Page 155 of Oleander

He still had that same soft look on his face as he looked at me. I didn’t know what it meant, what to do with it.

“No,” he said with a small, bitter smile. After a moment, he slid the green drink across the table to me. “It will help if you can keep it down.”

“What’s in it?”

“Best you don’t ask.”

“Poison?”

It was a joke, but he tilted his head, acknowledging the reference. It wasn’t as unpleasant as I feared: the consistency was the worst part; thick and gloopy, viscous as it slid down my throat. But almost the moment it settled, I began to feel some magic at work. The roiling in my stomach calmed a little, the nausea abating. I stopped sweating, though my body was still very hot.

“You’ll be wondering why I’m here,” he said at last.

“Uh, sort of, yes. Gideon never told me you were coming.” I told myself I wouldn’t have come if I’d known.

“It was very last minute – he doesn’t know I’m here yet. And I didn’t know you’d be here until I found you on the couch last night.” At this, he looked away, and I couldn’t decide which part he was lying about. When he met my eye again, he said, very sincerely, “If you want me to go, I will. I can stay at a hotel; it’s not a problem.”

I should have told him to go. The last time I’d seen him, I was an animal. I’d made threats that I was ashamed of now, and I was afraid of what I might do. I knew I shouldn’t want him anywhere near me, not again. But I was Jude. And Jude loved Cas. And so I also knew I would never tell him to go again. I regretted many things that had happened between us, and would regret a lot more before we were done, but none more than telling him to go that day in Oxford.

“This is more your house than mine; I can go.”

“I don’t want you to,” he said quickly. I thought I detected a note of panic in his voice. “We’re adults. Surely we can live under the same roof for a few weeks without killing each other?”

A few weeks? He was staying that long? I swallowed.

“It’s not killing you I’m worried about, Cas.” I knew he understood my meaning because his breathing hitched very slightly. “Where is he then? Will he be joining us?”

His breathing changed again before he shook his head and looked down at the table. “No. I...we...He’s still in Boston.” I’d never heard him speak with as little certainty before about anything. Certainly not about Blackwell. Stupid hope rose in my chest.

“What happened?” I asked. “Have you split up?” I was amazed to learn that I didn’t know what I wanted the answer to be.

“No. Nothing like that,” he said. “Everything’s fine.” The words rang completely hollow and I hated that I bloody cared.

I stood on slightly unstable legs. “Okay, well, I need to go for a walk and clear my head, I still feel bloody awful.” Feeling half-dead but exhilarated at the same time. His presence still had the same effect on me it always had clearly. “I’ll be back in a while.”

I was at the stairs when he called out after me. I turned. He looked so beautiful sat there, some godlike figure draped in cream and gold and light: too perfect to be real.

I needed air, a lot of it.

“Thank you,” he said, smiling that soft bloody smile again.

I almost fell over. Had he ever said thanks to me for anything before? If he had, I couldn’t remember it, couldn’t remember his mouth ever shaping into those words before.

I muttered something inaudible and bolted up the stairs and out of the front door. I was halfway down the street when I realised I hadn’t a clue what he had even thanked me for.

When I got home a couple of hours later, Cas was making dinner. Chopping lettuce one-handed as chicken, mouth-wateringly, roasted in the oven. I hadn’t been aware he cooked. The sight of him there, his back to me, soft classical musicplaying while he prepared dinner was so completely out of one of my fantasies, that I couldn’t move for a moment. I just watched.

He was dextrous with a single hand. Even when he rinsed a large tomato and set it on the board, he was able to cut down its centre and slice it into fine segments.

“You could help,” he said without turning. “I’m working at a handicap here.”

“I don’t know, I’m quite enjoying watching you struggle.” I went towards him and took the knife from his left hand. Cas was left-handed, and I thought about how lucky it was that this wasn’t the one he’d hurt.

“How’d it happen?” I asked as I began to slice a bell pepper.

“I was playing tennis,” he answered smoothly.

“With Superman?”