At Home

Well hello. Long time, no see. I’m happy to say I’m on new medication that is working very well, and I’m back in my groove. Thank you so much to you all for your words of encouragement (which I will reply to, I swear) and for sticking around. Hope you enjoy this story, which takes place after The Disney Diaries. Yeah, here I go again, not writing chronologically. But this contains no spoilers, and finishing Disney will be my next focus.

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“Babe, next time we move, please label the boxes in English,” Zain called from the living room. “I don’t know what ‘Serviettes’ means!”

I set a box marked Vaisselle on the counter as I called back, “It means ‘towels.’”

His footsteps tramped upstairs. A few seconds later, Theo appeared in the kitchen doorway with the microwave. “Where do you want this?”

“Um…” I looked around. All the surfaces were covered with boxes to unpack. We really needed more counter space in here. Maybe an island, if it didn’t impede the flow too much. “Uh, on the floor, I guess, for n–”

“SÉBASTIEN LEON MCKENNA CREWS!” Zain bellowed from above.

Theo jumped at least three inches, and then stared at me with his mouth open, like a guppy. “What the hell did you do?!” he whispered.

“He found it,” I said.

“Found what?”

There was no time to explain. I shot pass him to wait for Zain at the foot of the stairs. Behind me, I heard Theo put the microwave down and follow with more caution.

Zain was descending each step one at a time, his shoulders square, his eyes sparking, and a definite purpose held in all his muscles. He looked electrifying. At about five treads from the bottom, he raised his arm and pointed a finger squarely at me. “You,” he pronounced. “Naughty.”

I bit my lower lip. “You didn’t like my portrait of Babar? We couldn’t bring him here, so–”

“That. Thing. Is NOT hanging where I sleep!”

“He’s saying ‘je t’aime,’ though,” I said, innocently as I could. My voice broke into a giggle at the end.

Zain turned his hand over and crooked the pointed finger. “C’mere.”

Slowly, I backed up, shaking my head at the same time. But he followed, like a cat stalking its prey, and when I saw his weight shift, my nerve gave. I spun and bolted around a stack of boxes towards the front door with him hot on my heels.

Luck was with me. Quint had just stepped inside carrying my easel. I barely glimpsed the surprised look on his face before I dived behind his broad body and snagged his belt for security. Then I peeked around him.

Theo was across the room, clutching his stomach with laughter. My immediate interest, though, stood a foot in front of Quint, with his hands on his hips and his eyes narrowed. “Stand aside, Hanniford,” he said. “This doesn’t concern you.”

Quint considered him a moment, then looked over his shoulder at me.

For the first time I can remember, I consciously attempted to recreate the expression Zain calls ‘Bambi Eyes.’ I even tried fluttering my lashes. “Quint, I’m scared.”

“Ohhhh,” said Zain, “you are just asking for it, my boy.”

Quint’s lips twitched. He looked back at Zain, and, without saying a word, he stepped to the right, leaving me exposed.

I squeaked and flung myself through the open front door, but I was too slow. Zain lunged forward, caught me around the waist, and hauled me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. I was giggling too hard to put up much of a resistance.

“You,” he said, carrying me over the threshold into the house, “are a saucy little brat.” With a cupped palm, he swatted my bottom once for every step as he climbed the stairs again. “You’re going to put that painting somewhere I don’t have to see it when I’m home! Is. That. Clear?”

Hiding my flushed face in the sweaty fabric clinging to his back, I bit my tongue until I could stop laughing enough to gasp out, “But he loves you!”

Zain gave me a harder smack and set me on my feet. When the whirling world had righted itself, I recognized the new master bedroom. The silhouette of Babar’s head was painted on a nearly three-foot-square pallet of slatted wood that leaned against the wall where I’d left it earlier. Zain pointed at it. “If that is in here, I am going to sleep somewhere else.”

I rolled my eyes. “You’re such a baby. Fine, I guess we can move it downstairs to the hallway going into the dining room. I’ll be able to see it from my studio there, and it’ll fit perfectly.”

He regarded me suspiciously for a moment before he crossed his arms. “That’s where you intended to hang it all along, didn’t you? Brat.”

Then he stepped forward, and I let him catch me this time.

When our lips parted, he said, “I can avoid going through that hallway, as long as you do all the laundry. The washer and dryer are right there.”

“Deal.”

“Good. C’mon, we’re almost done emptying the pod.”

‘The pod’ was the portable storage container we’d rented to ship most of our household goods over from Hawaii. It, along with my car, had been delivered to the new place while we were at Disney World. We’d saved a lot of money by leaving all the furniture and Zain’s Jeep behind, but the house felt half-empty as I brought the painting downstairs with him following me. We’d need to find so much at yard sales and thrift shops. Uneasiness and excitement swirled in me, like looking at a blank sheet of paper with only a vague image in my head and a pencil in my hand. But Zain was here, and he was my home, no matter what else the house contained.

Theo came to meet me on the stairs. “Ohhh, so this is what you had wrapped in that blanket all the way down from New York the other week,” he said, taking the bottom edge of the pallet to help me carry it the rest of the way. “You told us it was a class project!”

“It was,” I said. “I got a good critique on it, too.”

“Clearly, you did the right thing by transferring schools, then,” Zain said. Theo snorted.

After Theo and I propped the painting up against the wall where it would be hung, we turned to see Quint with two boxes stacked on top of each other. He set them on the floor and dusted his hands as he straightened. “Those were the last of it.”

Silence fell, heavy with the unspoken knowledge. If the unloading was done, they had no reason to stay. Twilight was already bleeding around the edges of the sky, and a long drive home stretched ahead of them.

Zain didn’t let the melancholy go on for long. His grin brightened the whole room as he looked from Quint to Theo and asked, “Wanna stay for the inaugural dinner? We’ll probably just get Chinese takeout or something.”

Quint smiled faintly back. “I would love Chinese takeout right now.”

*

We ate sitting on the floor, using boxes as backrests and recounting favorite moments from Disney World and our other past trips between bites. I laughed along with Quint as Zain and Theo did a dramatic reenactment of our meal at the 50s Prime Time Café. The future, though, kept intruding in my mind. If only we could all stay on vacation forever.

An owl was hooting in the woods when Quint set his empty takeout container on the floor, checked his watch, and sighed. “We should be going.” He got to his feet.

“We could stay here for the night,” Theo said, tipping his head back to give his husband a puppy-dog look.

“Where would we sleep, angel?” Quint asked. “They have one air mattress, remember?”

“…The car?”

Zain squeezed Theo’s shoulder, and then used it as leverage to stand. “We’re going to miss you, too, squirt. Remember you’ll be back next month for Seb’s birthday, alright?” He offered a hand to help him up.

The expression on Theo’s face tore through me. Still on the floor, I hugged my knees to my chest and bit down on my jeans. Stop it, stop it, stop it! You’ll only make things harder!

Theo confirmed that when he saw me. “Oh, god, don’t cry!” he said, crawling across the floorboards to pat my back. “I’ll never get through this if you cry!”

I wanted to tell him I was sorry, but if I stopped sinking my teeth into the denim, I’d sob.

Crouching, Quint opened his arms. “Come here, mon chaton.”

I shook my head as my throat closed up. No one needed to see me shedding tears all over Quint’s shirt.

But Zain snorted, took two steps, hauled me up by my underarms, and swatted me forward. I stumbled into Quint’s chest. He caught me close and said, “We’ll all be alright,” as his fingers massaged the knot at the base of my neck. Three different hands joined in a moment later, rubbing all over my back. “All of us will be fine,” Quint murmured.

“If… I could live in two places at once…”

Zain and he both went, “Shhhhhh.” Then no one said anything for a long time.

When Quint let go at last, I’d barely had a chance to wipe my eyes before Theo pulled me into a hug of his own and swayed side to side. “Mmm. I’m gonna miss you, little brother.”

“You, too,” I said, sniffling. Especially knowing how much he struggled with abandonment issues. Maybe it would’ve been better if I’d never moved in with them at all.

He drew back and gave me a watery grin. “So will Jagger. I’ll find him doing yoga in your room, I bet.”

I giggled softly.

From behind, Zain’s arms wrapped around my waist. He lifted me clean off my feet with the force of his embrace. I huffed and tried to elbow him away. “You aren’t even leaving!”

“So?” he asked. “You think I’m gonna let these two show me up in the hugging department?”

Quint smiled at us, though his eyes were pink. “Ready to go?” he asked Theo.

“Yeah,” said Theo, on an exhale. “Okay.”

Zain and I went behind them as they walked to their rental car hand-in-hand. A few feet away from it, I remembered and dug my keychain out of my pocket. “Wait, I need to return your key and the building fob.” I could remember when they presented me with them, clear as yesterday. Quint’s kindness as he told me I was welcome in their apartment. My hand constricted around the metal, like my body was rebelling at giving it back.

Quint turned and shook his head. “They’re yours, mon chaton. We gave them to you before you moved in for a reason. You…” His voice broke, and he cleared his throat. “You are always part of our home, no matter where you live. Both of you.”

I couldn’t speak to thank him. I just nodded and swallowed hard.

“Are you going to be okay to drive?” Zain asked.

“Yes, I’ll be fine,” Quint said. “I can compose myself when we stop for gas.”

They each gave Zain a hug, too, and then climbed into the car and turned out of the driveway, and as Zain held me, one of the most important years of my life came to an end.

*

The next morning, I unearthed the hair clippers in a box full of bathroom stuff and sat Zain down on the edge of the tub to begin the chore of transforming the curls he’d let grow out over leave back into a regulation high-and-tight. I learned to do it in Hawaii, to save us some money on barber fees every Sunday, and it quickly started to symbolize in my mind the end of our uninterrupted time together. It’d never felt more like taking a lawn mower to a meadow of wildflowers than now.

To make matters worse, he kept moving his head. I finally put a finger under his chin and bent down to look him in the eye. “Zain. Hold. Still. Do you want your fade to be even or not?”

He grinned. “Sorry, babe. I was thinking we should go buy the shower kit today and get it installed so you don’t have to take baths all week.”

I’d wanted to have a final day of relaxing with him before he returned to school tonight. Needy, I thought. He’s right. Baths won’t be practical. So I said, “Okay.” Then, as I brought the clippers towards his skull, he angled his head. I yanked them away again in the nick of time. “If you wind up with a bald patch, it’s your fault.”

“Yeah, whatever,” he said. “Where’s the box you found those in?”

“The clippers?” I frowned. “Out on the landing. Why?”

Rather than answer, he stood up and vanished through the doorway. I heard him rummaging in the box. My stomach tightened. I turned the clippers off and set them on the counter.

“Ah!” he said, triumphant. A split-second later, he was sauntering in, swinging the bath brush jauntily on its short loop of cord. “Knew I packed it!”

“…But I’m not done with your haircut!”

At the same time those ridiculous words were leaving my mouth, my feet carried me backwards, into the corner between the toilet and tub. My hands cupped over my rear end without input from my brain, either. When the hell did he manage to sneak that thing into storage?! Merde.

“Don’t worry, babe.” He sat down on the closed toilet lid and reached for me. “You can finish as soon as we’ve drawn the curtain on that Good Boy Act.”

He really meant to spank me now. Of course he did. I’d grown too used to Quint giving warnings first. Zain never saw the point of that, and he always noticed when I pushed down my real feelings. I knew better even as I did it.

Grabbing my waistband, he yanked my yoga pants to my knees, then pulled me forward across his lap. He couldn’t pin me between his legs in the tight space, and I was facing the wrong way for him to use his right hand, but the bath brush found its target easily.

The sting overwhelmed everything else in just one swat. I didn’t even try to hold back my sobs. The world narrowed down to me, and Zain, and the bath brush, and the pain. No room for artifice. The purity of it was beautiful, in a way. Knowing he could see my pitiful neediness and he loved me all the same.

I don’t know how long the spanking went on before he let me up—aflame at one end and watery at the other—only to make me sit sideways on his lap with my pants around my ankles and the handle of the bath brush poking my ribcage. I didn’t mind. My head felt woozy. I closed my eyes, leaning into him while I sniffled and caught my breath.

“How are you feeling, habibi?”

I hesitated. Not to hide my emotion this time, but because the words were escaping me. “L–like a leaf in… like in Pocahontas when they do that…” I traced a loose circle in the air with my hand. “That thing.”

Zain snorted. “A whirlwind?”

“Yeah, a will– whiilll…” I trailed off and frowned at the green wallpaper we were going to be ripping out soon. Why was it so hard to pronounce?

His right arm held me tighter while he dug into the pocket of his cargo pants with his left hand. Then he pulled out a tube of glucose tabs and popped the lid open. “Here, babe.”

I stared at it for a second. “Ohhh, yeah,” I said, my voice coming out slow and slurred. It’d been so long since I went low from a spanking, I hadn’t connected the dots. I let him tip two tabs into my cupped palm, shoved them into my mouth, and chewed.

“That hit fast,” Zain murmured. “You went pale as a sheet. Except for your butt, of course.”

I grunted, unamused.

He kept me in his lap while we waited for my sugars to rise. At one point, after I’d stopped crying, he spun some toilet paper off the holder and dabbed away all the wetness on my face. Then he went back to hugging me tight. Neither of us said anything until I sighed and tried to stand.

Zain easily prevented me from moving an inch, and laughed. “Where do you think you’re going, brat?”

I stopped wiggling. “I’m okay now, Z. Really.”

He kissed my cheek. “Cool. We’ll eat breakfast in a minute. First—hey, look at me.”

I met his eyes, afraid I’d see the guilt that overtook him years ago when we accidentally discovered he could spank me into hypoglycemia. To my relief, he seemed normal.

“Was that enough to end the Good Boy Act, or will we need to finish up later?” he asked.

My bottom cheeks twitched. “It was enough!” I said, nodding quickly. “I– I hate the idea of doing any remodeling with our last day of leave, and I don’t want to go buy a shower kit, either, and I wouldn’t mind taking baths all week because they could help me relax after classes.”

