Page 65 of Collision

“You need sleep, Mik.” His breath is soft on my skin. “If this helps then, yeah, I’m okay with it.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

I close my eyes, smiling to myself as his breathing becomes deeper, and wait for sleep to come.

Moments pass, silence enveloping us, as I lay in his arms and I hold my breath when his fingers weave between mine.

“This only works if you actually try to sleep, Mik.” His voice is low, already thicker with the heaviness of rest, and my stomach knots.

“I can’t,” I admit.

Ben sighs as I twist. His arm remains around me, even as I move to face him, and I tuck my hands up beneath my cheek.

“Why?” I ask.

“Why what, Mik?”

His eyes are still closed, so I wait. When he opens them, I’m greeted by the calmest blue. In the depth of the crystal are flecks of navy and hints of green. Up close they resemble an artists palette, a mixing and melting of hundreds of shades just searching for the right one.

How have I never paid attention to the subtleties of those eyes before now?

“Why do you think I’m lying?”

He shakes his head gently and his fingers move up my spine, tenderly brushing over the sensitivity of the marks left on my back.

“I don’t think you’re lying, Mik. At least, not intentionally.” His fingers skim over the surface of my t-shirt, snagging slightly on a wound, and I close my eyes as I try not to flinch. He moves his hand lower instantly, resting it at the base of my spine, and resumes drawing patterns with his fingertips. “I think youthinkyou want me, but you don’t. Not really. There’s too much history behind us. Too many bad choices. And I think right now - as much as I want to think you do want me - what you really want is to feel safe and comforted. And I’ll give you that, Mikaela. I’ll stay until you feel safe and I’ll comfort you until you don’t want me to, but I can’t give you more than that. Not when I know you’ll just regret it one day.”

I open my eyes to him again, focusing on his words - his fears - and I smile softly. Slowly, with a shaking hand, I reach up to his face and brush my fingers over the little lines creasing around his eyes. I move tentatively as his eyes close, skimming down to his neck and holding him there. He sighs with my touch and my heart thumps. He’s right, of course, that there is history that needs to be unpacked and there is pain that needs to be talked about too, but he’s also wrong. He’s wrong to think I would regret it. He’s wrong to think I would regrethim,or that this is only comfort.

Ben is so much more than that. Ben has always been so much more than that. At times the thought of him makes me so angry I could set the world on fire, but then he says or does something disarming and sweet and, even when I hate myself for it, I catch myself smiling at the thought of him.

So yeah, he is unexpected and infuriating and frustrating, but I want all of it.

“You know,” I muse aloud as he lays still, “I’m going to prove you wrong, Haston.”

He smiles and my lips curve to match.

“Of course you are, Wilcox. Now go to sleep.”

I laugh when I move closer, placing my head on his chest as he tightens his arm around me, and I close my eyes. Somehow, I am going to show Ben that he’s scared of nothing.

I am going to show him I want him.

Ben

Waking up next to Mikaela for the second morning in a row is messing with my head. She looks peaceful wrapped around me, one leg hitched over my waist and the sheets kicked off of us, and my heart kind of stumbles in my chest.

What on earth am I doing to myself, letting myself get so caught up in her?

I move carefully, not wanting to wake her, as I brush some hair off of her face and she smiles as her eyes open.

“Morning,” I whisper, and I try not to laugh when she grimaces and nuzzles in closer.

“Morning,” she croaks, pulling herself tighter against me and placing a small kiss against my chest.

My heart does that stupid stutter again and she grins.