Page 19 of Say You'll Stay

Olivia hasn’t felt this good in weeks.

The dizziness is gone, along with the urge to pass out. Only after she found relief did her denial no longer mask how miserable she was. Feeling less alone helps, too. Her doubts about Cole have been consistent and nagging, as she waited for him to have a change of heart, but hearing his one-sided conversation with Lucy did a lot to squash that fear.

‘Not trusting anyone new with you.’He said to her, with no trace of his usual gruff facade.

This baby isn’t his, but he saved her life and she looks at him like she knows him.

Part of her wonders if it’s a bad thing. If they stay together long enough, Lucy may grow attached only to be crushed when he leaves. Olivia knows he will someday.

This isn’t permanent, fake marriage or not.

Still, she thought he’d leave them in an alley, assuming he’d make the same choices as her dead husband, but it’s clear she’s wrong about that much. He’s only doing his best to hide a soft heart. She hopes he might learn to trust her one day and reveal the side of himself that Lucy has seen.

“When can she eat real food?” Cole asks, from the small sofa by the window he’s sprawled out on, shoving Cheetos in hismouth.

“I think at six months. Not sure. Why?”

“Trying to remember what foods I liked as a kid. Couldn’t stand bananas, but liked broccoli well enough. Wonder what she’ll like.”

“I had banana cravings the whole time I was pregnant, so maybe she’ll hate them too since she had them so often,” Olivia muses.

“And junk food…a kid’s first taste of ice cream has to be funny.”

“If we even have ice cream anymore. Need freezers for that.”

“Solar power for a freezer should be one of the first things we get set up at the farm. Can’t imagine a world without ice cream,” he replies wistfully.

She smirks. “Find some cows, too?”

“Hell yeah.”

Their conversation about running a post-apocalyptic dairy enterprise is cut off by a commotion outside, and he rushes to lock the door after glancing out the window.

“Bunch of new people. Might have come for the junkie, Waylon.” He flicks the safety off his weapon as gunfire erupts below and footsteps filter through the halls.

Someone’s horrified ‘what the hell did you do!’is the only clear sentence above the muffled racket.

Cole flips the lock to peek around the door frame and just like that, she doesn’t give a shit who’s hurt out there, only cares that he might join them and end up on the wrong end of a bullet.

“Please leave it,” she whispers. “They can handle it. Please.”

“One of the grannies is hurt. Stay here. Don’t move.”

He’s gone before she can object. If she could reach out anddrag him back by the shirt collar, she would.

He left them. Granted, it’s to help someone else, but that doesn’t do much to quell her fears. She is selfish at the moment. Not confident enough in her ability to protect both herself and Lucy, and they need him for the foreseeable future. Anything that might compromise that isn’t something she’s willing to entertain.

Then, a twinkle of worry in the back of her mind reminds her she’s growing fond of him and it isn’t only about wanting protection anymore. She might miss him. What a bunch of nonsense that is, she thinks with a sigh. She’s so fucking desperate that she’s latched onto this man like a leech already.

When curiosity gets the best of her, she leaves Lucy sleeping in the middle of the bed and cracks the door an inch, peering down the hall to watch the scene unfold.

Cole and one of the leaders have their guns trained on a stranger while a nurse tries to keep one of the residents from bleeding out on the white tile floor.

“I didn’t see her,” the new man pleads. “I swear it. If you woulda told me the truth—”

“Only truth I see is that you got a hard-on for shooting old people if it gets you what you want,” Cole shouts. “Is all this worth those drugs? Need a fix that bad?”

“You don’t know what it’s like… there’s nothing left out there. We can’t go much longer.”

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