Page 78 of Late Bloomer
At the next groan, I give up on trying to gently reason with the oblivious hothead and decide brute force is the way to go.
I take two steps forward and reach out, one hand gripping Opal’s hip, the other knotting in the front of her shirt, tugging her toward me with all my strength. Opal pitches forward, losing her balance and collapsing on top of me, both of us bouncing like rubber balls across the floor. Once we land firmly, Opal rears up, hair wild and face furious as she stares down at me.
“What the fu—” Opal’s outrage is swallowed by a clash of thunder, then the screech of splintering wood and the clatter of shingles collapsing through the new gaping hole in the roof. The rain seems to pour in forever.
Opal pivots her body slowly, those endless ocean eyes the last thing to turn away from me, to face the avalanche of debris now covering her bed.
She is silent. Piercingly, hauntingly silent. Made all the more terrifying by the howl of the wind and pelting rain.
And then Opal leans her head back and screams.
“Nooooooooo,” she bellows. “Oh what the fuck.What. The. Fuck.” Opal disentangles herself from me and stands up, and I blame the instant coldness in my chest on the bedroom hurricane and not on the loss of Opal’s warmth.
“Why can’t anything go right?” Opal cries again. She throws herself against the mountain of flotsam, kicking and clawing at it like she’ll unbury her bed.
“Opal, it’s okay. It’ll be okay,” I coo, trying to calm her down. I’ve never been very good at it. “Don’t cry.”
“I absolutelywillcry,” Opal says, turning on me. “I will cry and scream and be upset because everything is terrible and there’s really nothing else for me to dobutcry.”
“We’ll figure something out,” I yell over another clap of thunder, stepping cautiously toward Opal. Something about seeing her cry has my chest cracking open like the ceiling moments ago. “Crying won’t fix it. We can—”
“No!” Opal shouts, dislodging herself from the wreckage to dramatically stomp her foot. Rain is still pouring in, her hair plastered to her head like seaweed. “Stop talking right now. For once, I’m going to be the grumpy one. I’m going to be the pessimist. And you’re going to listen.”
I don’t say anything, fixing Opal with a wide-eyed stare.
“My bed—my favorite safe spot in the entire world—is now buried under rain and a collapsed roof. The first thing I’veever owned is falling apart, and I’m living with a woman who doesn’t want anything to do with me and is so eager to get me out of her life because I’m that much of a burden! So, Pepper, I’m going to cry. I’m going to—”
Without thinking, I reach out, gripping Opal’s waist, tugging her close. Then closer still. I squeeze Opal against my chest until part of the ache eases. I can’t fix the hole in the ceiling. I can’t unbury Opal’s bed. I can’t do anything but let Opal cry.
Opal is tense for a moment, then sags against me, crying against my chest, resting her forehead on the angle of my collarbone, the rain still coming in droves, soaking us both.
I let her shake and cry and sob until she goes quiet, still holding me close.
After a few minutes, I shift, keeping her tucked against me but angling us toward the door.
“Come.” I drag my fingertips down Opal’s arm until our fingers twine together.
“Where?” Opal says with a sniffle, eyes red and puffy as she turns her gaze to meet mine.
I tug her through the doorway, shutting her bedroom door, then moving across the hall and pushing open my own.
“Here.” I turn her drenched frame, gently pushing her onto the mattress so she lies flat, dragging a throw blanket over her. I shut the door with my foot, the echoingthudhumming through my chest.
“What are you—”
“I know it’s not your bed, but you can use it. Have it.Whatever you need. You can cry here for as long as you want. I want you to know—to understand—it will be okay. I’ll make sure of it.”
Opal stares up at me with big, watery eyes and a look so adorably pitiful, I feel my lips twitch in an almost smile. The silence stretches between us, morphing from a quiet moment of kindness to sharp awkwardness.
I clear my throat, smoothing back my wet ponytail and glancing at the door. “I’ll, um, leave you to it.”
I turn toward the door, but a sudden grip around my wrist holds me locked in place. My eyes dart back to the bed, back at Opal, whose face has ebbed from despair to something softer. Something lovely. And the tiniest bit terrifying.
Opal tugs on my wrist, and my muscles and bones turn wobbly like Jell-O, moving wherever Opal pulls me. Which is how I end up on the bed, curled like half a heart with Opal tucked against my chest, both of us still soaked, a small tremor moving through her body.
I know I should get up and get towels. Go check on the storm in the other room. Take a shower. But I’m so content, so delightfully thrilled to be holding Opal to me, that I, quite simply, don’t ever want to move again.
“When the rain comes,” I whisper against her neck, my hand moving to tuck her hair behind her ears, “anemones—some of the most beautiful, delicate flowers to ever exist—curl inward and downward to protect their petals from the storm.”