He smiled as the rush of words ended. “True. Alright, no projects today. In fact, no worrying about the house or tackling any house-related stuff, beyond setting up your studio, until next Saturday. Concentrate on getting oriented at school. ‘Kay?”

“Okay.”

*

We spent the day how I’d pictured it after that. Having a bath together, going for a long walk in the woods, and plenty of what Zain called ‘making positive memories’ in every single room of the house. It involved a lot of dragging the air mattress around. We ended in the dining room as the sun set through the trees outside the windows. Both of us fell asleep, and when we woke up, it was nearly the time Zain had to report back to Annapolis.

In the rush to get dressed and in the car, we didn’t remember to bring the mattress upstairs. It was still in the middle of the empty room when I returned from dropping him off at the Yard. I felt too drained to attempt moving it by myself. Instead, I brought my laptop and diabetes kit down from the bedroom and then curled under the rumpled blanket to call Quint and Theo on Skype.

Quint answered. He was in the kitchen. I could see the microwave behind him and a dish towel slung over his shoulder. It was too late for them to be cooking still, so he must’ve been cleaning  up after dinner. I felt a pang. If I were there, I’d be helping.

He smiled and said, “Hello, mon chaton. How are things?”

“Okay,” I said with a shrug. “I just left Zain in Annapolis. It was easier knowing he’s only fifteen minutes away and I’ll be having dinner with him tomorrow.” Not easy, but easier.

“I’m glad,” he said.

Off-camera, Theo’s voice called, “Is that Seb? I want to show him Jagger’s new trick!”

“You taught him a new trick in one day?” I asked, as Quint turned his phone so I could see Theo with the dog in their living room.

“Yeah, had to keep myself occupied,” he said. “Jags, what do you do when Quint sings?” He tugged on his earlobe. “What do you do, boy?”

Jagger looked at him for a few seconds, then laid down and covered his head with his paws. I giggled.

“In my defense, I rarely sing,” Quint said from behind the camera.

“But when you do, it’s wise to take protective measures,” said Theo, crouching to pet Jagger. “Good boy! Yes, you are!”

Then he and Quint sat on the sofa and chatted with me for awhile about MICA, my new school. They both saw I was nervous about starting there.

“I don’t know why,” Theo said. “You’re amazingly talented. You’re transferring from Cooper Union, and that’s nothing to sneeze at.”

“MICA is in another league,” I said. “Plus it’s an art school, not an art, architecture, and engineering school. Everyone who goes there is an artist of one kind or another. I think the atmosphere is going to be… different.”

“Do you mean competitive?” Quint asked.

“More like challenging,” I said. “They expect a lot from their students.”

He smiled tenderly. “You expect a lot from yourself, too. Be careful of adding too much pressure, Seb. Your best is all anyone can ask of you.”

“Oui, monsieur.”

Theo changed the subject, and we talked for a few more minutes until I couldn’t swallow a yawn.

“We won’t keep you up any longer, mon chaton,” said Quint. “I know you have to buy your books and things tomorrow before class.”

That was true. Theo looked so sad, though, I said, “I’ll call you again when I get home. Promise.”

“Don’t feel like you need to,” Theo said. “We understand if you’re busy.”

Busy or not, I’d make time. I touched the screen. “I love you both.”

“We love you,” said Quint, Theo echoing him. “Sweet dreams.”

*

They did start sweet. Then they shifted from playing with Jagger in New York to standing in a brown field overgrown with milkweed. All the seed pods—hundreds of them—were bare, dried-out husks. It began to rain, yet my skin stayed dry. I knew I was supposed to be doing something. I couldn’t remember what. I tossed and turned in the sheets as the rain kept falling, the sense of urgency growing stronger and stronger and stronger until I panted myself awake.

There was real rain hitting the windows. I rolled over and checked the time on my phone. Only five AM. I had hours before I needed to be in Baltimore. When I tried to fall asleep again, though, the house felt like one of those milkweed pods. It stretched out around me and creaked in its bones, lifeless.

Don’t be stupid, I thought. You were excited to have this house. Remember how happy you were, putting the Babar portrait upstairs for Zain to find? Yesterday he held you down on this very spot and made you beg for him. Think about that. This house made that possible.

No matter what I did, the restlessness remained. With it came guilt. I’d insisted on moving nearer to Zain, and when I got my wish by disrupting everyone’s lives, was it good enough? Of course not.

Eventually I gave up and watched The Joy of Painting videos on YouTube until it was time to practice my yoga.

*

Baltimore was a quaint little town compared to Manhattan. The MICA campus occupied several blocks of it in a mix of old and new buildings, most of them on either side of a wide, tree-lined avenue. The drizzle of rain stopped me from seeing much of the charm. I’d had no idea where my umbrella was packed, so I pulled my hood up and walked with my head bowed to keep the worst of it off my face.

I arrived on the campus an hour before my first class to give myself plenty of time. Picking up my parking pass and art supplies took longer than I thought, though. There were lines of students at both places doing the same things. Some of them chatted with each other as they waited. I overheard invitations to gallery openings and start-of-semester parties, updates on works in-progress or completed over the winter break, and discussions of class schedules. Many of them talked about dreading the amount of homework that was about to be piled on. As I listened, I squeezed the small “bread doll angel” keychain squishy Theo gave me months ago. I’d attached it to the main zipper pull of my messenger bag before leaving the house this morning.

Zain sent me a text while I was struggling to put the parking sticker on the inside of my car’s rear window. I ignored the vibration until another one came in. Then I huffed, muttering, “You know I’m busy, you jerk,” as I pulled my phone out to see what he wanted.

It was a picture of one kid goat sticking its tongue out at another, followed by the caption, I lick you <3 .

I giggled helplessly as I wrote back, Cute. Is that a pun?

A pun? Moi?! How dare you, he said. And then a second later: Goat luck in class!

Truly awful.

By the time I finished with all my errands, there were only fifteen minutes before my class started, and I suddenly realized I had no idea which way the building stood. I pulled up a map on my phone and rushed along in what I hoped was the right direction. Shielding the screen from the rain with one hand, I kept my eyes glued to the small locator dot to make sure it was coming closer.

“Whoops, watch where you’re walking!”

I stumbled back a pace.

The tall girl that had appeared in front of me out of nowhere hefted her backpack and moved to let me go by. She was bald.

“Dé–désolé,” I said, staring. My mind automatically went to cancer, yet she had a healthy roundness to her face, and bright skin. The lack of hair made her look glamorous rather than frail. She frowned at me, and I realized I was gawking. She probably didn’t speak French, either. “I meant sorry,” I said as I hurried past.

She fell into step beside me. “It’s okay. I wasn’t really paying attention either, TBH, ‘cause I’m almost late for Sophomore Painting. Story of my life!”

That was the same class I was headed towards. I considered whether to say so, but she picked up speed into a half-jogging trot and left me behind.

At least I know I’m going the right way, I thought.

A block further on, I found the white stone Main Building rising regally from its modest surroundings like a smaller cousin of the New York Public Library’s most famous branch. I couldn’t help picturing lion statues on either side of the door.

The lobby did contain statues—of people, not lions—and rows of columns. I dripped rainwater on the marble tiles as I climbed one sweeping staircase, and then another, to the third story. Up there was like entering a different building altogether. The floors were concrete, the walls plain. But when I pushed open the door of the classroom, I gasped. A skylight covered almost the entire ceiling. Even with the clouds and the rain hitting the glass, it flooded the wide space in beautiful, natural light.

Roughly-made wooden tables, each about two feet square, stood dotted around the room, along with empty easels, padded chairs, and large partitions that were simply sections of white wall on wheels. One of them was placed close to the door, with a projector sitting on a table aimed at it, cycling through a slideshow of works from Old Masters up to contemporary painters like Kehinde Wiley. A rotund, middle-aged man chatted with students nearby. He must’ve been the professor.

I slid into the room sideways and glanced around for a place to go. Almost all the students were gathered in groups. The bald girl was standing with two shorter girls at the back of the room. She gave a loud, snorting laugh at something one of them said.

Over her and the hum of other conversations, the professor clapped his hands together and called, “Alright, people, welcome back. Snag a chair and gather round. You know the drill.”

Everyone picked up one of the padded chairs and carried it toward him, then set it down so they were in a loose semi-circle. I quickly grabbed one from the corner and took a seat on the outside edge by the door. My heart was tripping. This was a two-semester course, and they obviously kept the same students together for both halves. Would the professor make me introduce myself as the new guy, the way they do in movies? I held my breath.

But all he said was, “Does anyone want to share something they did over break?”

I kept my hand down as several people spoke about museums they’d visited or things they’d done with their families. Then the professor launched into the slide discussion.

*

Classes at MICA were all several hours long. That was why, with the exception of Wednesdays, I had only one per day, with a break for food midway through. I noticed some of the students pulled out bagged lunches and half-finished canvases to work on while they ate in the classroom. The majority, though, headed downstairs and outside. I followed them like a duckling follows its mother. I had scoped out the dining hall’s online menu yesterday to see the vegetarian options and carb counts, but I wasn’t sure where to find the building itself.

Once they lead me to it, I went through the lines for the various options as quickly as possible. I still needed to locate a bathroom to do my glucose test and bolus after I confirmed the carb counts on the website were accurate.

“Hey, new kid!”

It was the bald girl, stepping out of nowhere to block my path again. I nearly dropped my wrap.

She grinned a crooked grin. “You are a transfer, right?”

Warily, I nodded.

“I thought so. You didn’t look familiar. Want to eat with us?” she asked, pointing to the two girls she’d been talking with earlier, who were sitting at a table across the room.

“Um, thanks,” I said. “But I have plans, actually.”

“Oh, okay,” she said. “Maybe next week?”

“Mm-hm,” I said, hoping she wouldn’t take it as a firm commitment.

She walked away, and I decided to go to my car for lunch. If I ate here, they would see me sitting alone.

*

The rest of the class passed quickly. I drove back to the house—how long before I could think of it as ‘home’?—sat on the floor of my empty studio, and Skyped Theo like I promised. Quint would still be at the hospital. I could call again later to speak with him, during my dinner on the Yard. I didn’t want to make Theo wait that long.

But Quint answered. “Hello, mon chaton. How was your first day?”

I blinked. It took me a moment to place the wall of books behind him. He was sitting in his hospital office. Before I could ask where Theo was, I heard him say, “Quuuuuiiinnt!”

Quint aimed a Look in the direction of the whine. “Is there any chance you’ll behave if I let you out early, young man?”

“Yes,” said Theo. “I promise. Pleeaasse can I talk to Seb?”

Quint nodded, and Theo came over from whatever corner he’d been standing in, dropped straight into Quint’s lap, and snuggled close to him. His ears were pink, but he smiled at me. “Hi.”

“Hi,” I said. “Are, uh, you and Jagger volunteering?”

“No, we’ve just been sort of hanging out all day,” he said, with a one-shouldered shrug. “Quint’s idea.”

Did that mean Quint knew Theo would need extra support, or Quint wanted the company himself? Or both? I bit my lower lip.

“Nothing about this is bad or your fault, Seb,” Quint said, firmly. “We simply wished to spend more time together, and I couldn’t work from home. Answer my question, please. How was your day?”

“It was okay,” I said, still scrutinizing Theo. “Everyone else brought in some work from over break to get critiqued, and the professor did a good job facilitating. We discussed how we’re developing our artistic identities.” Or rather, the rest of the class discussed. I stayed quiet.

“Did you make any friends?” Theo asked.

I shook my head. “I’m not very good at that.” He had been the driving force behind the formation of our own friendship, not me. “Anyway, I have Bradley and them down here.”

“Mm,” said Quint. “That’s true, however, you should think about finding friends at school, too. Perhaps there’s a club you could join?”

“Maybe,” I said, thinking, no way. I am not a joiner.

He smiled. “I understand how you feel, mon chaton. I’m an introvert, too, remember. You don’t need to stay in the club forever, but it could be an opportunity for you to meet people in a social setting.”

“I’ll look into it,” I said, and then covered my mouth as a yawn escaped. “Sorry.”

“Oh, now you’ve done it,” said Theo. “Yawning at four PM? Don’t you know how a Top’s mind works? Right this very second, he’s considering ordering you to take a nap.”

“I was only going to ask how you’re sleeping,” said Quint.

“Fine.”

His eyebrows rose.

I made a face and elaborated, “I had a weird dream and woke up early. I’m sure it was just the nerves of my first day, though.”

“It could have been,” Quint agreed. “Have you told Zain?”

I hadn’t planned to. Now he would check, though. “…I’ll tell him at dinner tonight.”

“Thank you.” He glanced at his watch. “I have a meeting to get to. Angel, don’t keep him on the call too long. I’m sure he has other things to do today.”

Theo promised he wouldn’t and stood to let Quint up, but when the older man moved away, he held onto his hand for a few seconds more, like he didn’t want to be left. I swallowed.

Once I heard a door close, I leaned closer to the camera. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah.” He gave me a half-smile. “Quint and I both just have Empty Nest Syndrome, I think. It’s kind of weird. I found him in your room yesterday, sitting on the bed looking at nothing.”

A lump rose in my throat. Quint always said I was like a son to him. “I’m sorry.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Theo told me, shaking his head. “Baby birds gotta fly sometime.”

“I’m still sorry.” I hesitated a second, then added, “You were in trouble when I called.”

He settled more into Quint’s desk chair and shrugged. “My own fault. I’ve had a headache all day. It’s making me snappy. You didn’t give it to me.”

Stress could have.

“C’mon,” Theo said. “Tell me how Baltimore compares to New York.”

“Well, it’s tiny,” I said, and he laughed.

As we talked, his cheerfulness grew. It poured out of the screen and filled my studio—this empty space with its cold linoleum floor beneath me and bare shelves under all the windows. I didn’t want to stop. Eventually, though, he remembered what Quint said about not taking up too much of my time.

“If he comes back from that meeting and we’re still talking, we’ll both be in for a lecture. I bet you do have stuff to do, right?”

