Page 102 of Chaos

That smells like beeswax candles, a drop of sweat, spilled wine, and fucking smoke.

Slowly, I peel one eye open. That’s all I need to recognize the dark hoodie beneath my cheek. ThatI’mbeneath, that my hand has slipped under to fucking fondle thatfuckingpenis ravine.

I straighten so quickly, the bones in my neck shift with an audible click.

Hurriedly untangling myself from the blanket strewn over my lap, over Finn’s too because I’m practically on his lap, I plaster myself against the side of the truck—where I was at the start of the fucking movie, but evidently did not remain. “Sorry.”

In my peripheral, I watch the shoulder that I was just using as a pillow roll. An arm is discreetly shaken out. One long leg bends at the knee before straightening again, and repeats. Like each were as dead as my ass. Yet Finn claims, “Wouldn’t have woken you, but the movie ended an hour ago and they’re trying to clear people out.”

Again, my poor neck almost snaps as it whips to the side, towards him. “What?” I croak, grateful for the dark, for the hood pulled up over my head, for him being incapable of eye contact because I’m sure my face is red, flushed with confusion and unease. “Why are we still here?”

Fingers drumming against his thighs, Finn shrugs.

“Where are the others?”

“Yas and Theo went to find a bathroom,” he says, though his inflection replies it’s not their bladders that needed relieving. “And Adam’s over there.”

Following his pointed finger, I find the missing friend chatting to a couple of girls. Just past them, I notice a security guard flashing a torch into car windows and hurrying people along.

“Oh.” I fiddle with the drawstrings of my hoodie, wishing I could yank them tight enough to choke myself unconsciousness so I won’t have to experience another second of the very awkward energy floating between me and the man I accused ofwanting to get into my pants only to spend God knows how long napping with my hand damn near shoved down his.

I scramble to my feet. Wobble as the metal beneath them flexes and creaks. Steady myself with a hand on the roof—am steadied by another one on the outside of my thigh. One that retreats almost as soon as it lands, like its owner changed its mind only to immediately change it again, to revert, to burn through my sweats, brand the skin beneath, fuse to it so I can’t move away.

Finn murmurs my name the same, soft way he woke me up.

Swallowing thickly, I drop my gaze, and any chance of composure abruptly evaporates. Not because of the solemn face peering up at me, nor the wide eyes reflecting the damn moonlight like they belong to a cartoon prince—it’s what Finn holds that almost knocks me right out of the truck.

What hemade, I quickly surmise. Because there’s no way a man who whittles would offer up any creation that wasn’t carved by his own hand.

A rose.

A wooden rose with wooden petals and a wooden stem and wooden fucking thorns. Painted white, contrite like the mouth that whispers, “I’m sorry.”

My knees wobble.

“I was being childish,” Finn continues, grip tightening around my thigh. “But I swear to God, Lottie, it wasn’t why you think. That’s… so fucking far from it.”

My hand literally fucking trembles as he transfers the first flower anyone’s ever given me from his grip to mine. I thumb the delicate petals, prick the pad of one on a thorn,marvelfor a stunned second, before asking, “What was it then?”

“I don’t think you want to know.”

“Presumptuous.”

Finn looks at me. Just looks, but it feels like something more.

“Baby,” he says like the single word means a lot more too, like it’s a complete sentence, like it’s an explanation. A plea to understand.

I don’t. But a nagging sensation makes me think I’m missing something really obvious. I’m not seeing something that’s right in front of me. I’m being subconsciously obtuse—or maybe I’m doing it on purpose.

“You were mad,” I try, going with the obvious. “Because I pulled away.”

Before I even finish, he’s shaking his head and correcting, “I wasn’t mad.”

“You seemed mad.”

“I was giving you space, Lottie. I was trying not to make you uncomfortable. I was trying to give myself a fucking break ‘cause—” he cuts himself off. Assesses me. Shakes his head almost imperceptibly and inhales deeply like he’s trying to suck back in what sounds like half of an admission. “You were right. I wasn’t being your friend.”

“In the closet?” I ask without thinking and want to slap myself for it. “Or after?”

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