Page 20 of Eye of the Hurricane (Weathering Doves Harbor #2)

Katherine

It hurts.

The light hurts. My head hurts. My stomach hurts. Everything fucking hurts . I feel like my nervous system is hooked up to a live wire.

The tent unzips suddenly, letting in even more sunlight. I let out a guttural groan and slam my arm over my eyes.

“Feeling that good, huh?” Ares asks.

“Go away,” I grumble.

“Oh, party girl is grumpy now, huh? Where’s my girl who dances on table tops?” he asks. My heart sinks to my toes and I shoot up, wide-eyed.

“I didn’t!” I shriek, covering my eyes. He laughs.

“You didn’t. But only because I carried you to bed. You were definitely on your way to climbing up there.” God damn martinis. My arch nemesis .

“Thank God,” I huff. I look down and I’m dressed head to toe in Ares’ clothes. I also at some point lost my bra? Oh god, and he’s in just his boxers. The sinking feeling is back with a vengeance. Pure and absolute dread fills me. We had sex .

“Oh my god—we—” he cuts me off quickly.

“We didn’t. I took off your makeup and asked what you wanted to wear to bed.

You told me you wanted to wear my clothes.

So, I helped you undress. No funny business, I promise.

” The realization sets in that he’s looking at me right now with no make up and his lounge clothes on. I internally cringe at how I must look.

“I need to get dressed. I hate being seen like this,” I tell him, shooing him from the tent. He doesn’t budge though.

“What do you mean?”

“Oh, come on. You know it’s not a coincidence that you never catch me without a dress on. The heels? The make up? You’ve noticed.” He stares at me like I’ve suddenly grown a second head. “There’s just a certain image I like to uphold,” I admit quietly.

Ares and I linger in the silence with my confession. But where confusion once filled his eyes, there’s now a softer, sympathetic look. One that lets me know exactly what he’s going to say.

“Let me guess, you want to know why I feel like I need to be perfect all the time?” I snap.

“No,” he shakes his head. “I want to know why you think this isn’t perfect.” The world stops when he says it. My heart stops. Everything stops.

It feels like I’ve been stripped bare in front of everyone, despite it being just us in the tent. It’s the kindest thing anyone has ever said to me. So why is fear settling deep in my chest, making itself at home? I feel like a deer in headlights.

“You do know you don’t have to dress up to be perfect, right? You’re just as perfect like this as you are in matching heels and dresses. ”

“I don’t know,” I say under my breath. I don’t know that and I don’t know what to say.

“You don’t know what? Talk to me, honey.

” He asks, his hand reaching for mine slowly.

As if he’s scared I’ll fall to pieces if he moves too quickly.

Just when I thought this morning couldn’t get any more embarrassing, my lip wobbles and I burst into tears.

His eyebrows shoot up and he quickly drops to his knees on the ground next to the mattress.

“God, this is so fucking embarrassing,” I spit out, tears still flooding my vision.

“What’s wrong, Kat? I thought I was complimenting you. I didn’t mean to upset you,” he explains.

I know. Nothing he’s telling me is something I didn’t know. Ares means well, he always means well.

What I don’t know is how to explain to him that I’ll carry the things my mother has said to me with me for life.

I don’t know how to explain that she’s made me feel like I have to step into this perfect public persona to be liked.

I don’t know how to explain that I feel so distant from that persona that I feel like I have to scheme and trick people into liking me.

That right now, with my makeup off and in sweatpants, I feel like my jig is up.

“I just don’t feel good, it’s making me sensitive.” It’s half true. I do feel especially sensitive because of my hangover. I just leave out the part about my mom and all of those side effects.

“Let’s get you up and dressed then, yeah?” he asks, wiping my tears with his thumbs. He stands up and holds an arm out for me to stand with him.

As soon as I’m on my feet, the world in spinning. My heart is pounding in my ears. I’m going to throw up.

“I need out,” I tell him. He steps out of my way and I dart past him. I rush away from the campsite and into the wooded area. As soon as I’m out of eyesight, I let it loose.

I’ve never been hungover. I’ve never even been drunk enough to get me sick. This is absolute hell. I have no idea how I’m going to last another full day before everyone leaves tonight.

I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand and walk back. Ares is waiting by the tent for me with a bottle of water and a wet napkin in hand. I take the napkin and wipe my face before chugging the water.

“I feel so miserable,” I whine. He pushes my hair out of my face and hands me an ibuprofen.

