Page 35 of The Devastation You Reap

He pushes up from the ground and holds his hand out to pull me up.

I slide my much tinier one into his giant paw and he hauls me up and directly into his body.

Wrapping his arm and mine behind my back he holds me in place.

"Thank you for tonight," he whispers.

"Shouldn't I be the one saying that? You did all the work."

"But you made it perfect."

I can't help it, I swoon hard. Too hard.

"Come on, you need your beauty sleep for class tomorrow."

He releases me, although he looks reluctant to do it and together we tidy everything up before heading to his car.

"What about the rest of it?" I ask, the fairy lights still shining bright.

"I'll come back. Don't worry."

I smile at him across the trunk of his car. "Okay."

The second he's put the car into drive, he reaches over and takes my hand, lacing his fingers through mine, holding it tightly. I find it way more comforting than I know I should.

"Where'd you grow up?"

"Pittsburgh," I lie, my stomach twisting painfully that I still feel the need to do so. It's not an all-out lie. Pittsburgh is where I lived with my parents before they died. I just haven't been back there since then. "You?"

"Rosewood. It's the next town over. You miss it?" he asks.

"Nah. This place feels more like home than anywhere else I've lived."

He nods, accepting my words as the truth.

Guilt sits heavy in my stomach but it's the way it has to be. He might have somehow managed to break down a few of my barriers tonight, as well as shatter my clearly mistaken assumptions about him, but he’s not getting anything else out of me. I've told no one the truth about my life. My roommates know more than most, but even that is the least I could get away with so they can feel like they actually know me.

"What about when you're done here? Any plans for where you want to play next?"

"I've got a wish list sure, but I'm not putting all my hopes on one team. I'm happy to go with the flow."

"That probably makes it easier."

"I can only hope."

We chat about other nonsensical things as we make our way back across town once more, and all too soon, we're pulling up outside my dorm building.

He undoes his seat belt like he's about to walk me up and I panic.

"It's okay, you don't need to."

Looking over, he studies me for a beat.

"You ashamed of me, Red?"

"What? No."

"So you're not hiding this from your roommates."