[ 038 ] do not open till you've got forever to spend with me

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CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
do not open till you've got forever to spend with me




"CAN YOU JUST TELL ME WHY YOU HATE ME SO MUCH?"

"Breaking news: it's not my problem," Sawyer deadpanned, flicking Wyatt a dispassionate look.

Last night they stayed up until the sunlight peeled away the husk of the moon, sugar melting between their teeth, their tongues sour with the aftertaste of chocolate. They didn't speak much, and they didn't have to. There weren't enough words to build a bridge overnight, to undo years of damage, but in the absence of cicada song a new star was born, an old wound patching itself together, not quite healed but healing.

At one point while they were watching the sunrise spill over the rooftops, soaking the snow in a bright corona, Sawyer caught Wyatt shutting his eyes tight, like a kid making a wish, and then blinking himself awake. They'd made themselves coffees just a half hour ago, so it wasn't possible that he was tired already. And then she realised he was testing if this was real. If he'd open his eyes and she'd be on the other side of the wall, silent and resentful, rather than beside him on the window seat, watching their filthy city crawl to life. But she was still here, hands stained with glow-in-the-dark paint, forehead pressed to the window, fogging up where her warm breath skated over the glass. There were still freshly painted stars on her ceiling, fading as the darkness retreated, but tomorrow night, they'd still be there. Evidence that something had been reborn that night.

There was no dream to wake up from. No fear that this would dissolve in his hands, that he'd done something wrong, that he was being chased by some nagging terror. Sawyer could sleep inside this moment, live inside this string of seconds. For an endless moment, as the city woke up, as the snow ploughs lumbered like mechanical bison through the snow-blanketed streets, they could heal because these minutes had some place to nestle and burrow. A place to survive. No need to wake up. This was all real.

They'd also resumed the annual Christmas Eve tradition of opening their presents under the tree while everyone else was asleep just to see what their parents had gifted them. Sawyer found another stack of cassette tapes from her father. She didn't bother opening what her mother got her. Wyatt got a new pair of sneakers and a red Puddlemere United sweatshirt. It felt like they were six again, viciously shushing each other as Wyatt almost knocked over the tree in the dark and the sound of wrapping paper tearing through the silence, before they'd been ripped apart. All of that seemed so far away then, nestled at the bottom of the tree with tinsel and ribbons crinkling under their legs.

Funny how quickly things changed.

One moment they were sneaking off into the kitchen at midnight, devouring gingerbread houses until they were eighty-percent sugar, twenty-percent sick to their stomachs like they used to when they were younger, the next were trading hostile blows in the living room. Aggravation gleamed in Wyatt's eyes. The air around them tensed. The afternoon sun set their features aglow, harsh lines bathed in harsher light, shoulders wired for a fight.

"Fine," Wyatt sighed, tipping his head back in defeat. "F-8."

Sawyer flicked him a cool look. "Miss."

"Fuck this shit," Wyatt growled, his eye twitching in frustration. In jerky motions, he marked out an X on the sheet in the appropriate box before setting the paper down on the floor under the coffee table, out of sight. "Your turn."

"H-10."

Wyatt blinked. Mouth parted in disbelief, he glanced up at her from his side of the board. The strangled sound that escaped the back of his throat wasn't human.

SOME KIND OF DISASTER ─ oliver woodWhere stories live. Discover now