“…I was going to set up my studio today,” I admitted. “If I don’t get to it before dinner with Zain, it’ll have to wait until tomorrow.”

“Yeah, so I should let you go. Thanks for calling, though. Probably has something to do with the Tylenol I took, too, but my headache is gone now.”

“Bien.”

He smiled. “See you tomorrow?”

I promised I’d call in the morning while I was visiting Zain, so they could talk, too. After I hung up, I went to get one of my boxes of art supplies.

Everything seemed to have survived the long journey intact, to my relief. Soon the line of shelves under the windows were covered with repurposed containers of all kinds, from soup cans holding paint brushes to cigar boxes full of oil and acrylic colors, chocolate tins stacked with watercolor pan sets, and a couple gallon-sized buckets of gesso.

Then I ran out of room. I pulled a staple gun from a shipping box and realized there was nowhere to put it. With a sigh, I dropped it back on top of several yards of unstretched canvas in the box and rubbed the end of my nose. There were four more boxes stacked up by the door to empty. I hadn’t even brought everything. Maybe Zain was right about me being a packrat.

Or maybe we just needed to build extra shelves. We did it before, in Hawaii. That first summer was filled with us sweating together in my huge, sun-drenched studio, molding the space with hammers, nails, and salvaged wood until it fit me like a glove. It took twice as long as it needed to because Zain refused to wear a shirt the entire time. Smiling at the memory, I turned to unfold my easel.

From absolutely nowhere, a chime sounded. I almost jumped out of my skin. What the–?!

There were several seconds of silence, and then a rapping sound. Someone was knocking on the front door. My eyes fell closed as I exhaled, thinking, The doorbell, you idiot. I’d never heard it before, but what else could it have been?

And who could be ringing it? Who even knew there were people living here now?

I inched closer to the windows, then craned my neck to peer around the frame, hopefully without revealing myself. Through the front porch windows, I made out a person with silver hair and an elegant bearing to their shoulders. Of course. Our neighbor, Cecilia, the real estate broker who sold the house.

As I considered pretending not to be home, she raised her hand to knock again. Clearly, she wasn’t the sort of person who gave up. My car was parked in the driveway like a bright orange sign announcing my presence, too. With a deep breath, I opened the outer studio door.

She looked over at the noise. When she saw me, she backtracked and descended the front steps to the gravel pathway. Even in jeans and a sweater, she had an air about her like she was wearing a ballgown. “Hello,” she said, crossing the yard. “Cecilia Strong.”

“Um, yes, I remember you.” She was hard to forget.

“And I remember you,” she said. “Zain’s young man, Seb.” Coming to a stop at the bottom of the studio steps, she presented me with a silver foil bread tin covered in plastic wrap. “I brought you a meatloaf.”

“Oh.” I blinked at it. “Thank you.” My fingers held the door handle tighter.

“I won’t ask to come in,” she said, understandingly. “I know you must still be unpacking. I thought a night off from cooking… or however you procure food… might be welcome.”

I forced myself to smile as I reached out and accepted the pan. “Merci.”

She looked surprised for a moment, before saying, “You’re welcome. I’ll leave you to it, then.” Her eyes flicked to the stack of boxes behind me. “I can see I interrupted a project here. The pan is disposable, so you don’t need to trouble yourself about returning it. I know how busy college students can be.”

“Thank you,” I said again, because I couldn’t think of anything else.

With a nod, she stepped back, brushed her hands on her jeans, and then strode off across the yard and disappeared into the woods.

After she’d gone, I looked down through the plastic wrap at probably countless animals’ flesh. What was a meatloaf made out of, anyway? I didn’t even want to know. Zain would eat it, so at least it wouldn’t go to waste. I carried it inside to refrigerate, making a mental note to bring it with me when I went for dinner.

*

Zain was waiting for me outside Dahlgren Hall with the collar of his jacket turned up against the chill. I practically threw the pan towards him. He caught it, and then raised his eyebrows in puzzlement. “What is this?”

“Meatloaf,” I said. “Cecilia Strong brought it over to welcome us to the house.”

He laughed. “Aw, how sweet of her. Did you tell her you’re a vegetarian?”

“Why?” I asked, frowning. “That’d be rude, and I knew you’d eat it.”

“True,” he agreed cheerfully. “It’ll save me some dinner money tonight. C’mon.”

We went inside to Drydock, the restaurant open to mids and the public. Zain plucked his cover off his head and set it in one of the cubbies on the wall near the entrance. A few of the others contained covers, too. I saw several midshipmen eating at the tables spread across the room.

One of them, over by the far end, was Myrick. He sat with a group of mids that all had rows of stripes on their uniforms marking them as company officers. Not a single head was blond.

“Where’s Bradley?” I asked Zain as I followed him to the lines to order and pay for food.

He glanced over his shoulder. “Oh, he’s got an Eagle Scouts’ Association meeting.”

I nodded. Even if Bradley were available, I wasn’t sure he’d be allowed to hang out with all the upperclass officers, so maybe that was best.

Zain watched me pick out a salad from a cooler of grab-and-go items. For himself, he just got a plastic fork and a huge handful of ketchup packets. He carried the pan from Cecilia under his arm like a football until we sat down at a table in an empty corner of the room. I popped the lid off my salad and made a face as he squirted ketchup directly onto the fork and dug it into the meatloaf. “Ewwww. Couldn’t you at least use a plate and a knife, you savage?”

He grunted, lowered his eyebrows, and hunched over the pan. “Tarzan eat with pointy stick!” Then he aimed the tines of the fork at my nose. “You tell Tarzan how day went!”

“I am not Jane,” I said.

“Tarzan think Not-Jane stalling,” he replied, tilting his chin.

Even as my stomach jerked, I had to bite the inside of my cheek to stop my smile. Quickly, I started filling him in on everything that happened from my yoga until I came home.

When I got to lunch, he laughed around a mouthful of meatloaf and shook his head as he swallowed. “Babe, I think rule one of art school is if a strange bald chick wants you to eat with her, you accept. Where else is that going to happen?”

“I didn’t feel like it,” I said, shrugging one shoulder. “It isn’t a big deal.”

Zain snorted. “You realize you pulled a Theo just now? He makes that half-shrug when he knows he did something.”

He does, too. I must’ve picked it up from him. Dammit. “I Skyped him earlier and he and Quint were in the middle of… a thing. That must be why.”

“Suuuurree,” said Zain. He ate another bite of meatloaf. “Okay. You don’t have to join a lunch group on your very first day. Too much overload. Later, though….” He trailed off ominously, then grinned. “Tell me about this Skype call.”

I scrunched up my nose and decided to get it out of the way. “Quint wanted me to let you know that I didn’t sleep very well last night. It was just first-day jitters, though.”

“Yeah?” he asked, his eyes narrowed as he studied me.

I nodded while holding the rest of my body motionless.

“What about second-day jitters? Something’s still bothering you.”

Shifting, I pushed a piece of lettuce around my salad bowl with the fork. My teeth dug into my lower lip. “They were together in Quint’s office even though it was only four-thirty. Theo said Quint brought him to hang out there all day.” I felt my eyes prickle and willed the tears not to fall. “Both of them are having a hard time.”

“That’s natural, and not your fault,” Zain told me. “We all have to adjust to this, right?”

I didn’t answer. Not even when he tipped his head to the side and softly said my name. Talking would break the dam.

Stabbing the fork into the meatloaf, he got to his feet, grinned at me, and walked off. I blinked. He hadn’t made any indication I should follow him. As I watched, he weaved through the tables until he reached the one with Myrick and the other company officers. His smile was aimed at all of them, but he spoke directly to Myrick. I felt Myrick’s gaze land on me for a brief moment. My cheeks flushed. Then he nodded and stood up, and side by side, they started back to the table where I sat trying not to squirm.

While Myrick watched impassively, Zain gathered everything on the table into a plastic bag, plucked his coat off the back of his chair, took my hand, and said, “C’mon, babe.”

I had no choice but to follow as they both headed for the door. Each of them paused by the cubbies to retrieve their covers, but they didn’t put them on. Zain tucked his under his arm without letting go of me.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“Not far,” he said.

I cast an apprehensive glance at Myrick following behind us, then lowered my voice. “Why is he coming?”

“To guard the door.”

The implications of that made my skin burn with embarrassment. I couldn’t look towards Myrick again.

Zain was telling the truth about the distance. We didn’t even go outside. One short flight of stairs, and we were in a dimly-lit room filled with couches. I’d never seen it before on all my trips to the Yard. Were civilians supposed to be here?

Myrick stopped on the threshold. Turning to him, Zain held out the bag of food. “Help yourself to some meatloaf while you wait,” he said. “We shouldn’t be too long.”

“Thanks,” said Myrick. He took the bag and nodded once to me before he shut the door between us.

Zain tugged me over to the nearest couch. It was made of leather. He spread his coat out on the left-hand side of it before sitting down in the middle. “Sorry I can’t cover the whole thing, but beggars and choosers and all that,” he said as he pried my fingers off the button of my jeans and delivered a sharp swat to my right sit-spot.

My gaze flew to Myrick’s shadow, visible through the door’s frosted glass. I was sure he could hear. He hadn’t reacted, though, that I could tell.

Then Zain bared my butt and pulled me over his knee, and my other concerns faded in favor of pressing my face into the lining of his jacket to muffle my yelps as he set to work. His lack of an implement didn’t matter. I was still sore from the bath brush yesterday, and he wasn’t holding back with force or speed. I became a wild thing, flailing in his hold and gasping desperately. But each intake of air brought with it the scent of him from the jacket. The animal part of my brain knew that scent. It overwhelmed my cells and tamed me with the security of being home, being with him. My resistance fell. I broke into gut-wrenching sobs.

He went on for a few seconds more, then turned me over and helped me sit. I clung to the jacket. He settled it over my shoulders so that when he held me tight and rocked me back and forth, I was surrounded by his scent.

After I calmed down to the point where I was only taking uneven breaths with occasional sniffling, he sighed and whispered, “I am so enjoying being able to do this again.”

I lifted my head off his shoulder. “Uh!”

His chest shook with silent laughter. “Oh, put your eyebrows down. You know what I meant.”

Yes. I knew. Between us is sacred space, and never is it more concentrated and potent than when we’re this close.

“So.” He threaded his fingers through my hair. “Quint and Theo needing to adjust to you moving is whose fault now?”

My gaze shifted. “Theo said… he said Quint was in my room yesterday, doing nothing, just sitting on my bed.” I couldn’t stop picturing him there.

Zain grunted softly. “Does Quint know he told you that?”

A little ribbon of warning slithered through my gut. I looked at Zain again and discovered he’d angled his chin. “He didn’t say it to upset me!”

“Of course not, habibi, but–”

I rushed over his words. “He even said I did nothing wrong, and that him getting a headache wasn’t my fault, and– and I’m a baby bird, so–”

“You’re a bird?” Zain asked, laughing now.

“Because they have Empty Nest Syndrome,” I said. “It was a metaphor. Please don’t be mad at him!”

He grinned. “Do I seem mad?”

“No, but you never do,” I said, watching him with dark suspicion. “Don’t get Theo in more trouble.”

“I am not gonna get squirt in trouble.” Easily, he set me on my feet and bent down to untangle my jeans and underwear from around my ankles as he continued to speak. “I am gonna let Quint know the two of you are winding each other up, and together we’ll decide if you should be talking unsupervised before everyone’s adjusted.”

My jaw dropped. I would’ve stepped away if he hadn’t been at that very moment guiding my clothes over my extremely-tender rear end. “We’re adults! You can’t keep us from talking if we want to!”

He stopped in the middle of zipping my fly to give me a look of burning curiosity. “Did someone say you wouldn’t be allowed to talk? Who was it? Was it Myrick? I’ll call him in here and–”

“Theo was only sharing how he and Quint are feeling. If you do this, he’s going to think he’s losing us even more.” My voice broke into a plea. “You can’t, Zain.”

Standing up, he wrapped his arms around me. “Babe, I said Quint and I would decide together. You really believe he’d let it happen if it would affect Theo that way? I just don’t want either one of you unknowingly making a comment that sends the other into a tailspin, like today.”

I huffed. “I was not in a tailspin.”

“Yeah, your tail shows differently,” he replied, and gave me a swat on it before letting go.

The door opened a crack. “Mohyeldin, we have bogeys approaching,” Myrick said. “Should I engage?”

Zain rolled his eyes at me as he said, “No, stand down. We’re all done in here. Right, babe?”

I sighed. He was going to talk to Quint about this no matter what. But he’d been right to point out Quint would never let it happen. “Yes.”

Myrick opened the door wider and jerked his head at us. I could hear footsteps on the stairs now. “Move,” he said. “Seb, put that coat on over your civvies.”

It was still hanging from my shoulders. I got my arms into it with Zain’s help and buttoned it as I scurried after him out of the room. The hem hit at my knees. My jeans and sneakers were clearly visible below. Zain set his cover on my head and smiled. “Just walk like a midshipman.”

Easy for him to say. I tried to stay behind him on the stairs, and keep my head down. I was sure my eyes were pink. The two mids approaching—both female plebes—paused in front of us. My heart froze. But they only saluted Myrick, and once he returned it, they continued on without a backward glance.

We stopped outside the entrance to Drydock, Zain and Myrick standing shoulder to shoulder to block me from view of anyone else as I passed Zain his cover and stripped off his coat. “We are not doing that again!” I said.

“Up to you,” Zain replied. “It’s the closest place to Drydock, but we can take a walk next time if you want. Also, your, uh…” He wiggled his fingers at my waist, and I glanced down to realize neither of us had finished doing up my fly.

My face flamed as I fixed it. I didn’t bother saying there wouldn’t be a next time.

Myrick was gazing off in another direction. “Are you alright, Seb?” he asked, gruffly.

“Y-yes,” I said, blinking at him.

“Don’t worry,” said Zain. “He always looks like this.” He was talking to Myrick, not me. “Appreciate the help.”

