Three Little Birds

Exposure Pt. 5

His feelings for me were growing deeper and for the first time since Kaiden's death, he had an interest in more than a one-night stand. I gave way to the thought that that's possibly why he didn't look at me. 

I was a reminder that he was alive, that his first love wasn't, and he was beginning to move on.

Subconsciously, as he began the process of life and living, and as he started falling in love, he was hanging on tooth and nail to the promise of a devotion that had died six years before. 

Once everything was smoked, we collectively stood and made our way back to the house. The temperature was dropping and while Liz and I had had the presence of mind to put on a jacket, Mykel had not. We entered the house, quiet and morose, shrouded in grief, and the darkness of the past.

As for my part, I was still half reeling in the fact that neither of them had really said more than I did what I had to to survive. I was not naive enough to think everyone would have this same reaction, I knew I had lucked out in finding Liz, and subsequently Mykel. 

I had kept quiet, listening to Mykel prattle on about his dead lover while we were outside, and I analyzed my own feelings for him as he spoke. 

I was not jealous of his love or heartbreak with Kaiden Jones. There was no need. Though I did feel a certain degree of kinship with him. I didn't know what exactly drove him to suicide, but for some reason, I felt that he and I were connected somehow. 

I did not mind in the least that the attention had been diverted to Mykel and away from me. 

I found that now that the secret was out that it was rather anticlimactic, even with my bawling in Liz's arms. But the conch had been passed and it was no longer my turn in the spotlight.

Liz had asked me to look out for him. She knew there was something between Mykel and myself, even if none of us knew exactly what that something was.

Mykel hugged her and it amazed me how such a large man could look so small. At that moment I understood what Liz had meant. I was also perceptive enough to know that Liz's asking me to move in with her had more to do than with her wanting to look out for me.

They were right. We were all running from something. Three little birds with broken wings still trying to fly. 

"It's late. Or early, depending on your views. You have work tomorrow." Mykel stepped back, his head still down.

"I love you, Monkey." They both smiled at the nickname. 

"I love you, too, Lizard." She chuckled, punching him softly and playfully on the shoulder.

"I'm not a lizard." She smiled at him and I knew that this was a game long rehearsed. She kissed my forehead and bid us both goodnight before heading to bed. She had to be at the cafe in four hours.

Mykel was leaning against the counter when next I looked at him. He had his back to me, his arms spread along the counter holding his weight, his head hanging, eyes screwed shut against the world.

I placed my hand along between his shoulder blades, bringing my left hand along the defined muscle of his bicep. He jumped slightly at the contact, startled from his past, his guilt, his memories of a long-dead lover. He did not open his eyes as he leaned into me, accepting the offer of comfort, but not heavily enough to unbalance me.

I kissed his shoulder lightly and tugged on his arm. "Come on, Mykel. We should get some sleep, too."

He scoffed derisively but nodded, his eyes finally sliding open. His eyes were soft as they bore into mine, but within those honey-wheat eyes held more pain than I had seen in a long time. Fresh and refreshed, a memory and memories from years before, but felt as if it were all happening for the first time.

I linked our fingers together and gently pulled him up the stairs and into his room. 

"Come on." I helped him get undressed, directing him in his movements. Movements that were of second nature at this point.

I crawled beside him and saw thanks in his eyes that I wasn't going to leave him.

"It's my fault," he whispered. We had been lying quietly so long, I had thought he had fallen asleep. His arm was wrapped around my midsection, his hand closed into a fist against my side, enclosing a handful of material from my shirt.

Slowly I traced my fingertips along his arm, over the top of his hand, and back again. He had spoken so quietly I almost missed it. I looked to him then prepared to expostulate against his comment, but his breathing evened out and I could tell he was asleep.

The next several days passed in a blur. Mykel was busy getting his shop in the beginning stages of remodeling. Knocking down walls "here and there" as he put it. He kept the place a secret until it was how he wanted it. I was dying to see it, but he would just smile and say I would have to be patient. You'd think with as long as I sat curled in a closet I would have all the patience to a saint...this, however, is not the case. 

As the season got colder, the cafe grew more crowded as the vacationers of the ski resorts began to take advantage of the mountain. This meant I was helping Liz from morning to close with the other employees trickling in and out for their shifts as the day went on. The good thing about the skiing season is that these rich resortists tip well.

That Sunday as Liz and I closed shop as the last customers walked out the door, I stood beside her as she locked the door, hovering slightly in anxiety-ridden nervousness, staring at my shoes.

"Mattie, you okay, sweetie?" She tousled my hair slightly. Since I had stayed with her that first night the bond between us had deepened immensely. Since I broke down while telling her my deepest shame, she'd become even more protective, the bond between us, while still growing, solidified.

I nodded. "I was hoping maybe I can ask you a favor?"

I felt a soft finger under my chin lifting my head up. She had been trying, with little success at this point, to teach me to use eye contact. I felt my heart constrict at such a simple move. Such a motherly move that never once had I ever experienced as a child. 

I brought my eyes up to hers; she smiled. "You can ask me for anything, but you have to ask me, not your feet."

She spoke in the gentlest of ways, but I felt chastised nonetheless. I nodded again, swallowing. Instinct told me to look away, and I did, before gathering my courage and meeting her eyes again. She waited mollifyingly as I prepared to make my request.