“I’ll take you home.”

“Everyone is leaving tonight, anyways. I don’t want you or Luna to have to miss out. I can just lay in the tent until we go,” I assure him. Ares refuses to take my suffering in silence as an answer, though. He walks back over to the group.

“We’re going to head out early. Kat isn’t feeling great, so I’m gonna pack up,” he announces as he walks towards our friends where they’re gathered in lawn chairs in the late morning sun. He turns his attention to Luna. “Do you want to ride with us?” he asks.

“You’re welcome to ride back with us if you want to hang out,” Audra offers.

“Or us,” Beck chimes in.

Luna looks towards me with concern, trying to judge if she needs to pull on her mother hen persona to take care of me. I give her a small shake of my head, as much as I can manage without the world spinning and look towards Ares. She nods and turns back towards Audra.

“I’ll hang out then,” she says, plucking a marshmallow from the bag and popping it in her mouth. The idea of eating anything churns my stomach and I have to look away from her.

That was the worst car ride of my life. I thought crying this morning about not being seen in the best light would be the highlight of the day, but I really put the cherry on top by having Ares pull over for me to throw up. Not once, but twice.

I’ve never been so happy to be pulling into my driveway in my life. I haven’t had a proper shower in days, I’ve been throwing up all morning, and my head is absolutely throbbing.

Ares helps me in the house by carrying all of my things. Normally I’d give some push back but I’m so weak from being sick all morning that I just let him. I don’t think I could have done it if I wanted to.

I flop myself on the couch with a loud groan. A ball of black fuzz hops into my lap and settles on my stomach.

“Honey, you’re so pale. I’m not sure you’re just hungover,” Ares says, sitting next to me.

Bellatrix stands and hops into his lap. “Hi, Bells,” he greets her, giving her a little scratch on the head. She purrs loudly.

“You think I’m sick?”

“I definitely think you might be,” he says, planting a kiss on my forehead. At first, I think he’s just being sweet. That is, until he looks at me with a sympathetic look in his eye.

“You’ve got a fever.” Shit .

“No. No, no, no. I don’t have time to be sick,” I whine .

I open my phone and look at my calendar. Meetings all day tomorrow with Jacob. “Ares, classes pick back up tomorrow. I can’t be sick,” I remind him. His lips tug to one side.

“Sorry, honey. I’m not so sure that the flu cares if you have time for it.”

I look over my calendar again and the stress only rises. These are not things I can move around.

“I have to be better for tomorrow,” I sigh.

“I’ll stay here and take care of you. We’ll worry about tomorrow when it comes, okay?” he asks.

“What? No. Not okay. You can’t miss class any more than I can.”

“Who said anything about missing class? I’m going to get up and go to class as planned. I have a whole carload of things, thanks to the camping trip,” he explains.

“I can take care of myself,” I state defensively.

“I know,” he says, standing up and pulling me to my feet. “Bath or shower?” he asks.

Now I’m the one staring at him like he’s grown a second head.

“What?”

“Bath or shower? Getting clean and something in your system is the only thing that’s going to help you feel better, so what’ll it be?

” Ares’ tone is somewhere between stern parent and overly happy game show host. I’d laugh in his face if I didn’t think I’d lose the contents of my stomach for the fourth time today.

I don’t have the energy to fight with him, so I close my eyes and lean into Bellatrix’s comfort before answering, “Shower.”

He nods and walks to my bathroom to turn on the water.

“The shower’s gotta warm up, but I’ll get you a towel and pajamas in the meantime. Where are they?”

“Towels are on the top shelf in the hall closet and you can just grab me a soft dress from my closet.”

“Katherine, you’re sick. You’re going to wear pajamas and I’m still going to think you’re beautiful and perfect and sexy, okay? Where are they?” My heart skips a beat. His words take me back to this morning and all I can do is stand there stunned for a moment.

“Second drawer of my dresser.” He walks out of the living room and I can hear him shuffling around, looking for the things he went off in search of.

Ares comes back a few minutes later, gently grabbing Bellatrix off my stomach and placing her on the back of the couch. He reaches out a hand to help me up.

“I can take care of myself,” I state once more, feeling a little indignant.

“I know, but I’m going to take care of you anyways,” he says, pulling me to my feet and helping me towards the bathroom.

After undressing, I step into the scorching water. For the first time this weekend, I actually feel clean. The water is hot and the pressure is strong. I would stay in here forever if the water would last that long.