Myrick’s dark eyes flicked over me. Then, apparently at least somewhat satisfied, he turned to Zain and offered up the plastic bag of food. “I only had a bite of the meatloaf. It was good, though. Thanks.”

“Sure.” Zain took it back. “See you later.”

Myrick nodded, glanced at me again, and walked off towards the exit.

I frowned as I followed Zain into Drydock. “What do I ‘always look like’?”

With a snort, he said, “You don’t wanna know.”

*

After we finished eating, Zain walked me back to the gate of the Yard and kissed me on the cheek. “Wish I could do more than that, but one of my instructors is just over there,” he murmured, glancing behind me. “Tomorrow morning when you’re here, we’re going to flagrantly violate the no-PDA rule. I’m looking forward to it.”

“As long as you don’t get in trouble,” I said, my brow furrowing.

He simply grinned and said, “Take a nice, long bath tonight, and Skype me before you go to bed.”

“That’ll be during your study period,” I pointed out.

“I’m not a plebe anymore, babe. No one is checking up on me.”

I knew he wouldn’t change his mind, so I sighed and nodded.

*

No one did check on him. That night, at least. I still didn’t want to make a habit of it.

When he answered, he frowned for a moment. “Are you in the dining room?”

I pulled the comforter tighter around my shoulders and nodded. I was lying on my stomach with my elbows propping me up. “I keep forgetting to drag the air mattress upstairs and then it’s too late and I just want to go to bed.”

He shook his head, smiling. “Okay. How was your bath?”

“Nice,” I said, before adding in a grumble, “Except the hot water made my butt feel like it was on fire again.”

“Good,” said Zain. I made a face at him, and he interlocked his hands on his head as he tipped his chair backwards. “Did you put in bubbles?”

“We don’t have any. I used epsom salt, though.”

“There’s a Lush store at the mall. You should pick up some bath bombs tomorrow.”

“Maybe,” I said, not wanting to say that we couldn’t afford to spend money on frivolous things until the house was furnished. “What did Quint say?”

“I’ve only texted him to call me when Theo’s not around,” Zain said. “Don’t want him overhearing and getting upset before we’ve decided anything.”

“So… you just wanted me to Skype to see how my bath went?” I asked. I’d assumed he would have Quint’s answer by now.

“No, I wanted to watch you fall asleep.” His eyes narrowed as he grinned. “Which sounds a bit creepy, now that I say it out loud. Whatever. Get comfy. I’m your sandman tonight.”

I stared at him for a moment, but despite the smile, he wasn’t joking. My stomach tightened. I know how much clearer he can see me when I’m deep in slumber. Slowly, I shifted to my side, folding the pillow in half for added support. Even more slowly, I closed my eyes, only to pop them open again when I heard him thump the chair down onto four legs. He was leaning close to his computer screen, like I was a specimen under a microscope. I squirmed. “This is going to look strange when JJ comes back.”

“He’s used to me. Hush.” With one hand, he made a sprinkling gesture, accompanied by a whooshing noise that might’ve represented falling sand.

“Can you at least talk so I don’t feel as weird?”

“Sure. I have to study Arabic, anyway,” he said, taking a book down off his desk shelf and flipping it open. “Shut your eyes.”

I did.

My Arabic is beginner-level at best. I could pick out a few words, but not enough to make sense of it. And as he went on, the meaning was muddled even more because he kept interrupting himself in English with tangents that didn’t seem to connect together. His voice meandered this way and that, like a butterfly in a meadow, until it became just a hum in the background of my dreams.

*

What felt like half a minute later, a roaring crash of thunder jolted me to the surface of consciousness once more. My eyelids turned pinkish-red with the accompanying lightning. I opened them and saw my laptop’s screen had automatically dimmed after Zain ended the Skype call. The sound of his voice was replaced by the rain lashing the house. More thunder rumbled farther off.

But it’s January.

Isn’t it?

I couldn’t remember. It had felt like late autumn in my dream, with all the dead milkweed. I drew my finger across my laptop’s trackpad and squinted at the date when it brightened. Yes, January. Thunder in January means frost in April.

Only an old wives’ tale. Something felt cold, though. Another flash of lightning made me tense and pull the covers nearly over my head.

“Oh mes dieux, don’t be ridiculous,” I hissed at myself. “You like storms.”

But I felt very small and alone in the middle of this house. Every shadow grew darker in the wake of the lightning. The cold lurked in it.

“Stop that,” I said, sternly as I could, and I didn’t know if I was talking to the shadows or my own imagination. It had to be my imagination. The energies of this house were positive from the first moment I stepped inside, and I had cleansed it with juniper smoke it before we even finalized the sale, just for good measure. I shivered under the comforter. “It is not haunted.”

Then I got up and padded to the living room to dig through the unpacked boxes for my herbs and bowl.

*

Smoke-cleansing the entire house took awhile. I wanted to be sure I covered everything, from the basement and attic to all the strange nooks and crannies that came with a building this old. The last spaces to purify were the closed-in cubbies built under the lowest part of the sloped ceilings in each bedroom, like tiny closets with half-sized doors. But the one in the guest bedroom had been varnished shut at some point. Zain and the house inspector had both tried to pry it loose before we bought the place, and failed. So by the gray light of the sun hovering below the horizon, I found my old canister of turpentine and carefully dissolved enough of the varnish at the edges of the cubby door to free it.

It came open with a dreadful squeak of hinges. I coughed as the turpentine fumes mixed with the dust inside. Even the cobwebs looked like they hadn’t seen a spider in years. As soon as I’d properly cleansed each corner, I cracked a window open enough to ventilate the room without letting in too much rain, and then went downstairs to my yoga mat, feeling slightly better.

*

Zain stood by the statue of Bill the Goat, just outside the security checkpoint of the visitors center. He had one hand in his overcoat pocket and the other holding his phone to his ear. When he saw me, he smiled, then narrowed his eyes. “Hang on, Quint. Gotta find out why Seb just walked up looking like death warmed over.”

“Don’t say that!” I hissed, hopefully too quietly for Quint to hear. “He’ll be worried now!”

“He’s allowed,” Zain replied, unconcerned, dropping his phone to his side. He tilted his head and began to circle me, as if he needed to study me from all angles. A tingle went down my spine, straight to my still-sore bottom. I couldn’t help a nervous glance over my shoulder. Clicking his tongue, he came back around to my front and asked, “What happened to my Brat? This is not how I left him nine hours ago.”

“I’m alright.”

He snorted.

I shuffled my feet on the cobblestone walkway. “The storm woke me up. It was loud.”

“And you couldn’t fall asleep again?” Zain guessed.

“No, I slept a little.” I had laid down for half an hour after eating breakfast. I was sure I’d dozed off at some point there.

“Hmm,” he said, stepping close enough to make me worry he’d smell juniper smoke, even though I’d bathed. Without looking away from my face, he brought his phone up. “Quint, I’m back. Trouble sleeping still. Did you wanna talk to him? …Yeah I think that’s best.”

His hand moved the phone towards me. I reached for it, grateful for an excuse to turn away, but he didn’t let it go. I wound up hanging onto his wrist as he held the phone to my ear. I made a face at him. He grinned.

“Seb?” Quint asked. “Are you there?”

“Hi,” I said, tugging fruitlessly on Zain’s fingers wrapped around the phone.

Quint’s voice grew warmer. “Good morning, mon chaton. First of all, Theo and I are both alright. When he found me in your room, I was thinking of all the memories it holds now, and how lucky I am to have them. We miss you, but that doesn’t mean anything bad is happening. Second, if Theo says something that upsets you, I want you to tell me. Understood?”

“Yeah.” I was now using both hands, and Zain was silently laughing at me. We must have looked insane to anyone passing by.

“Pardon?” Quint asked, gently.

I stilled, the scowl dropping off my face to be replaced by a flush. Zain watched with mild curiosity as I replayed Quint’s words in my head. So he hadn’t been as melancholy as Theo thought? Or he’s downplaying it.

“Oui, monsieur.”

“Thank you. I hope this wasn’t making you lose sleep.”

“No, it wasn’t that,” I said. “I mean, it wasn’t anything, really. Just… just a thunderstorm.”

“Hmm,” he said, an echo of Zain.

I bit my lip for a moment before asking both of them, “Will Theo and I be able to talk still?”

“Yes,” Quint said, while Zain nodded. “Without supervision, provided you keep your word to me.”

My shoulders went slack with relief. “Oh, I will, I promise.”

“Good. I’ll let you get back to Zain, then. I have rounds to make. Love you, mon chaton.”

“Love you, too,” I said. “Bye.”

Zain took the phone away, glanced at the screen, and then rested his forearms on my shoulders and tipped his forehead close to mine. His eyes sparkled like smoky quartz. “So it wasn’t worrying about Quint and Theo at all, just a thunderstorm, huh?”

I fidgeted. In truth, neither of those things were what kept me up last night. But how could I tell him that I felt uncomfortable in the house we worked so hard to get?

Obviously confident he was right about my worry for Quint and Theo being the cause of my insomnia—I can always count on Zain’s confidence—he didn’t press through my silence. He just kissed the tip of my nose and said, “Next time, call me.”

“Oh, JJ will love that,” I huffed.

“My problem, not yours,” he said, airily. “Your problem will be what happens if you lose more sleep.” He smiled. “Remember I can get my hands on you every single day now, and I’ve scoped out plenty of private spots on the Yard to sneak away to.”

My cheeks went warm. “I remember.”

“Aaannnnd?”

Making a face, I mumbled, “Fine, I’ll wake you and JJ up in the middle of the night next time.” Then I changed the subject. “Theo wanted to see you this morning.”

“What a coincidence! I want to see him, too!” he said. “I’m cold, though. Let’s go inside first.”

We went into the building behind the Bill the Goat statue. It housed the swimming pool. A few mids were doing laps, but Zain brought me to a small, empty gym off the upstairs gallery and sat us down on the bleachers against the wall. After what he’d just said, I couldn’t help imagining getting spanked there. Would he be too worried about how much it would echo? Or would he simply use a quiet implement, like a loop of cord? I really didn’t want to find out.

Theo was laying on the couch looking half-asleep when he answered, but his face brightened as he saw Zain. “Hey! Lyra has put hearts on every single picture I posted from Disney with you in it. I think she’s printing them out and adding them to her scrapbook.”

Zain laughed. “She’s so cute. How are you, though, squirt?”

“Good. I’m going to the studio to start recording a new song today. Sort of a rock folk ballad thing.”

“Sounds cool.” Zain slid closer to me and put his arm around my shoulders. “So, even though you miss Seb, you’re still functioning? The world hasn’t ended? There’s nothing for him to feel guilty or worried about?”

Theo frowned. “Seb, were you?”

“Um, duh,” said Zain, before I could deny it. “Have you met him?”

Sighing, Theo said, “Well, I told him yesterday that we were fine.”

“He did,” I said to Zain.

To my surprise, he didn’t bring up Theo’s other comments, the ones about Empty Nest Syndrome. Maybe he was leaving that to Quint.

“Work on believing him then, habibi.”

“Yeah,” Theo said. “I mean, I wasn’t going to mention this because I didn’t want you feeling like you were in the way when you lived here, but there are benefits to having more privacy. Earlier, Quint made the most interesting sounds when I surprised him in the shower–”

“Ew!” I exclaimed. “Theo!”

They both laughed.

*

Class that day went from four to ten with a break for dinner, which I ate in the classroom while reading a book and answering occasional texts from Zain. Most of the students seemed in no hurry to get to their dorms after it let out, despite the hour. They stood in groups under the lamps that lined the pathways, chatting happily. I skirted around the edges of those illuminated pools, as if I might slip and drown by getting too close.

Halfway to my car, I found a group surrounding a blanket laid on the ground, with an old computer monitor in the center of it. Among them was the bald girl from my Sophomore Painting class. She took a small sledgehammer from a guy next to her, raised it high, and brought it down in a swing that smashed the glass of the monitor. The other girls shrieked.

“Yes, Jordan!” said the guy. “One more good one should do it.”

I didn’t stick around to find out what sort of art they were making.

*

My headlights swept over the side of the house as I took the last curve of the driveway. Briefly, they illuminated a cardboard box sitting at the top of the front steps. I frowned and turned the engine off. We hadn’t ordered anything since moving. It must’ve been meant for a neighbor. I got out, thinking I’d have to bring it to the right house tomorrow. Early, before anyone was awake, so I wouldn’t need to ring an unfamiliar doorbell.

But when I went up the steps and squinted at the address label in the moonlight, I saw, beneath the SAME-DAY DELIVERY designation, where the name of the recipient should’ve been, the words Mon Chaton. I huffed, thinking, Didn’t I tell you no housewarming gifts? in the direction of New York. Then I tried to lift the box, just to nearly drop it onto my own fingertips. It weighed at least fifteen pounds. “Quiiiint,” I moaned under my breath as I hefted it indoors. “What did you do?”

I brought it to the kitchen, set it on the only clear counter, and cut through the tape with a knife. Inside, I found a white noise machine and a gray quilted blanket wrapped in plastic. I assumed the heavy item was beneath the blanket, until I picked it up. All the quilted sections were filled with small, hard pellets, like beans. How strange. Hugging it to my body, I lowered it to the floor the way I used to with the big bags of goat feed on my parents’ farm. I had always found moving them to be oddly satisfying.

The only thing at the bottom of the box was the packing slip and a card with a typewritten message.

Mon chaton,

I hope these help you sleep. The research on the use of weighted blankets to treat insomnia is limited, but promising. Theo also highly recommends a podcast called Sleep With Me, which he uses when I am out of town.

Love,
Quint

I looked at the blanket again. Now I remembered seeing similar ones advertised on Facebook. They weren’t only for insomnia. Supposedly, they helped with anxiety too.

Stop it, I told my squirming insides. He doesn’t know about the house. And maybe it would help.

