Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 79892 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 399(@200wpm)___ 320(@250wpm)___ 266(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 79892 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 399(@200wpm)___ 320(@250wpm)___ 266(@300wpm)
As if Summer was more afraid of not trying...
Than he was of trying, and failing.
Of trying, and losing.
He’d been willing to risk losing Fox completely, losing his job, just for the thin chance at having him for just a little while.
And Fox was letting himself get sucked into that idealism, when he knew better.
He knew better, when unlike Summer...
He knew how it felt to believe in forever, only to have it cut short.
And just thinking about the idea of forever with someone like Summer, thinking about letting himself get tangled that deep and giving in to this quiet feeling of longing that kept pulling him into the vibrant young man as if they were tethered by unbreakable strands of fragile, glittering spider’s silk...
It had terrified him.
It had terrified him, and he’d almost driven away from the library, out of Omen, and out of Massachusetts without ever looking back.
Summer would never know the struggle of will it had taken Fox to turn his car around, drive back to the school, and show up just in time for his class blocks with some murmured excuse about not being able to find the books he’d wanted and losing track of time.
And Fox didn’t want him to know.
He was already going to hurt Summer by leaving him, by leaving Omen, once this charade was over.
While they were here, while they were together...
He could at least keep his fears, his hesitations, to himself—and not use them as blunt objects to hurt Summer even more.
Right now, though...
He suddenly couldn’t stand to be idle, in this moment.
Couldn’t stand to lie here playing at domestic bliss, with Summer’s body heating the bed.
And so, gently disentangling his hair from the snares of Summer’s limbs, he slipped out of bed and into the living room, drifting to the window.
The plants along the windowsill were hardy succulents, and he ran his fingers over their dry, waxy leaves, stopping on an aloe plant. He hadn’t made anything, from the simplest aloe salve to herbal pain relievers, in so very long; even the salve that helped Summer not be quite so obvious about why his nethers were smarting was from older stock that Fox had tinned and set aside ages ago.
And he smiled faintly, bitterly, to himself as he tested the jagged edge of another thick leaf with his fingertip, then let go, lifting his head to stare down at the spindly trees below and the way the mist crawled and rolled through the nighttime forest like a strange, smoky thing.
He used to create things. To take pleasure in making things simply for the sake of building something useful with his hands; simply because that was one of the things that made him feel alive.
He would say he didn’t know why he stopped, but he knew.
The same moment when he’d stopped doing anything that wasn’t the bare necessity to function, and to fulfill the duties that were expected of him.
He drifted his hands along the shelf beneath the windowsill, stopped when he found the familiar gritty shapes of an old, pecked stone mortar and pestle, an antique piece he’d picked up on his last visit to Japan, when wandering shops in Sapporo. He didn’t know why he felt so hollow, right now. So pointless, so devoid of purpose, his hands aching for something to do, but...
Gathering his hair up behind his head, tucking it into a knot, he dragged a chair over and pulled over the aloe plant, the mortar, the little carved wooden box he kept on the shelf full of various dried herbs and ingredients.
He didn’t know what he’d do, not just yet.
All that mattered was that he was doing something.
Instead of continuing years and years of doing absolutely nothing at all.
* * *
Summer wasn’t sure what woke him.
Maybe the emptiness of the bed, the sheets cooling around him when he was getting used to the warmth and weight of Fox against his back, heavy arm over his waist.
Maybe it was the chill of the night air, prickling at his skin.
Or maybe it was the overwhelming scent of peppermint, drifting through the suite and powerful enough to sting his nostrils.
He creaked one eye open, sniffling and rubbing at his nose, then pushed himself up and squinted drowsily around the room. No sign of Fox, but that smell was overpowering. Had something spilled in the essential oils in the bathroom...?
Yawning, rolling the stiffness out of his shoulders, Summer stood, rubbing the back of his neck and padding out to the living room—only to stop at the threshold of the doorway, as he saw Fox.
Silent, his posture gracefully taut, Fox sat at the windowsill, using the shelf beneath it as a table. He was surrounded by many of the potted plants scattered through the apartment, different herbs, some of them delicate, some thick and succulent. A carved wooden box with multiple compartments sat open next to him, and he worked over a mortar and pestle, grinding something green and strong-smelling into a waxy, oily paste against the carved stone basin.