Page 39 of Waste of Worth

As Dino walked into the comfort of her apartment, where he could see marks of her life every which way he turned, he wondered how long it would be before he was forced out of it again.

Karen leaned over Dino’s shoulder, her lips pressing sweetly to his cheek as she placed a coffee to the small table in front of him. Steam lifted in dancing ribbons from the black coffee, smelling wonderful and demanding his attention.

He’d drink it in a minute.

Something else was taking up his interest.

Turning just enough to catch Karen’s mouth with his own, he felt her smile grow against the kiss.

“Morning,” she said, the gravely hoarseness of sleep coloring up her greeting.

Dino kissed her forehead. “Morning, sweetheart.”

He turned his attention back to his task and Karen stretched up on her tiptoes before heading back to the kitchen. She was back at his side in less than a few seconds, placing her own coffee down beside his. The milky cream color swirling around in hers was a stark contrast against the blackened bitterness of his.

Karen practically fell into the couch beside him, tucking in close to his side and pulling her legs up tight. Dino passed her coffee over without even needing to be asked, knowing she would want it first and foremost.

She had several routines that got her through the day.

He figured her morning one was most important, though.

Dino continued sketching out lines and shadowing in curves on the notepad with a sharpened pencil as Karen sipped happily and silently from her coffee, never once interrupting his work. She wouldn’t, he knew, not until she’d downed at least half of the caffeine she needed to actually feel awake.

He knew she was close to reaching the halfway point in her coffee when she shifted beside him, finding a more comfortable spot and stretching her beautiful legs out to rest her feet on the arm while crossing her ankles. Her arm hung over his knee, her fingertips grazing softly back and forth over his bare calf, rhythmic and gentle.

They’d done this before; quiet mornings and soft touches.

It was one of his favorite things to do with Karen.

Oddly, it allowed him to just be in that moment with no expectations but sunlight filtering in through the window and the silence stretching on between them until she was ready to talk.

The image he was drawing—a memory that had haunted him the night before as he walked the floors of Karen’s apartment—was beginning to take shape. He didn’t think he was particularly good at drawing, but it was calming. Sometimes it even helped to remove the awful demons living inside his head, if only long enough for him to put them to paper.

It never failed to amaze Dino how easily and peacefully Karen slept night after night. Since showing up at her place, he’d fought with himself about leaving again, and his heart ended up winning the battle. He stayed one night, then two. She went off to work that Monday morning, not even bothering to ask him if he would be there when she got back.

Dino figured she already knew and didn’t need to ask.

Of course he was there.

He only left to grab some of the pastries she liked from the shop down the street.

Karen never once noticed his odd habits at night, and if she did, she never said a word about them. Watching her sleep, tangled in blankets with messed hair and a lax smile, was probably the closest he’d ever come to actually wanting to crawl into a bed and close his eyes.

If only because she looked so peaceful there.

It would, however, be selfish of him to get in bed with her, only to wake her up with his nightmares, something he wasn’t quite ready to explain just yet.

His body was starting to feel the exhaustion of three nights with no solid sleep. He’d caught a couple of hours during the day, but it wasn’t enough to keep him distracted from the tiredness seeping into his system every time he turned around.

If he were at home, he could distract himself with all sorts of things. Being at Karen’s place meant he couldn’t fiddle around, or change and reorganize her cupboards and drawers, and he was pretty sure she wouldn’t appreciate him cleaning her place from top to bottom, even if the action would have literally nothing to do with the cleanliness of her place.

The apartment didn’t need it anyway.

Karen kept the place spotless.

Dino still needed a distraction.

Well, the truth of the matter was simple. Despite how much he wanted to stay, if even for one more night, he was going to have to leave. He’d have to battle through a good night’s worth of nightmares because he was too tired to ignore the rest he desperately needed.