My laugh catches me off guard, the sound a bit too big for the low-ceilinged kitchen. I set the dish down and try to pull Toni into me. To my delight, she fights me.
“Absolutely not.” She pushes against my chest. “You just called me difficult.” Playfully, she bats my kiss away.
I get around her defenses. This time, her lips soften against mine. “I like that you’re difficult,” I say softly.
An emotion I can’t quite clock flutters behind her eyes, so fast I may be imagining it.
Toni clears her throat a little before saying, “So does that mean you’ll let me do the dishes?”
We ultimately split the task, falling into an easy rhythm of me washing, her drying. When I rinse soap off the final spoon, I’ve never been so disappointed to be done with the chore.
Before my mind spirals into thoughts of what to do next, Toni asks, “What’s your go-to comfort movie?”
I consider. “There are a few.”
“Nope.” She shakes her head, folding the dishtowel. “You can only pick one.”
“The Lord of the Rings,” I say without hesitation.
She grins. “That’s three movies.”
“One trilogy.”
“Loopholes,” she sighs, rolling her eyes playfully. “Fellowship is one of my all-time favorites, so I’m game.”
“Extended edition?” I ask.
“Is there any other way?”
We settle in on the couch, Toni cradled between my legs, her cheek on my stomach. Somewhere around the Lothlorien mark, she drifts off.
I feel the steady rise and fall of her breathing, every shift her body makes. The rhythm of her sleep paired with thecomfortingly familiar sounds of the movie soothes me to my core.
“Cillian!”
The sound of my name, followed by a banging on the kitchen door, wakes us both. I clutch Toni, momentarily too flooded with fear and adrenaline to register that it’s my brother’s voice.
When he calls my name again, accompanied by the slamming of the kitchen door, the fog clears enough for me to let her go. I haul my stiff body off the couch as Michael barrels up the stairs.
“What the hell?” I ask, intercepting him in the hall.
“I could ask you the same fucking thing.” He shoves my chest. I can’t tell if his intention is to move me out of the way or, given the force, if it’s an alternative to hitting me. “Do you not know how to answer your goddamn phone?”
I hadn’t even thought about my phone since pulling into the driveway yesterday. Today? I can’t be sure what time it is, seeing as it’s still pitch black outside.
“I—” He doesn’t let me answer.
“No one has heard shit from you since yesterday. Since...” He drags a hand over his face, a tick we share. “You can’t just—You can’t drop off the planet!”
“I didn’t. Mom knew I was?—”
“Yeah. And how many times did you lie to her before?” He spits the question at me.
If I were in a better, clearer headspace, I’d be able to acknowledge that he wasn’t wrong. But at the moment, I am not in a clear and balanced headspace.
All I’m seeing is red.
“You think I’m lying?” My voice is dangerously low.