*

Zain squinted at the blanket when I called him like he’d made me promise to do again. I had it pulled up to my chin as I lay on my side on the air mattress—still downstairs. Zain was in his rack, holding his phone so I couldn’t see anything other than his face and pillow. He was wearing earbuds, which probably meant JJ was in the room, too. “Quint told me what he was sending,” he said. “How’s it feel?”

“Like I have a heavy blanket on top of me.”

“Seeee-eeeeb,” he singsonged as if I hadn’t answered, though clearly he’d heard every word. I pressed my cheek into my pillow on reflex, for protection, and he made a soft tsk noise. Hurriedly, I shifted. He waited, silent and amused.

I rubbed the edge of the blanket between my thumb and fingers as I searched for the right words. “It’s, um, nice. Sort of soft, even pressure… like I’m deep underwater, but anchored.”

Smiling, he said,  “Sounds like a full-body hug.”

“I guess.”

“Think it’ll help you sleep?”

“Maybe.” I shrugged. The truth was that the weight made me feel safer, protected, as if it provided more of a barrier than our comforter did between my skin and… and what? I glanced at the shadows in the corner of the dining room. “Je ne sais pas.”

“Let’s find out, then,” Zain said. “Close ‘em.”

I sighed and closed my eyes.

He stopped talking—probably to keep JJ happy—but he held the phone so close to his face, I could hear his breathing, could almost believe the pressure of the blanket was him lying on top of me like he does sometimes, holding me in place as securely as his best ropework. And for the first time since the move, I slept through the night.

*

My Wednesday class, Color Abstraction, let out earlier than any other. By three in the afternoon, I was back at the house, with hours of emptiness before I could meet Zain for dinner. I finished a couple of sketches for a homework assignment, then gathered some dust rags, went upstairs, and cleaned the cobwebs out of that cubby. It smelled only of old wood when I was done. There was no visible sign of the turpentine, either, once I closed the door. Unless I told him, Zain would assume it was still sealed shut. I tried not to linger on that thought.

It was only four now, the start of his drill practice. Sighing, I went downstairs to find a Bob Ross video on YouTube. It would do until we unpacked my DVDs and the television.

*

Milkweed growing like brambles. Stems matted together, dried seed pods cracked open. Empty. Growing over me, my body pinned to the muddy ground, suffocating. Low orange sky, like a thunderstorm coming on. Had to get free. Had to… something. What? I thrashed. White sap leaking, oozing from the crushed leaves. Feet kicking, shoulders tearing roots from soil. Throwing the knotted mass off and sitting up with a gasp.

On the air mattress, in the middle of the to-be dining room, with Bob Ross calmly explaining how to use a palette knife on the laptop next to me. The video was only minutes further along than I remembered it being. I stared at the weighted blanket I’d just heaved onto the floorboards, and I tried to get my breath back.

Not again.

No. I just needed to clear my head. Closing the laptop, I went to put on shoes and a coat.

*

In the woods, the wet, earthy scent of rotting leaves rose from the ground like morning fog, and the sunlight was dappled gold. My gnawing unease faded away as the house disappeared behind me. I sat down with my back against a tree trunk and shut my eyes to meditate.

A few minutes later, my peace was interrupted by something moving through the bush. The noises were so quiet, I assumed it was an animal and paid no mind, until Cecilia Strong stepped out of the undergrowth yards away. She was wearing the most casual clothing I’d ever seen her in: khakis pants, a flannel shirt, and a vest covered in pockets. She looked equally surprised to see me there.

“Oh, hello.”

I scrambled to my feet. “Sorry, is this your property?”

“No, it’s state land here. You’re perfectly welcome to sit on it,” she said, before getting distracted by something on the ground. I watched her bend down and pluck a clump of mushrooms from the dirt. She examined it, then held it out towards me. “Have you seen any others like this?”

I blinked. “N-no. Are they poisonous?”

“Quite the contrary,” she said, briskly. “Would you like to taste them? I have enough to sauté now.”

I wasn’t sure what to say to that. Cecilia apparently thought I didn’t trust her word.

“They’re known as oyster mushrooms, and they’re greatly used in oriental cooking. Come home with me and I’ll show you in my field guide.”

“It’s not that,” I said, shaking my head. “I’ve gone foraging before. I-I know you wouldn’t offer them to me if you weren’t sure. But you must have spent a long time collecting them. I don’t want to take any.”

“I collect more than I need,” she said. “I’m semi-retired now, and I enjoy being outdoors. It won’t take me long to replace what you eat. Come on, now’s about the right time for an afterschool snack.”

Without waiting for an answer, she turned and walked off through the woods. It seemed rude not to follow.

In only a few hundred feet, the trees thinned and gave way to neatly-cut grass, and I got my first view of her house. It was larger than ours; brick on the lower level and white siding above, with a clothesline going from the screen porch to a pole standing in the middle of a planter made from an old tractor tire laid on the ground. In the January cold, nothing was growing, and the grass had a raw sienna tint, but it looked well-maintained.

She led me through a side door into her garage. The scent of sawdust filled it, mixed with… dried herbs? I squinted upwards in the low light, and after a few seconds, I could make out the bundles of plants hanging above me. Cecilia crossed to a beat-up refrigerator in the corner next to a woodworking table. She removed something wrapped in wax paper, then went to another door that opened onto a bright, airy kitchen with a sitting room through the archway beyond. I followed her inside, copying her example and carefully scraping my shoes clean on the mat before I stepped onto the cherry hardwood.

“Have a seat,” she said, pointing to a stool at the island counter. “I’ll put these on to sauté. It’s a shame milkweed isn’t in season. The pods are delicious stuffed with wild mushroom.”

My milkweed dream replayed in my mind, striking with such vividness it momentarily overpowered her words. I pinched my wrist underneath my medical alert bracelet until the pain brought me back to the present. She was looking at me like she had asked a question.

“S-sorry, I didn’t catch that,” I admitted.

“I asked if you’re enjoying the meatloaf.”

“Oh! It was delicious.” Both Zain and Myrick had said so, so I wasn’t lying.

She smiled. “You already finished it, then. I had a feeling, knowing how much young men can eat from my experience with my own boys. There’s another in the freezer you can take home with you. I’ll write down the directions to heat it.”

My fingernails dug into my skin again. “You really don’t have to give us any,” I said.

“Yes, but I hate cooking for one, so I make several of them at a time and then they fill up my freezer,” she said as she unwrapped mushrooms and began to slice them with a chef’s knife. “You and Zain may as well eat them up.”

I felt a blush starting and was glad she had her back to me. What could I do that would dissuade her? I looked around, as if I would find the perfect excuse hiding somewhere.

A cat poked its head in from the sitting room, sniffing the air with interest. It had the most beautiful frosted silver fur, with darker gray on its face and legs. When it noticed me, though, it pinned its ears back and stared. Up to that point in my life, I couldn’t say I had ever seen a cat look offended. This one did. It let out a little hiss before bounding away.

Cecilia glanced over at the sound. “Don’t mind Estelle,” she said. “I often think she only tolerates my company because I bottle-fed her from a kitten.”

“She’s gorgeous,” I said.

“And she knows it!” Cecilia replied. “Of all the cats I’ve ever had, she is by far the most stuck-up. Do you like animals?”

“I love them,” I said, and then, somehow, I was talking about my parents’ farm instead of the meatloaf.

*

Zain laughed when I thrust the pan at him outside Dahlgren Hall. “More? She must really think you don’t eat well enough.” He shook his head and looked me straight in the eyes. “If only she knew.”

A small tremor went through my stomach. “She put it in my hands just as I was leaving,” I attempted to explain. “What was I going to do? Drop it on her doorstep?”

“You were at her house?” he asked, surprised.

I sighed and, as we went inside to find our table at Drydock, I told him about meeting Cecilia in the woods. “She’s nice. She even loaned me her Maryland field guide.”

“I’m glad you’re making a friend,” he said, tearing open a ketchup packet for the meatloaf, “but have you thought about playing with kids your own age? Hey, has that bald girl invited you to lunch again?”

“No, I only saw her once, last night, with a group of people destroying a computer for some sort of project,” I said. “And she’s not my age. I’m older than most college sophomores.”

He rolled his eyes. “Oh, yeah, clearly you’re far too mature to have fun joining in with such hijinks. Gotta leave all the shenanigans and tomfoolery to the young’uns.”

I huffed. “I already said if she asks me to lunch, I’ll go.” Not that I could imagine Jordan ever taking notice of me again.

“Technically, you didn’t,” Zain replied, grinning. “Just like you didn’t promise to tell Cecilia you’re a vegetarian, but you’re gonna do both those things anyway.”

I blinked and shifted in my seat. Zain smoothly changed the subject without waiting for my agreement. He didn’t need it. The decision was made.

*

Luckily for me, Jordan wasn’t in my classes for the rest of the week. Unluckily, Cecilia was not so easy to avoid. She came over bearing another aluminum foil pan the next afternoon. I really did try to say something. “Cecilia… I appreciate your kindness,” I started, holding the pan and looking at the top of the meatloaf through the plastic wrap.

“It isn’t kindness,” she said.

That threw me off. “It’s not?”

“No. I told you I hate cooking for one. I miss having my children near. We used to get together for dinner every Sunday. Feeding you and Zain makes me feel I’m taking care of someone like that again.”

I swallowed. She’d mentioned having sons before. Hesitantly, I asked, “Where are your kids?”

Smiling, she said, “Their location changes quite often. Army and Air Force, you see.”

“Oh.”

“That’s another reason,” she went on. “Military families have to support each other, don’t we? As for the third reason… I’m glad someone finally bought this house and is planning to breathe some new life into it. I’ve always liked the place.”

After that, I couldn’t keep refusing the meatloaf. I put it in the freezer and told myself Zain never specified when I was supposed to tell her.

Maybe because of that, or maybe because of her words about the house, or both, but I felt more guilty than ever that I couldn’t seem to be happy. The weighted blanket and white noise machine helped me sleep through the night, yet always, the milkweed filled my dreams, and I didn’t like to be in the house at all during the day. I spent most of the time I wasn’t in classes out exploring the woods while I counted down the hours until I could visit Zain on the Yard again. Saturday was very slow to come.

When it finally arrived, and he followed me through the front door carrying his weekend duffle bag, he brought peace and happiness with him like Apollo drawing the sun across the sky. I turned to him, smiling.

He smiled back. His, though, had a wicked edge. “Do you need to eat something before we get started, my boy?”

I blinked as more joy flooded through me, along with a spike of sweet arousal. He’d given no warning at all on the whole drive home, and he only asks if I need food when he’s planning something particularly intense. I thought back to the small lunch I’d eaten before leaving to pick him up. Doing some rapid calculations, I said, “I should probably have a snack, sir.”

“Go on, then,” he said. “I’ll be back in a sec.” He left his bag at the foot of the stairs and went up.

A few minutes later, he rejoined me in the kitchen wearing boxer-briefs and a UC Santa Cruz sweatshirt Keegan gave him years ago. Standing in the dining room doorway, he said, “You know, I’m starting to think maybe you have an exhibitionist kink and that’s why you haven’t brought the mattress to the bedroom yet.”

I rolled my eyes. “Very funny. I just haven’t had time.”

“Less distance to carry you, I guess,” he replied, and then he leaned one shoulder against the wall, crossed his arms, and proceeded to watch me eat an apple, his eyes hooded and promising, while I tried not to drool.

*

I woke up gradually, my eyelashes barely parting as my consciousness returned. Every muscle beneath my skin was still singing with pleasure, but the ropes were gone from my wrists, so I must have been out for a few minutes at least. Through my lashes, I could see Zain’s face, close to mine and unnaturally serious. His gaze was scanning over me like he was taking inventory of my freckles. Then, the moment he noticed I was awake, he grinned wide.

“How are you, babe?”

I shoved away the small worry and answered honestly. “Good. Wonderful. Fantastique.”

“Same. Except I’m starving. Think you could maybe find it in your kind, generous heart to get up and make me some of your delicious banana pancakes?”

Huffing, I punched his shoulder—though without a lot of force. “Make them yourself, lazy.”

His eyes narrowed. “Disrespectful.”

“Mmph,” I said, burrowing into the blankets more.

He groaned, but got up. I could hear him opening and closing cupboards and rummaging through packing boxes. Then there were a few seconds of silence.

“Babe?”

His tone made me open my eyes again. I rolled over on the air mattress and peered through the doorway. “Yeah?”

“There’s a third meatloaf in the fridge,” he said, like I might not know.

“Cecilia…” I trailed off helplessly.

He laughed. “You still didn’t tell her.”

“You can eat it!” He couldn’t understand how hard that woman was to say no to!

“So not the point,” he said, shaking his head and smiling as he advanced. He flopped down head-to-toe with me, dug under the end of the mattress, and sat up. The bath brush was in his hand.

I shot upright too. “What the hell is that doing down here?!”

“Thought I’d keep it nearby, just in case.”

Before I could get my feet under me to escape, he hooked his elbow around my neck. The knuckles of the hand holding the bath brush rubbed back and forth on the top of my head. He was actually giving me a noogie!

“Oh my gods, I hate you so much,” I said, trying to struggle free.

“Love you too, brat.” He kissed my forehead, and then the next thing I knew, I was across his lap.

*

“Okay, it’s been ten minutes. Wanna try being verbal?”

Ten minutes since he stopped spanking or since I stopped crying? I had no idea, despite the large gap between the two. Technically, I was still crying, if you counted sniffles and hiccupping breaths I kept smothering in Zain’s shoulder. We were laying down. Rather than try to move me once he was done, he’d simply stretched out beside me again and gathered my body close. One of his hands was gently cupped over my bare bottom. The heat of it must’ve scalded his palm.

“Habibi? Just a couple of words?”

“Forest fire,” I said, muffled by his shirt.

He shifted downward so he could look into my eyes. “Are you feeling low?”

I was confused for a moment, until the voice in my head began to scold. Of course he’s worried about that! You went low from the bath brush earlier this week, and then you go and act nonsensical again. Why can’t you just talk like a normal person?

