Page 21 of Hero

We stand in silence together just outside the cabin for a long time. The breeze has cooled since this afternoon. Faster than I would have expected. I’m almost chilly out here with bare arms.

Finally Zed gives his head a little shake. “We can go in.”

“The fresh air feels good.”

He slants me a narrow-eyed look. “You’re cold.”

“I’m not—”

“Stop it.”

I glare, since the way he bluntly tells me to stop it has always annoyed me. But there’s not much heat behind the look. I’m not actually angry with him right now. Or even particularly exasperated.

He killed that bear when he didn’t want to. He did it to protect Rina. And me.

I can’t be too annoyed with him at the moment.

“What’s that look for?” he asks, opening the cabin door and holding it until I step inside.

“What look?”

“The look on your face right now.”

“It’s probably my you’re-obnoxious look.”

“No, it’s not. I know that expression well. It’s something else.”

I’m not about to tell him that I feel bad about what he had to do. He’d hate that more than anything. So instead, I say, “You’re imagining things.”

“No, I’m not.” He locks the door but doesn’t barricade it with the large metal bar we use. It’s still early, and one or both of us might need to go outside to go to the bathroom before bed.

“Yes, you are.”

“Why are you arguing with me right now? You know I know better.” He’s not angry either. Mostly impatient. But he’s tenser than I would have expected him to be. I can see it in his shoulders. In the way he’s holding his neck.

It gets to me for some reason. My breathing accelerates. “I don’t know anything of the kind. If I tell you that all I’m thinking is that you’re obnoxious, then that’s what I’m thinking. You have no choice but to believe me.”

“Screw that. I don’t believe half of what you tell me.”

This startles and upsets me. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“Exactly what it sounds like. You hide what you’re really feeling most of the time. You tell me you’re fine when you’re not. You tell me you’ve got things handled when you need help. You tell me to go away when you’re about to fall apart.”

I’m so surprised by that angry declaration that my mouth drops open. He’s never said anything like that before. Nothing so earnest or connected to emotions. Or deep. I know by now there’s more to him than he shows to the world, but I had no idea he had such layered, complex insights.

About me.

True ones, as it happens.

“I’m not falling apart right now.” There’s no reason to say this. It’s not even what he was implying. But he’s gotten too close. Pried too deeply into the heart of me. And my reaction to that is always to put up my defenses.

“I never said you were. I said you don’t tell me the truth about how you’re feeling, and you’re not telling me the truth right now. You were thinking something about me as we came inside, and I want to know what it is.”

“Well… tough. You don’t get to know everything.”

He steps into me, backing me up against the closed door. “Tell me,” he mutters.

His bulk is intimidating. So is the palpable tension in his eyes, his stance, his clenched jaw.

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