmth of his body against hers vanished and was replaced with cold emptiness.

He was standing away from her, face flaming, dark hair sticking up at odd angles. Tie slightly askew, white collar wrinkled. His eyes, wide on hers. His chest rising and falling as if he had just run a race. Between them was a current that was like nothing she had ever felt in her life. It ran like a river and shook like a fever.

And Five . . .

Five had been wrong. He realized that now. He had thought kissing her would make all the awfulness disappear, but the truth was that the pain didn't fade. It seemed to grow worse, and in a colder, uglier way. Before, his loneliness had been an impersonal thing, he had never been able to say to himself that the presence in his life of any one being could remedy it. But now that loneliness had a name: Zara.

Zara, Zara, Zara . . .

He came out of this reverie to find Zara staring at him unblinkingly. Now he would have to say something. Some vague excuse—or apology. Maybe he should plead insanity. That would be true enough. Or . . . did she know? Did she know how badly he had wanted to kiss her?

No, nothing of the sort. The kiss had been—a confused impulse not rooted in desire. Just something he wanted briefly and took without thinking. A moment of weakness. That was all.

He was about to say as much to her when she moved toward him. Her arms slid up under his to meet across his back; he could not stop himself flinching, suppressing the exclamation of pain. She drew back a little.

"What's the matter?"

"It's nothing. I'm fine."

"Here, let me see."

Fingers steady, she unbuttoned the shirt and pulled it off his arms. Under the surface of the smooth skin a purpling ugly patch extended from one side clear across to the other below the rib cage. If you looked hard enough you could just make out the vague outline of the bottom of Lila's boot. Her breath caught.

"You never said anything! Do you feel all right, Five? No faintness? How it must hurt!"

"No, I'm okay. I didn't feel it. Honest. I barely noticed before now. Shit, Zara, don't—!"

Her head had gone down, she was delicately touching her lips to the bruise, her palm sliding up his chest to his shoulders with a deliberateness that staggered him. Fascinated, terrified, meaning to free himself at any cost, he pushed her away; but somehow all he succeeded in doing was having her back in his arms, a snake coiled tightly about his will, strangling it. Pain was forgotten, regret was forgotten, the world was forgotten.