Page 50 of King of Hollywood
I didn’t know what that tone of voice meant.
I wasn’t sure I wanted to.
It wasn’t rejection—but it wasn’t…well, it wasn’t good either.
“But I don’t think that’s in the cards for me,” Felix tipped his head back, staring up at the stars as his lips twisted into a sad, flat line.
His declaration was so inaccurate I nearly scoffed, thinking he was joking at first. He didn’t look like he was joking, however. And…I realized he was serious. For whatever idiotic reason, Felix—the actual embodiment of sunshine—thought he was not…worth committing to.
Was it because of the murders he’d committed?
As always, my mind immediately went to the bloodiest option.
No, no. That didn’t seem…quite right.
There was something else there.
Something I didn’t understand yet, but I wanted to.
“I think it is,” I grunted. He’d made it clear how little he liked prying, so I wasn’t about to push his buttons, not when he’d given me more than he’d probably intended to already. Not when the gravel crunched beneath our feet, quiet and unobtrusive. Not when he was holding the flowers I’d bought for him. And not when I had hope that perhaps…perhaps I’d kiss him tonight. Here, surrounded by trees, stars, and the empty parking lot.
The secrets were piling up. The pile growing taller and more wobbly by the second.
One day, they’d all come tumbling down like a fucked up game of Jenga.
They’d spill on the floor, just like the condoms Winnie had sent me.
I’d see him for what he truly was behind the masks, behind the deflection.
Every part of him would be mine.
The pieces he was ashamed of. The pieces no one else had ever known. The parts that made him vulnerable and soft. The parts that made him human.
I’d see him, and maybe, when he knew how easily I bore his weight he’d realize how badly he needed me to do so.
He’d had a lot of opportunities recently to show me his strengths, but at the end of the day there was no forgetting that Felix was a deeply unstable person. I’d seen beneath his skin. Seen how pitiful and wretched he was. Brittle, broken, scared.
He needed to be loved.
I wanted to hold his secrets.
I wanted to keep him safe.
“I’m glad you think so,” Felix laughed, and I jolted, unsure why he’d found my reassurance that he was marriageable—god, that did not feel like a word—funny of all things. He should’ve been relieved, right? Or happy? Not…amused.
An owl hooted, hidden somewhere in the line of trees that reached scraggly and dark above the parking lot.
I wasn’t sure what the next socially acceptable thing to do would be.
Quick, do something romantic, Marshall.
Food was romantic, right?
I should give him more food.
He had to be hungry.
If I went more than six hours without eating, my stomach started to eat itself. He was small. Way too fucking small. Did he cook? He needed someone to cook for him.
