Page 63 of Hush, Little Baby

I’m still chewing. The gum has gone tasteless, just a soft, pliable thing between my teeth, but the motion of it is nice in a way I don’t want to examine. Rhythmic. Grounding. Something to do with my mouth that isn’t crying.

“You can spit that out now,” Nikolaus says.

I blink at him.

He holds his palm flat and open under my chin, waiting. Just like that. Completely certain I’ll comply, because apparently that is his default setting for every interaction we have.

I do it anyway. I don’t know why I keep doing what he tells me. The gum drops into his palm, and he doesn’t even flinch, just turns his head toward Constantine with an expectant look.

“Trash,” Nikolaus says, like it’s one word.

Constantine glances at the gum in Nikolaus’s palm, then at me, then back at Nikolaus, and something passes between them—not a conversation, exactly, more like a shift in the weather—before he leans across the small aisle, takes the gum between two careful fingers, and drops it into a small waste bin built into the cabin wall.

He does not get up.

Nikolaus does not get up.

I stay exactly where I am, curled on his lap, and the gum is gone, and no one had to move, and the whole exchange took less than five seconds, and I am so tired that even this feels like a kindness.

“Good,” Nikolaus murmurs, and I don’t know if he’s talking to Constantine or to me.

Then his hand comes back to my face, but instead of cupping my cheek, his fingers drift to my lips, two of them pressing gently against the lower one until my mouth opens on instinct, and then they slide inside.

I freeze.

“Just suck,” he says, voice low and easy, like he’s telling me to breathe. “You need something in your mouth, sweetheart. I can see it. It helps you settle.”

I blush furiously, knowing he’s right, and suck on them.

I close my eyes, so I don’t have to see his face while I do it, because there is a limit to how much humiliation I can witness happening to myself in real time. I breathe through my nose and try not to think about what I probably look like to the other man sitting just feet away from us.

But Nikolaus is right, and the sucking helps, in the same way my blankie helps and snuggling close helps. My whole body sighs around it, the last coiled tension in my shoulders releasing in a slow, involuntary exhale through my nose. My tongue presses against the undersides of his fingers, and my jaw goes loose, and the floaty place gets quieter and softer and easier to live in.

I hate how quickly I become comfortable.

Nikolaus makes a low, satisfied sound above me, and I keep my eyes shut and focus on breathing, on the weight of his fingers, on the faint hum of the plane around us and the distant sound of Constantine’s phone and the way Nikolaus’s thighs are so warm under me.

Then his other hand moves, and at first I think he’s just adjusting his hold on me, repositioning, the way he does constantly, like he can’t stop touching me even when he’s already touching me everywhere.

But then his palm settles low on my stomach, and my eyes fly open.

Not there.

He’s not supposed to be there.

My body goes rigid under his hand, every muscle locking at once, and Nikolaus’s fingers still in my mouth as he makes a small, shushing sound that vibrates through me.

“Easy,” he murmurs. “Easy, baby. You’re all right.”

His hand slides lower, and I squirm, trying to shift away, but there’s nowhere to go. I’m pinned between his body and the armrest, and the safety belt is off now, but his arm across my back is just as effective, and my hip is pressed into the hard muscle of his thigh, and—

Constantine.

Constantine is right there.

The thought hits me like ice water, and I go perfectly, horribly still. My eyes dart toward the other seat, where Constantine sits with his phone, and for one terrible second, I’m certain he’s watching, certain he sees Nikolaus’s hand on me, certain he’s going to look up and know exactly what I let happen.

But Constantine isn’t looking at us.