“D–désolé, I promise I’m lucid. I only meant–”

“That we burned out all the undergrowth, yeah.” Smiling at my surprise, he ran his fingertips softly from my back to my thigh and asked, “What’s coming up clearer now?”

I rubbed tears off my face and took a steadier breath. “You wouldn’t have asked me to tell Cecilia by myself if you thought she’d react badly.”

“True. She might call you a silly goose for not telling her earlier, but you can handle that, right?”

“Yes. I just…I don’t want her to feel like I didn’t appreciate it, or to stop coming around, because she’s–” I bit my lip to stop the words from falling out.

“Ah-ah!” Zain patted my bare rear end. “None of that.”

So instead, I shifted closer into the crook of his neck, my eyes trained on his heart tattoo as it slowly rose and sank with his breath. My throat was filled with rocks. I rasped, “She’s… she’s one of the only things that– that m-made this place feel like a h-home.”

“What does it feel like otherwise?” he asked, sounding curious.

The tears started to fall again. There was no point in hiding it now, much as I wanted to. He’d only return to spanking. “Big and empty and c-cold. I wake up every night and there’s shadows all around like creatures.” I pressed my mouth to his shoulder as the sobs fought their way out. “Je suis désolé. I don’t understand why I’m not happy here!”

“Oh, my sweet, beautiful boy.” For a few moments, his arms squeezed around me, keeping me afloat in the sea of guilt. Then he moved. “Up.”

I lifted my head and blinked away tears to watch in confusion as he got to his feet. When I didn’t follow, he reached down, took my hand, and pulled.

“Up, habibi. We’re moving this air mattress to the bedroom.”

“Now?” I asked, struggling to untangle my legs from the blankets.

“Yep.” He shook his head. “I should’ve made you do it days ago. Wasn’t thinking.”

I finally stood, unsteady after so long horizontal and still perplexed. “Why does it matter?”

“Because I said so, of course,” he replied with a grin. “C’mon.”

He didn’t even let me get dressed first. This was full-on Taking Charge Zain with a laser focus on what he’d decided to be the best solution to the problem. I knew better than to argue. We each grabbed an end of the mattress, flipped it on its side, and hauled it up the stairs.

It was much easier than I thought it would be. Once we’d brought it into the bedroom and laid it on the floor under the window facing the backyard, I felt rather silly for leaving it in the dining room for so long. Zain barely waited a second before turning around and heading out the door again. “Stay here,” he commanded over his shoulder.

So I stood with my arms wrapped around me against the chill for another minute, until he returned carrying the weighted blanket and our pillows.

“Okay, lay down.”

I obeyed, wincing as my sore bottom touched the mattress and then quickly turning onto my side. Zain dropped the pillows and, with a little grunt of effort, spread the weighted blanket over me from neck to foot. I wiggled. “Z, I don’t need–”

“Hush.” He shut the bedroom door before flopping next to me again and lifting my head to shove a pillow under it. “There,” he said, apparently satisfied with his work.

I sighed. “There, what?”

Rather than answer, he took a few seconds to get comfortable and to prop himself up with his elbow. Then he smiled at me, full of sunshine. “Look around. We still need a real bed, ASAP, but this is a lot better, right? Than sleeping in a dining room with no doors and a bunch of boxes stacked up in the corners? No wonder you felt uneasy all night.”

I frowned. Could he be right? Had that really affected me so much? Even more ridiculous, was the solution truly this simple? I doubted it, somehow. Yet… when I did look around, beyond his warm brown eyes…. Three walls were close enough to touch, and the ceiling met in sloping angles overhead, like the room was made to cradle the bed. I felt… sheltered.

“It… is better,” I said, but some of my uncertainty made it into my voice.

“Give it a while,” he suggested. Reaching out, he rested his hand on my hip. “Fifteen minutes, to start. Staring contest time!”

I groaned. “My eye contact has been fine!”

“You’re just scared I’m gonna win.”

“You always win,” I muttered.

He smirked and patted my rear end, which even over the weighted blanket, created a powerful motivation to cooperate. I met his eyes quickly.

“Fifteen minutes,” he repeated, and then we both lapsed into silence.

I have no idea how he keeps track of the time when we do this. Seconds fade into eternity for me. The pitch black of his pupils and the warm, earthy sparkle of his irises, the beauty of which I’ve never managed to adequately capture in paint, become my world. My heart beats fast as I lay it bare for him to examine, to find the flaws and the secrets and hold them in his hands. Any hint of hiding, any waver in my gaze, will not be tolerated. And there is safety in that.

The intimacy cloaking me was almost as tangible as the blanket when at last he swept forward to press a kiss to my lips and murmur, “Good job, babe.” Then he rolled away onto his knees. “Man, I’m starving. We can go tell Cecilia the truth after I have a snack.”

I made a face. “Can it be tomorrow instead?”

He stopped climbing to his feet to give me a look with his chin tipped pointedly.

“So I can bake her something,” I explained swiftly, “as a thank-you. I’ve been planning to.”

“You can’t bake tonight?” he asked.

“We don’t have any ingredients. I need to go grocery shopping. And I need time to make puff pastry.”

He ran his tongue between his teeth as he thought it over. Finally, he said, “First thing tomorrow.”

Nodding in agreement, I pushed the blanket off and knelt as well. “I’ll go pick up everything now, so I can get started.” Then I leaned over and hugged him. “Thank you,” I said, meaning for all of it—not only the clemency but untangling my head and giving me this safe space filled with nothing except the feeling of him.

When I drew back, his smile told me he knew. “No problem, brat.”

*

Two large grocery bags fill the hatchback of my Fiat. I had to hold the second one to keep it from spilling out into the parking lot while I reached for the rear door overhead. The moment I managed to safely close it, my phone buzzed. It was a Skype call from Theo. I picked up as I went around the car to the driver’s side. “Hey.”

He looked caught off guard. “You answered! I was expecting you and Zain to be… occupied.”

I blushed. As if I had to prove my innocence, I spun around so the Safeway sign was visible behind me on the building across the parking lot. “I’m grocery shopping. Zain’s at the house.”

Theo smiled and stretched a bit. He was lying on the couch. “Mmf. I’m flying solo too. Quint got called into the hospital and I’m bored.” While he spoke, I was swinging open my car door and sitting down. My lips pressed together reflexively when my tender rear end made contact. Of course, Theo noticed. He looked sympathetic and morbidly curious at the same time. “Hairbrush?”

My face heated again as I quickly shut the door before the family getting into their minivan a yard away could overhear. But to my surprise, I didn’t mind telling Theo. I kind of liked the opportunity to grumble, in fact. “Bath brush,” I said, darkly. “It’s his new favorite.”

“Oof. I have never been more happy that Quint is not inventive.”

“Yeah.”

“So what happened?”

“It was a stress thing.” I pulled on my seatbelt, looking down to buckle it even though I could’ve done it by touch alone. “He’s been, um, very… active in squashing that.”

Theo snorted. “Yeah, Quint’s all over me, too.” He rolled his eyes and grinned. “Tops. They don’t do change well, do they?”

I giggled weakly. It sounded like Quint had things in hand. That was good. Still, I hoped Theo hadn’t needed to be spanked as much as I had over the past week.

His gaze softened into a mirror of my concern. “Did it, y’know, help?”

I nodded. “For now. I’m not sure how long it’ll last.”

“Ah, there’s the rub,” he said, with a sigh. “Is it just schoolwork, or are you still not sleeping well?”

Should I tell him about the house now that Zain was taking steps to fix it? Or would it make him feel worse about me moving to know I wasn’t as happy as I’d claimed I would be, like I’d abandoned him for no good reason? I couldn’t risk it. “Sleep’s improving,” I said, truthfully.

He brightened. “Yeah? I meant to ask, did you try that podcast I recommended?”

I nodded. “It’s nice. It reminds me of Zain when he’s on a ramble, kinda. And the blanket is helping too, but don’t tell Quint that.”

Laughing, he said, “Right, don’t want him to think he can just buy you presents whenever he wants.”

I made a face.

“Well, anyway,” he said, still smiling, “I was only calling to say hi. I’ll let you stop using your data and take your groceries home now.”

Biting my lip, I studied his expression carefully. “You won’t be lonely?”

“Nah, Jags is keeping me company.” He panned the camera down to show the dog sprawled over his chest and legs. “And if I get up the energy, I can walk to Zeggy’s for dinner.”

“Okay,” I said, feeling better. At least he had a warm body to cuddle.

*

I returned to discover Zain had unpacked the entire kitchen while I was gone.

“We can rearrange things later, if you want. I kinda tried to follow the layout we have in Hawaii,” he said, opening doors to show me stacks of plates and bowls. But my gaze was more drawn to the empty counters and the floor where the boxes had been piled. The room looked far from lived-in, but it was getting somewhere. It felt light as a cloud.

“Merci,” I said, and my voice almost broke.

In a millisecond, he caught me close. “Hey, hey, it’s okay. See, I knew telling you not to unpack anything other than your studio this week had been a mistake. I’m sorry, habibi.”

“Non, don’t apologize!” I wrapped my arms around him in return. “I’m glad we’ve waited to do most of it together. This place is for both of us.”

“Yes,” he agreed. “And now you can make the kitchen yours, too, by baking in it. What are you whipping up, anyway?”

“Mom’s raspberry pain au chocolat,” I said, adding, “And yes, I’ll make some extra for you,” before he could ask.

“But will you let me watch you pound the crap out of the butter like an avenging angel with a French rolling pin?” he asked.

I sighed. “Sure.”

“I love you so much.”

*

In the morning, Zain went out for his run while I did a quick yoga routine and then headed to the kitchen to pull the pastry dough from the fridge and finish the pain au chocolat.

As I was removing the plastic wrap, I heard the front door open. I looked into the living room in surprise. Zain was breathing hard, and he had one hand cupped to his stomach. “What’s wrong?” I asked, going towards him. “Why are you back so early? Did you get hurt?”

“No, I’m fine,” he said. “Need a towel.”

“What?”

He went right by me, still not moving his cupped hand, and snatched a clean dish towel from the oven door. Then he turned his hand up so I could see what he was holding. A little ball of mottled, wet, muddy fur. He rolled it gently onto the towel. It was a kitten.

“Come on, girl,” he whispered, all his attention on the tiny creature as he bundled the towel around it and started to dry it off. “Cry for me.”

That shook me out of my surprise. Oh mes dieux, it’s freezing. I looked around the kitchen, trying to remember if we had a hot water bottle. My eyes fell on the pantry door, and inspiration hit. “Rice,” I said. “Mom uses rice and old socks to make heat packs for chicks sometimes.”

Zain looked up. “We have rice?”

But I was already pulling out the bag I’d bought to cook koshari for him tonight. I ran upstairs, found a pair of socks, and pounded back down. Once I filled the sock with rice, I tied a knot in the open end and put it in the microwave for twenty seconds. Zain brought the towel-wrapped kitten over.

“Do you think it’s too warm?” I asked, holding out the sock for him to feel.

“That’s perfect, babe. You’re amazing,” he said, carefully bundling up the sock, too, so the towel was between it and the kitten. I could see the kitten’s fur move with each breath it took, but its eyes were closed, and its ears looked slightly floppy.

“It’s way too young to be without its mother,” I said fretfully. “Where did you find it? She might just be off hunting or–”

“No, habibi,” Zain said, in his gentlest voice. “I saw the mother first. She was in the road, probably for a few hours.”

My stomach turned. I tried not to picture what she might’ve looked like.

“I went to get a stick or something to help me move her out of sight,” he went on, “but I just found a ton of milkweed and this little girl.”

My lungs turned to lead. I stared at him in shock. “Milkweed?”

He gave me a puzzled look. “Uh, yeah, a whole field of it. I knew what it was because I broke a lot of the stems looking for her littermates, and they all had that white sap.”

My eyes dropped to the kitten again. I could feel my heart beating fast. A field of milkweed and a sense of something urgent to be done. “You didn’t find more?” I asked. My voice trembled.

Zain put his free hand on my back and pressed close to me. “No, she was the only one. I didn’t see any sign of others, on either side of the road. The mother was small. She probably only had one.”

I shook my head. “Go back and check again.”

Something about my manner must’ve told him I wasn’t simply doubting his thoroughness. His brown eyes were still worried for me, though. “…Sure, if you want me to.”

“Yes.” I took the bundle of towel from him and cuddled it to my chest. “Hurry.”

He went at a run.

I spent the endless minutes while he was gone pacing back and forth between the kitchen and living room while rubbing a corner of the towel over the kitten’s forehead, hoping it would feel like a mother’s tongue. Had I been right to send Zain back alone? It was my dream. What if I had to be the one searching? “I don’t even believe in clairvoyance,” I said aloud, trying to scoff. Still. Two people could cover more ground than one.

But then I heard the smallest chirp, nearly drowned out by the sound of my own footsteps, and realized it came from the kitten.

“Oh!” I held up the bundle to my nose so I could see its black, orange, and gray-striped face. It had opened its eyes. They were dark, milky blue, like a foggy night sky. It looked at me and chirped again, more insistent. “Merde, you’re hungry, aren’t you?” I asked. I knew I couldn’t give it cow’s milk. Was there a way to make something else, though? I pulled out my phone to google, and I was still reading through a blog post titled How to Rescue Orphaned Kittens when Zain came through the front door again.

“You were right, babe.” He parted his cupped hands just enough for me to see the orange tabby kitten inside. “I found the nest this time. There weren’t any others, though. I double-checked.”

“We need formula,” I said, as he took the towel from me to wrap the second kitten up with its littermate. “I found recipes for ones you can make at home in an emergency, but we don’t have any of the ingredients, and none of the pet stores around here open until ten or eleven on Sundays, and this one is hungry, look!”

“She’s crying,” he said, calmer than me. “That’s a good sign. Her brother already started as soon as I picked him up. He’s a little fighter.”

“Zain!”

“Habibi, take a breath, and then tell me what these ingredients are.”

