Page 28 of Jonas

To stop that feeling from taking root I did what I always did and changed the topic quick-like and in a hurry.

“Why do men call their penis and testicles junk? I don’t get it. I would think with all the love men show their…parts they’d call it something else like precious or treasure or gems.”

I jolted when Jonas’s laughter hit me. It felt like a literal blow to my belly. The sound of it nourishing my lonely soul, filling me with something that was not mine to have. The ridiculousness of that hit me harder. Now was not the time to ruminate on my life, or lack thereof. Now was not the time to wallow—something I’d been able to successfully shove aside for the last, oh, I don’t know, the last twenty-some-odd years since I realized as a young girl I’d never have a normal life or a normal family. But I couldn’t stop the richness of his laughter from slapping me right in the face, reminding me I wasn’t normal. I didn’t have a normal family. No one to make laugh. No one to make me laugh. No one to share with or turn to when life got hard. So as much as it hurt to hear, it also felt good.

“Damn, you’re a trip,” he muttered. I didn’t know if that was good or bad. Was I a trip to Looniville, or was I a trip to a fun day at an amusement park? “Let’s get your face clean. This time, let’s try it with your mouth closed.”

Right. My face.

I hadn’t forgotten the stinging in my eyes or my sinuses burning, but for some reason bantering with Jonas made the pain bearable.

I tipped my head back, this time with my lips pinched tight. Cool water hit my forehead, slowly the stream moved to my right brow, then my left, before he moved the bottle over the bridge of my nose and my cheeks.

“One more time,” he told me and started over again following the same path. When he was done he declared, “Keep your eyes closed.”

I did as I was told. Without sight, my hearing intensified. Thus I heard his even, steady breaths. I heard him moving around me. And I swear I could feel him studying me.

“Are you staring at me?” I asked.

“Shoulda told you to keep your mouth closed, too.”

Well.

I felt the pad of his thumb swipe over my lips. The touch was quick, but the feeling remained, leaving me in a frozen stupor.

From a swipe of his thumb.

What in the actual hell was wrong with me?

Without warning he was blotting the water off my face. The fabric was rough like a cheap towel but his ministrations were gentle.

“We’re movin’,” a voice I didn’t recognize called out.

“Almost done,” Jonas replied as he kept gently patting my face with the towel.

My stupidity got the best of me—that was my only explanation for reaching out and grabbing ahold of Jonas. As it would happen, my hands hit his hips. Once there I continued to perpetuate this idiocy and held on. Not only that, my fingertips dug into his flesh. I blamed this on two things: the fullness of seeing Jonas go down on the street, understanding he’d been hit with a sedative that would leave him incapacitated and helpless. Which led to both of us being taken hostage, to the uncertainty of not only my immediate future but also left me wondering if I’d be breathing by the end. The second part of my excuse was purely emotional and irrational and was the crux of my foolishness—he made me feel, and I hadn’t felt anything in a really long time. Even being under the microscope of his stare, which made me feel uneasy was better than the apathy. I didn’t want to process why that was. I didn’t want to analyze why hearing him laugh made me feel lonelier than normal. I didn’t want to think about why when he mentioned his team it felt like a knife to the stomach. But I felt all of those things, and after years and years of detachment and disregard for anything that remotely stirred an emotional response it felt…welcomed. And if that wasn’t a mindfuck I didn’t know what was.

I felt Jonas’s hand cover mine on his hip. And there again I allowed my stupidity to keep me perfectly enshrined in its clutches. Instead of smartening up I fed off his touch—how his big hand engulfed my smaller one, how good the rough callouses felt against my softer skin, how warm his skin was.

So stupid.

“You’re all done.”

I was so lost in my head I hadn’t realized he’d stopped patting my face.

“Thanks,” I mumbled.

“You can open your eyes.”

Slowly I cracked my eyelids.

I wished I could say it was because I was testing the waters so to speak, seeing if my eyes still burned from the CS gas. But that wasn’t the real reason. I was afraid of what I would find when they fully opened. And when they did I was right to be afraid. Jonas was staring down at me. His gaze roaming over my face, a look of concentration mixed with something else I couldn’t read.

“How bad is it?” I asked.

His eyes stopped roaming and locked with mine. What he didn’t do was answer, which I figured was my answer.

“Right.” The word was barely out of my mouth before his hand not covering mine at his hip came up, his knuckles brushed under my chin, and he tilted my head back. He already had my attention, but one could say with that maneuver he now had my full and undivided attention in a way that sent a shiver through me.