Page 22 of Creatures Like Us

“Help you?” Noah asks, a crease between his brows.

God, why is he so suspicious as soon as I indicate any sort of intimacy between us? He acts as ifI’mthe one keepinghimprisoner, not the other way around.

I sigh. “Can you please come and help me, Noah? I’m sick, and I’m tired, and I know it’s all my fault, being a junkie and all, but could you just?…?make this a little easier for me?”

As always, when I address him by name, he gets this weird look on his face: a puzzled, pleased sort of look. The change is subtle, but it’s there, and I like it. I prefer it to his creepy, blank stare, anyway. I prefer it to that soft look he got when he was wiping my face with the towel too.

He rises from the toilet seat and kneels behind me on the floor. Grabbing the shower nozzle, he turns it on and directs the water to the back of my neck.

“Ow, that’s cold!” I hiss.

“Sorry,” he mumbles as he changes the setting.

The water goes lukewarm, then hotter, until?…?“Ow, now it’s too hot!”

Noah hisses a curse under his breath and tweaks the setting again. “How about now?”

“That’s better.”

He wets my hair thoroughly, and I tip my head backward to avoid getting water in my eyes. He grabs the square soap by the edge of the tub, lathers his hands, and starts massaging my scalp.

“That feels nice,” I mumble.

Noah says nothing, but I can hear his breathing deepen as he works the soap into my hair with his fingers—mechanically at first, detached from what he’s doing. Then he slows down, thetouch deepening, as I suppose he’s getting lost in the feel of my curls.

“Nice, isn’t it?” I ask.

“What?” Noah says, voice thick.

“My hair. Got it from my mom. My brother’s is the same, only a bit darker. I’m the only one who got her golden curls.”

“I know,” Noah says in that same thick voice.

I frown and glance backward. “Are you?…”

Fuck, his face has gone pale, and his eyes are glazed over, as if he’s about to cry.

I stiffen. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know. I just?…?It’s been a while since I touched someone like this.”

“Have you washed someone’s hair before?”

“Auntie’s. She needed my help with everything.”

A sudden understanding dawns on me. Noah’s aunt needed him for everything, and when she died, he had no one to take care of anymore. No purpose in life. Is that why he’s keeping me here? God, that’s?…?kind of sad, but it still doesn’t justify what he’s done to me. What he’sdoingto me.

He digs his fingers into my scalp, massaging me the way no one’s done since my mom used to bathe me when I was a child. My mother’s touch didn’t feel like this though?…?It didn’t feel this good.

I should be horrified to have Noah’s hands on me, and I shouldn’t feel bad about him almost crying. So why do I feel like crying too?

“When did she die?” I ask.

“Four weeks ago,” Noah croaks. “I buried her in the garden.”

“In the garden? Are you really supposed to do that?”

“Supposed to?”