“There’s a few different recipes,” I said. “Evaporated milk is in a lot of them, and eggs—I knew I should have bought eggs yesterday—and corn syrup. Pediatric vitamins, but that’s optional.”  

“Okay. So if we can’t find a vet open, we can run to the grocery store and get those, no biggie. Hell, we can walk through the woods and ask to borrow an egg from Cecilia if we have to.”

I gasped. “Cecilia!” Ignoring his look of confusion, I snatched up my phone and prayed she was an early riser.

She answered after the first ring, sounding wide awake, and when I stumbled through an explanation as to why I was calling to ask if she had any kitten formula left over from raising Estelle, she didn’t hesitate.

“Yes, and more. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

Hanging up, I told Zain she was on her way over. He laughed and said, “Well, that’s two birds with one stone.”

But my worry for the kittens drowned out the smaller anxiety about telling her the truth. They were both crying constantly now. I peered into the towel-burrito Zain held to get a better look at the second one. “It’s a lot bigger.”

“Yeah, I think he’s closer to the size she ought to be.”

There he was again, calling them ‘he’ and ‘she’. “You checked their sexes?” I asked.

“I always forget you never had cats,” he said, shaking his head. “Calicos are almost always female, and orange tabbies are much more likely to be male. I could be wrong, but as in most cases, I doubt it.”

I rolled my eyes. “Whatever they are, I’m just glad you found them.”

“Yeah about that…” He hopped onto the kitchen counter next to the sink, holding the kittens in his lap and rubbing their little heads with the corner of the towel as he studied me curiously. “How’d you know to tell me to go back and look again?”

Shrugging one shoulder, I answered, “It was a hunch.”

“Seemed like a pretty strong one,” he observed.

My lips pressed together to hold in a huff. There was an itch beneath my skin, and the only way to scratch it was to pace back and forth. After a few seconds, even that wasn’t enough, and I burst out with, “I don’t believe in clairvoyance.”

“Uhhh, neither do I?”

“I know you don’t!” I snapped, but I couldn’t have said if I was annoyed at him or myself. “You think all of it’s woo-woo rubbish.”

Zain blinked, the curiosity in his expression becoming much more pointed. He tilted his head and grinned. “Since when?”

My feet stuttered to a halt. “I just meant you don’t believe in a lot of the things I do. The… the rituals and stuff.”

“Not literally, no, but have I ever called it ‘woo-woo rubbish’ or given the impression I don’t respect what you have faith in?” he asked. “Take a minute and think back. I want the truth so I can change my attitude, if I have.”

“You haven’t,” I said. “I swear.” The way he’d once explained it, he didn’t need to believe a crystal or bit of dried plant had its own energy. So long as I found using rituals to be beneficial, he fully supported them. I loved him for that.

The angle of his chin increased. “Why the defensiveness, then, babe?”

I sighed and admitted, “Because it sounds woo-woo even to me, if I say I’ve had dreams every night since we moved here where I’m standing in a field of milkweed feeling an overwhelming sense of urgency.”

His eyebrows went up in true surprise. “Really?”

“Oui.”

“Weird,” he said. I watched him think it over for a moment, hoping perhaps he’d offer a rational explanation. Instead, what he said was, “I suppose these dreams had nothing at all to do with your sleeping problems, or clearly you would’ve mentioned them sooner.”

Just as my butt clenched, a chime sounded through the house.

Zain laughed. “Wow, actually saved by the bell. We’ll get back to that later, brat.” He slid off the counter and went with me to let Cecilia in.

She wasn’t carrying only kitten formula. Along with a canister of that, she had a shallow cardboard box that held a crocheted blanket, a small nursing bottle, and a plushie in the form of a brown-striped cat lying on its stomach. She carried everything past us briskly, saying, “Close the door before they get chilled.”

We followed her back to the kitchen, where she set the box and canister down.

“Let me see them.”

Zain handed the bundle of towel to her. Cecilia unwrapped it, nodding in approval at the rice sock before she felt each kitten over.

“They’re very emaciated. Mother wasn’t producing enough milk, perhaps. Temperature is good, though. Seb, would you microwave a cup of water for thirty seconds, please?”

I rushed to obey. From the corner of my eye, I saw her swapping the muddy towel for the blanket and settling it atop the cat plushie while Zain watched in interest.

“What does the stuffed animal do?” he asked.

“It’s called a Snuggle Kitty. It has a plastic heart inside that makes a ticking noise similar to a pulse,” Cecilia explained. “It’s very soothing for orphans of any species.”

“Clever.”

When the microwave beeped, she showed us how to mix the formula and warm it up by putting the bottle in the cup of hot water, and then how to feed the kittens. She demonstrated with the orange one. “On their stomach, never on their backs, and don’t be afraid to hold their head firmly, like this. They don’t understand what you’re trying to do, remember. You need to guide them.”

Zain and I crowded on either side of her, watching closely. The kitten—I was already beginning to think of this one as ‘he’ too—opened his eyes when she pressed the nipple of the bottle against his mouth. He chewed on it and squirmed his small body like a worm under her palm. Cecilia gently squeezed the bottle. As soon as he tasted the formula, he became much more interested. Still, he wasn’t suckling the way a baby goat would.

“Shouldn’t he latch on?” I asked worriedly.

“It usually takes a few tries for them to do that,” Cecilia said. “He’s swallowing just fine, touch his neck here.” She took her hand off him so I could. Once I had a hold of him, feeling his throat work to get the formula down and all his tiny, fragile bones through his fur, she said, “You can take the bottle now. Don’t squeeze too hard,” and it was transferred to my other hand before I could protest.

I held my breath as I copied what I’d seen her do. After an endless moment, the kitten returned to nursing like nothing had changed.

Zain smiled at me. “So,” he said. “We have cats now.”

“What?! Zain, we can’t keep them!” I said. “Who’s going to take care of them while I’m in class?”

He opened his mouth, but Cecilia spoke first. “I will, of course.”

I shook my head violently. “No, no, that’s too much to ask. We couldn’t–”

“Nonsense,” she interrupted. “I told you before, I’m semi-retired. It’s no matter to me to drop by a few times a day, or you can bring them to my house in the mornings.”

“But…” I trailed off, looking from her, to Zain, to the two balls of fur I’d already fallen in love with despite knowing their stay with us was temporary. If it didn’t have to be, then– then– “You’re sure it’s not too much trouble?”

“I’m positive,” said Cecilia. “They’ll only need round-the-clock care for a few weeks. What’s that to an old woman?”

Pressing his hands together under his chin, Zain fixed me with a puppy-dog stare. “Pleeeeasse can we keep them? Prettyprettyprettyprettyprettyprettyprettyprettypretty–”

“Yes, alright, yes!” I said. He could go on like that for ages, and we had company.

Cecilia smiled at both of us in amusement. “Congratulations, then.”

“Thanks,” said Zain. “Oh, by the way, while you’re here, we need to clear up a teeny miscommunication. Seb?”

Oh, gods, here we go. I focused hard on the kittens. “Um… it’s about the meatloaf. We really appreciate it, it’s just… I’m, I’m a vegetarian. So, uh, Zain’s been eating them all, not me.”

“And they’re delicious, I might add,” Zain said.

Cecilia made a small, huffing noise. “I understand now why you kept trying to turn them down,” she said. “You could have told me; I wouldn’t mind. Or am I really so scary?”

Zain laughed. “You scare me a bit. In a good way.”

“Thank you,” she said. “I think. And thank you, Seb, for telling me. I’m sorry I gave you something you couldn’t enjoy.”

“But we did appreciate it,” I repeated, looking up from the kitten so she could see my honesty. “I was going to make you pastries this morning, to show our gratitude. Now I think I’ll have to make a few dozen more, as payment for taking care of the kittens.”

“Absolutely not. I refuse.”

“But–”

“Don’t offend me, Seb,” she said, and my heart thudded even though she was smiling. Without giving me a chance to argue again, she looked down at the kitten and went on, “He seems to be finished. Let me see the bottle?”

I handed it over. She tipped it upright to see how much he’d drank.

“Not bad. It’s still warm enough for her, as well.”

“Oooh, I wanna feed her!” Zain said.

Cecilia handed the bottle to him, and we watched as he held the calico kitten’s head up towards it. She didn’t wiggle in his hold like her brother. Zain pushed the nipple into her mouth, squeezing a drop of formula out to get her interested.

A second passed. He and Cecilia both frowned and leaned closer. The kitten didn’t move.

“Why isn’t she nursing?” I asked. “She’s okay, right?”

Zain looked at Cecilia. There was fear in his eyes.

“I’m going to call Estelle’s vet,” Cecilia said. “Bundle her back up with the rice sock and Snuggle Kitty, and keep trying.” She took a cell phone from her pocket and stepped a few feet away.

*

For once, I didn’t argue with Zain driving my car. While he took care of putting the vet’s address into Google Maps, all of my attention was focused on the two small bundles of fur in the box on my lap.

The orange tabby was curled up next to the Snuggle Kitty, sleeping comfortably with a full belly. The tri-colored one, though, still wasn’t responding to the bottle at all. Tears prickled my nose. But I could feel a heartbeat in her tiny body. This was no time to lose it. I held her firmly, the way Cecilia had demonstrated, and nudged the nipple against her mouth again. “Just open up, c’mon.”

“Try gently opening her mouth with your fingers,” Zain suggested. He was glancing away from the road every few seconds to watch.

I set the bottle down and carefully inserted my pinky at the corner of the kitten’s delicate jawbone. My heart skipped a beat. “Z, her gums are white.”

He didn’t need me to say anything else. We both knew what that meant.

“Almost there, habibi,” he said, and put on gas.

My fingers trembled as I picked up the bottle and tried to get the kitten to latch on once more. “Je sais. Je sais ce que tu ressens,” I murmured. And I did know exactly how that felt, but only as a human. Imagine being a tiny, helpless kitten, just days old, and in the middle of that hell without even your mother to take care of you. I lost the battle with my tears. “You have to eat. Try. S’il te plait!”

“Four hundred feet to go,” said Zain. “Must be this place.” He pulled into a parking lot that was empty apart from one truck next to a dumpster, and I was unbuckling my seat belt and opening the door before the car had fully stopped. Zain hurried behind me.

As promised by Cecilia, the vet was waiting in the lobby to unlock the clinic and let us in. “I’m Dr. Harvey,” he said, his gaze immediately going to the box. “How are they doing?”

“The calico hasn’t eaten yet,” Zain said. I felt his palm steadying me at my lower back. It gave me the strength to swallow around the lump in my throat and speak.

“We think it’s hypoglycemia.”

“Let’s see,” Dr. Harvey said. He took the box from me and then seemed to look properly at my face for the first time. I must have been a mess. “It might be less stressful for both of you to wait out here,” he said. “They’re in the best care, I promise.” He started to walk around the counter. I made a half-step after him without thinking about it.

Zain moved his hand to my shoulder, but not to hold me back. “If it’s alright with you,” he said, “we’d like to stay with them.”

Dr. Harvey shrugged and kept moving. “Whatever suits.”

He went down a short hallway to an examination room and set the box on a metal table in the middle of one wall. Zain and I stopped next to the table, where his arms looped around my waist from behind, steadying us both. Dr. Harvey paid no attention to the obvious intimacy between us. Gently, he picked up the calico kitten and brought her over to the counter running along the other wall. We watched him weigh her on a large scale, then turn her this way and that, pinching the skin at the scruff of her neck and peering into her mouth.

“You were right,” he said. “She’s hypoglycemic, and dehydrated as well. I’ll give her a dextrose solution by IV.”

“And then she’ll be okay?” I asked.

“Then we’ll see how she responds,” he said, not unkindly. “She’s very small for her age.” He carried her to a machine with a clear plastic box on the top, which he opened to put her inside. It must’ve been an incubator. “You two should sit down. This may take awhile.”

“We’re good here,” Zain said. I knew he didn’t want to lose the full-body contact. It was giving him as much comfort as I got from it. I pressed into him and felt his sigh as his grip tightened.

Dr. Harvey worked in silence, using the ports on the side of the incubator to handle the kitten. His back was to us, but I could see the bag of fluids and guess he was giving the IV. She was so tiny, though. How would a needle even fit in her veins? My throat closed up. I brought my hand to my mouth to bite down on the side of my thumb. A moment later, Zain caught my wrist and pulled it away.

“Don’t hurt yourself, habibi,” he murmured, dropping a kiss on my neck. “That won’t help her.”

Neither will sobbing, I told myself. Stop it, stop it, stop it!

Yet the pressure built like ozone in the air before a thunderstorm, until I wrenched myself around to face Zain and sank my teeth into his coat instead, deep enough to feel the muscle of his shoulder. Without a word, he let me clamp down on him and simply held me as I shook.

An eternity later, Dr. Harvey spoke softly from across the room. “She’s becoming more alert. I’m going to tube-feed her some formula. She’s still too weak to swallow, and if she aspirates any, it could cause pneumonia.”

“Okay,” Zain said, his voice rough. I squeezed him harder.

Another eternity passed.

“There,” said Dr. Harvey. “Now we wait for her to digest that. Would you like to pet her in the meantime, while I check over the other one?”

I drew away from Zain and nodded.

“Wash your hands first, please,” Dr. Harvey said. Once we’d done that, he let us each put an arm through one of the ports in the incubator and stroke the little calico kitten with our fingertips. Her belly was rounded now, but her eyes stayed closed. I closed mine, too, and conjured healing, fighting energy, the kind I use against diabetes, guiding it to surround her in a protective cocoon.

And I heard the most beautiful noise. A faint, chirping meow.

“Oh!” Zain said. “She’s picking her head up!”

More than that, she was trying to crawl across the blanket to the plastic wall of the incubator. “Maybe she’s looking for her brother,” I said.

Dr. Harvey came over carrying him as I spoke, along with the Snuggle Kitty. “That’s a wonderful sign. He looks to be in excellent condition, so he can definitely keep her company.”

