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“I’m not ready.”
I can work with that.
I smile and tuck my knuckle under her chin, encouraging her to lift her head. I don’t know how, but I feel more fucking connection in that half-inch of contact than I’ve ever experienced with another person in my whole waste of a life. I feel her struggle as if it were my own, and I guess, in a way, it is. The only difference between us is that she hides from her pain.
While I run away from mine.
Rain lifts her eyelids, heavy with fat black lashes, and looks at me with a silent plea.
“You will be,” I answer with more confidence than I feel.
That earns me a tiny smile.
“Plus, we can’t leave right now. I haven’t found your favorite song.”
That earns me a bigger smile.
“You really suck at this.” She grins.
“Damn, woman. Give me a chance.”
Rain giggles as I stand and pull her to her feet. I grab the duffel bag and guitar but leave the candles.
Maybe I’ll get lucky, and we’ll burn the place down.
I turn to start walking, but Rain doesn’t follow. Her eyes are locked on that goddamn blanket, and before I can stop her, she’s moving toward it.
Fuck me. Here we go.
I hold my breath as she lifts it off the ground. Draping it over her arms, Rain hugs the fuzzy woven fabric to her chest like a teddy bear, and I prep for the waterworks to start. I sling the guitar over my back and get ready to drop the duffel bag, so I can catch her when her knees buckle and the hair-pulling begins.
Her face crumples as she buries her nose in the cable-knit nightmare. A tear spills over her busted cheek.
But my girl stays strong.
With a deep, steadying breath, Rain lifts her head, looks at me in utter fucking sorrow, and says, “We need something to sleep on.”
There’s my little survivor.
Supplies over goodbyes.
I don’t make a big deal about it, but inside, I’m fist-pumping like one of those Jersey Shore douche bags. I’m gonna get this girl outta here by the end of the week. I know it.
I sling the guitar back around to the front as we head toward the bookstore—our bookstore—to break the silence. “Okay, pop quiz …”
I play the guitar line from “Hey Ya!” by OutKast and laugh when she tucks the blanket under one arm and does the clap, clap, clap part.
“Nice. Didn’t expect you to be a hip-hop fan.”
“What?” She shrugs. “Everybody knows OutKast. They’re from Georgia.”
“True. How ’bout this one?”
I play the intro to “Call Me Maybe” and sigh in sheer fucking delight when her nose wrinkles and her head tilts to one side.
“No? What about this one?”
I pluck the first few notes of “Sugar, We’re Goin’ Down” as we walk into the almost-pitch-black bookstore, and Rain calls it before I even get to the chorus.
