Page 61 of He Should Be Mine

I close my eyes again. His presence beside me is a comfort. A shield. And even if I can’t say the words, I hope he knows what they are.

Thank you. Don’t leave. Please stay.

He sits beside the sofa, his back against it, legs stretched out. He keeps a small distance between us, but his presence is solid. Comforting.

We sit in silence.

Eventually, I slide down lower. Dario shifts beside me, folding his arms across his chest and settling in.

I don’t remember falling asleep. I just remember waking later to find he’s still there. Not in the same spot exactly, so he must have got up at some point, but he didn’t leave me.

He has moved down and is sitting on the floor by my feet. Back still resting against the sofa I’m lying on. His arm is draped along the edge of the sofa, close enough that we are nearly touching.

I reach out and gently lace my fingers with his.

He tenses. Just a second. Then relaxes. He doesn’t say a word.

Neither do I.

We sit like that. Minutes. Maybe hours. I drift in and out of sleep, waking every now and then to find him still there, a silent sentinel on the floor beside me. Still holding my hand.

“Duckling,” I croak. It’s barely a breath of sound. But he hears it.

A faint smile tugs at the corner of his mouth. “Yeah?”

I try to smile back. I think I manage it.

For a little while, everything is okay. The pain dulls under the blanket. The room is dim and quiet. Dario’s presence is a warm weight on the edge of my awareness. I rest. I let myself rest.

Just before sleep takes me again, I feel his fingers ghost over mine. Adding a caress to our touch.

He thinks I don’t notice. But I do. And it means everything.

Later, when my throat isn’t made of glass and rust, I’ll tell him what this meant. I’ll joke about how he’s not allowed to leave my side now. I’ll call him Duckling again and watch him pretend he doesn’t like it.

But for now, I let the silence stretch. I let his fingers curl around mine. I let myself breathe. And, for the first time in my entire life, I don’t feel alone.

Then my head spins. Time swirls. It turns disjointed. The light fades slowly, silver turning to gold, then to blue, and finally to gray. The shadows on the walls grow long and soft, crawling across the ceiling like slow-moving water. I blink, and it’s hours later. Blink again, and the room has grown dark.

I can’t tell what time it is. The sofa’s become my world. The scratchy throw, the cushions pressed against my back, the pulsing ache behind my eyes, they are the only things that exist. Time slips through my fingers like steam. I drift in and out, chasing pieces of dreams that dissolve before I can understand them. I think I hear Dario’s voice, low and steady, sometimes a word brushing against my ear like a feather. Sometimes just the sound of him breathing near me.

My head is pounding. My skull feels too tight, like it’s trying to burst open and let the fever out. My throat has sealed itself shut. The pain is unbearable. Raw, swollen, angry. I can’t breathe through my nose, and every shallow inhale through my mouth is like swallowing smoke and ash. I want to cry, but even tears feel like too much effort. They’d burn on the way out.

I shift, trying to get more comfortable, but everything hurts. My skin is damp, slick with sweat, yet I’m trembling beneath the blanket. I can’t tell if I’m hot or cold. Maybe it’s both, maybe neither. I think I try to speak, but the sound is a wheeze, something pitiful and unformed.

There’s movement. A shape in the dark. Footsteps.

“Molly?” Dario’s voice, close now. He leans over me, and I feel his hand on my shoulder. “Hey. You with me?”

I blink at him. The room tilts slightly, like a boat on a slow wave.

“You’re really burning up,” he mutters, brushing my hair off my forehead. His hand is cold, and the contrast makes me shiver. There’s a crack in his voice. He’s trying to stay calm, but I can feel the worry rolling off him like heat.

“This fever’s bad. We need to get you to a hospital.”

“No.” It’s a croak, barely more than breath, and it hurts so much I nearly gag. But I say it again, because I have to. “No. Please.”

His eyes search mine. “Molly…”