We stepped back for a moment to let him open the incubator and settle both kitten and plushie inside. Then all of us watched as the calico butted her head up against her littermate, meowed once more, and fell softly asleep.

Dr. Harvey was smiling. “I’d like to keep them both here for an hour or so and do her next feeding by tube as well,” he said, “but I’m fairly confident we’re out of the woods.”

Looking at me, Zain said, “We should go get supplies, then. The pet stores will be open by now.”

“And leave them here?” I asked.

“Give me your numbers,” said Dr. Harvey. “I promise I will call immediately if anything changes.”

It was the best place to leave them, and we would need more formula right away, if nothing else. “Let’s be quick, though,” I said.

“Sure,” said Zain. “I’ll even let you drive.”

*

Halfway to the store, I interrupted the silence after Zain finished calling Cecilia to update her on the kittens to ask, “Do you really believe that dream was some sort of message from the future?”

He looked over and frowned. “It’s actually bothering you.”

“I don’t like the idea that my future already exists in any form,” I said, shifting my hands on the steering wheel. “That would mean I’m not in control of my life.”

Grinning, he replied, “But you’re not, I am.” Then he leaned one shoulder against the passenger-side window and lost a tiny bit of the humor. “You want a more… conventional explanation? Okay. That field of milkweed is just down the road from the house. You must pass it multiple times a day, driving to Annapolis and Baltimore.”

I thought back and shook my head. “I never noticed it.”

“Not consciously. But I’d say there’s a really good chance it sank into your subconscious. The field’s all brown and dead and overgrown. If you ignore that the road is right there, it looks like a very lonely place. And I know that brain of yours.” He reached over and tapped my temple. “It likes to make metaphors for your feelings using the natural world.”

I wanted to shy away from ‘lonely.’ What a pathetic word. Pathetically fitting. But no. His explanation couldn’t be right. It left part of the dream out. “What about the sense of urgency?”

“Was it really urgency, or just panic?”

“Definitely urgency. I knew there was an action I needed to take, right away.”

“Hm, so, something to make the house feel less lonely? Like unpacking, or making a friend in the neighborhood? Or maybe it was your subconscious going,”—he formed his hand into a puppet and switched to a high, squeaky voice—“‘I know what would help! Tell Zain! Right now! He always has the bestest ideas!’” The ‘puppet’ pecked from my cheek to my earlobe. “‘Right now, wake up and tell him!’” Peck peck. “‘You butt will thank you later!’”

I huffed and grabbed his fingertips, holding them together with his thumb.

“Mmmhh-nnggh!”

Giggling, I shoved his hand back onto his side of the car. “S-stop it!”

“Speed limit,” he said.

Merde. I pressed the brake pedal until the speedometer fell to fifty-five again, then gave him a guilty sideways glance. “Désolé.”

Zain smiled. “All in good time, babe.”

After a few seconds to let my blush fade, I tried to get back on topic. “So your theory is that finding the kittens in the same field I’ve been dreaming about was just a coincidence?”

He shrugged. “Stranger things have happened. You can believe any theory that makes you feel most comfortable. Whatever the explanation, I’m just thankful you told me to go back and check for more kittens.”

“Me too.” I didn’t even want to contemplate what would’ve happened to the tabby otherwise.

“Oh, oh!” He sat up straight and pointed through the windshield. “I see the pet store!”

From there, what I had assumed would be a quick trip to get more formula and maybe an extra bottle turned into an expedition. Zain pointed out that we needed a litter box and at least one carrier, too, which was reasonable. The number of toys we wound up with was less so.

“Looook, these ones are shaped like macaroons! We have to have those.”

“They are cute,” I admitted.

Zain gasped, grabbing more toys from the rack. “Sushi! And pizza! Aww, and a little donut… Are you getting hungry, babe? Let’s stop at a drive-thru after this.”

I watched him put a raccoon-shaped toy in the cart. “Isn’t that one too big for them?”

“It’s supposed to be oversized so they kick it with their rear legs,” he said. “Anyway, they’ll grow up fast. What do you want to get them?”

“Um, maybe a laser pointer?”

“Oh, yes! They have to have those here!” He bounced off to find one, while I followed with the cart.

After the laser pointer, we found a pop-open play tunnel, and then I spent a few minutes talking him out of spending nearly a hundred dollars on a cat tree shaped like a small castle.

“But it’s a caaastllle!”

I shook my head. “You said yourself they’re going to grow up fast. That’ll be too small for them soon, and we can DIY something cheaper. Come on, we need to get back to the vet.”

Sighing, he waved goodbye to the castle and trailed after me.

*

Dr. Harvey still hadn’t texted either one of us when we exited the drive-thru with breakfast. I reminded myself that was a good sign. He’d said he’d contact us if anything changed. Still, I breathed a sigh of relief when we walked through his office door and he greeted us with a smile.

“They’re both doing very well. Come back with me and I’ll go over how to feed them until they reach normal weight for three-week-olds. Do you have a digital kitchen scale?”

“Yep,” said Zain, walking with him down the hallway to the exam room. “So they’re three weeks? How soon will they be on regular food?”

I listened carefully as Dr. Harvey explained everything. He gave us a chart with feeding amounts and intervals based on weight, with a circle around where each kitten was at. The tabby was so much bigger, he wasn’t even in the same interval as his sister. I was doing math in my head, trying to see if I could sync up their overnight feedings at least so I wouldn’t need to wake as often, when I heard him say, “If you want me to continue seeing them as my patients in the future, I’m happy to start a file for you now. Otherwise, you’re free to take them home. This first visit is pro-bono.”

“Thank you!” said Zain. “We really appreciate that.”

“Cecilia Strong is a good friend of mine,” he said. “I was happy to do it as a favor to her.”

I murmured to Zain in French. “She trusts him. We should start a file.”

“D’accord,” he said, before turning back to Dr. Harvey. “We’ll take you up on that offer to continue seeing them.”

He smiled again. “Alright. Do you have names picked out?”

“No,” I said.

At the same time, Zain said, “Kinda.”

I frowned at him. “You do?”

“Just for the girl,” he said. “That raccoon toy made me think of it. See how her tail is silver with black rings?”

“Oh mes dieux, don’t tell me–”

“Meeko.”

“I knew it.”

He smiled proudly.

“Okay, fine,” I said, rolling my eyes a little. “Only because I love Pocahontas and Meeko is a pretty name. But I’m naming the boy, and it’s not going to be from a Disney movie.” I looked to Dr. Harvey. “Can you just put down one of their names for now?”

“Of course,” he said. “Call me when you’ve decided on the other one.”

*

Both kittens took to the bottles like they’d been doing it for years the second time around. Zain and I fed them together, sitting on the air mattress. He looked up from proudly watching Meeko suckle to ask, “Have you thought of a name yet?”

“No,” I said, rubbing the orange tabby under his chin. “I want it to really fit him.”

“Take your time. I don’t want something weird like Mollusk.”

My head snapped up with a huff. “I had nothing to do with naming Molly! Mom named our first goat Cream, and then Dad named her kids Peaches and Cookies, and Mom named Peaches’ daughter Georgia, and then when Georgia had a kid they decided to let Keegan name it, and…” I sighed. “They should’ve known better.”

“Riiiight,” Zain said, clearly not following.

I studied the tabby again. He was nearly finished with his meal, his little ears twitching as he gulped down the last drops. I could feel him tugging the bottle. “The cat in the book Coraline says cats don’t need names because they know who they are.”

Zain laughed. “Okay, but don’t you think that might get confusing?”

“Probably,” I allowed. “I’ll think of something.”

*

We were sitting down to call Quint and Theo that night when the perfect name finally hit me. Zain clicked the button to connect the call and then looked at me. “What?” he asked.

“I didn’t say anything.”

He narrowed his eyes. “You just had a weird smile.”

“I’m not supposed to smile?” I asked, biting the inside of my cheek. “I’m excited about surprising Quint and Theo with the kittens.”

His suspicious look didn’t fade, but Quint answered before he said anything else.

“Hello. Theo is running late, I’m afraid. He just texted to let me know he’s less than a subway stop away, though, so it should only be a few minutes.”

“Oh.” I glanced at Zain and the box of kittens just out of view of the camera. “Should we wait, then?”

“Wait for what?” Quint asked, at the same time that Zain said, “Nah, I’m too impatient! Squirt can still be surprised when he gets there.”

Quint frowned. “You have a surprise?”

“Mm-hm. Two, actually,” said Zain. “The family has a couple of new additions.” With aplomb, he scooped the kittens out of the box and held them up, one in each hand, so Quint could see.

“Oh!” Quint said. “They’re adorable. But… how did this happen?”

“He found them on his run this morning,” I said. “They’re orphans.”

“It’s been an eventful day,” Zain said. “I found this one first.” He lifted the hand with the calico slightly. “Her name’s Meeko, by the way, ‘cause she has a ringed tail, see? And I thought there was only one, but when I brought her back to the house and told Seb she was in a field of milkweed, he made me go back and keep looking, because apparently, he’s been having disturbing dreams about milkweed all week, which were contributing to his sleep issues, yet he thought it wasn’t important enough to tell anyone.”

Quint’s eyebrows rose. I shifted, and then winced as it reawoke the tenderness of my rear end. “You didn’t have to bring that up,” I muttered to Zain.

“Just making sure Quint’s kept up to date,” he replied sweetly.

“I appreciate it,” said Quint, “especially as I recall asking you several times why you weren’t sleeping well, young man. Do I need to remind you about the definition of lying?”

My head hung. “Non, je sais, monsieur. I should’ve told you both.”

“The kittens made it come out, at least,” Zain said. “I thought it was weird how he got all paranoid about there being another one, so I interrogated him a little after finding this guy.” He lifted his other hand, with the orange tabby. “But then we had to call the neighbor—Cecilia, you remember her?—to bring over formula for them, and Meeko gave us a scare by not eating at all, and long story short, it got put on hold for an emergency vet visit. Everything’s good now, though. They’re both healthy and I spanked Seb about half an hour ago.”

“ZAIN,” I squawked.

“What?”

I would’ve hit him if he wasn’t holding the kittens.

Quint coughed. “Well, I’m glad they’re healthy.”

“So are we,” said Zain. “By the way, how is Jagger with cats?”

“He gets along with everything,” Quint said, smiling. “I’m sure he’ll be a bit curious about them at first, but he won’t bother them.”

“Good. Don’t want the cousins to fight.”

“What’s the tabby’s name? Meeko and…?”

“Seb hasn’t decided yet.”

“No, I have,” I said, taking him from Zain and petting him. “Just before we called, I figured out his name. Matisse.”

“As in Henri Matisse?” Quint asked, quizzical. “I didn’t realize you favored him particularly.”

“C’est parce qu’il est un fauve.”

He began to chuckle.

Zain looked from one of us to the other. “What? What’s so funny? Seeeeb, my French isn’t that good. It’s not fair.”

Still laughing, Quint said, “Henri Matisse was the father of Fauvism, an art movement named after the French word for ‘wildcat.’”

At that, Zain’s mouth dropped open. He turned to me. “You gave our cat a name based on a pun?! And you have the nerve to judge me for naming his sister Meeko?”

“It is not a pun!” I said, trying to sound outraged through my giggles.

“Oh, I think it is,” Quint said.

I kept protesting, though I knew it was a lost cause, until Theo came home a minute later and appeared behind Quint.

“Hey, sorry I’m– are those kittens?! You have kittens??”

“Yep,” Zain said. “Meet your new niece and nephew, Meeko and Matisse.” He pointed to each kitten in turn.

“Really? Awesome, so Seb will have company! I wanna go down and play with them, though. Quint, can’t we go sooner than Seb’s birthday?” He sat down in Quint’s lap and twined his arms around his husband’s neck. “Pleeeaase?”

“You’re forgetting again that they don’t have a bed for us to sleep in yet, angel. They need time to get settled.”

“We’ll be doing that PDQ after the week we just had,” Zain said. “Turns out Brats don’t do well when uprooted. Keep you posted on the guest-bed situation.”

Theo frowned and began to ask a question. I was so grateful to Quint for cutting him off.

“Why don’t you explain to Theo why he’s named Matisse.”

Zain put his nose in the air. In a snooty, vaguely-British voice, he said, “Well you see, it’s hilarious if you know art history and French.”

I punched his shoulder.

*

I hadn’t dreamt of milkweed in ten days. The hours between overnight feedings were so short, I’d barely had time to dream of anything. I didn’t mind. Meeko and Matisse grew stronger with each bottle.

It was just before eleven, and I sat in half-lotus on the bed, testing the temperature of their latest bottle on the inside of my wrist. Flashes of light filled the night sky. The thunder was almost constant. Behind the storm, a cold snap lurked, ready to pounce on the unseasonable warmth the last one had brought. The warmth that had allowed the kittens to survive until we found them. And I’d been so afraid of that first storm.

Steadying myself with one hand on the old iron and wood headboard, I leaned over the edge of the mattress to scoop Meeko and Matisse up from their nesting box. Neither of them seemed to notice the weather. Meeko butted her head against my palm, mewing insistently.

“Yes, alright, ladies first.” I pulled the weighted blanket over my lap and set her on it. She knew that meant feeding time. The trouble was, so did Matisse. Despite the mass she’d gained, he was still bigger, and he climbed right over her to get to the nipple. “No,” I said, holding the bottle out of reach. They both squalled until I picked Matisse up, set him on my shoulder, and cupped one hand over him while I fed Meeko with the other.

The thunder quieted. For a few minutes, there was only the melodious sound of rain on the roof and only the golden gleam of the lamp on the nightstand. I took my eyes off Meeko’s twitching ears to gaze around the room. Our latest Craigslist find, a vintage secretary desk, glowed with its new coat of polish atop a woven rag rug in blues and purples. My favorite books filled the built-in shelves over the storage cubby. We still needed curtains for the windows, but at the moment, I didn’t mind. A lightning bolt painted silver tendrils in the clouds hanging low over the forest, and I smiled.