Page 82 of Crown of Thorns
"Tell me the truth."
I clench my jaw. Look away. My heart’s racing, and I hate that he can see it.
"Keep the key," I say through my teeth.
"I don’t want the damn thing. I want you to tell me something. Anything. A crumb."
I want to scream at him. Throw something. Break the glass between us. But I don’t. Because I know he’s not wrong.
He watches me for a beat, unreadable. Then, with a sigh so casual it almost stings, he says, "Have you eaten?" Like we’re not on the edge of something sharp and irreversible.
I shake my head. The cold tiles sting beneath my feet, grounding me. My skin prickles.
He presses the key into my palm. Grabs my cock through the towel. My breath catches. A flicker of something flashes inhis eyes, not just lust. Something sharper. Darker. Like he’s checking if I’ll flinch.
"Get dressed while I make us something."
He strides to the kitchenette like he’s done it a hundred times before. Like he owns the counter, the drawer handles, the knife that somehow always ends up in the drying rack. The fridge door hisses open, and he hums under his breath as if this were his dorm. As if I were his.
I sit there stunned, towel still clinging to my hips, watching as he unpacks groceries I didn’t buy, chops vegetables like a chef on TV, then rinses the cutting board with one hand while checking the pan’s heat with the other.
There’s something surgical in the way he moves, like he’s dissecting me with domesticity. My stomach tightens with a sick sort of awe, equal parts fascination and dread, as if every motion is slicing me open, revealing the soft, quivering thing I swore I'd never show anyone. He slides eggs into the pan and tosses them with a flick of his wrist, eyes never leaving the sizzling center.
I hate how good it smells. Hate how familiar this feels. Like we’ve always done this. Like he’s always been here, in my space, making himself at home. Candlelight dances across his cheekbones. The room flickers like it’s holding its breath.
And I let him because some part of me wants him to.
But something inside me is cracking. Something old. Something bitter. A memory tries to surface, dust and smoke, a voice I haven’t heard in years whispering, 'Boys don’t cry like that, Noah.' I shove it back down.
And yet Louis moves through my space like he’s earned it. He flips the eggs, plates them, then wipes his hands with a towel he brought himself, claiming the moment as if it belongs to him.
Why now? Why the key, the file, the interrogation? It doesn’t feel random. It feels like he’s trying to anchor me. Make sure I’m not still half in the past. Maybe he’s afraid. Or worse. Maybe hewants proof I haven’t already given myself to someone else. That I wasn’t his first fire. That he’s not special. But he is. And that might be the scariest part.
He wasn’t breaking new ground. He was burning through everything I thought I understood about myself. Stirring ghosts and waking things I buried years ago.
I want to tell him none of them mattered. That they were placeholders. Ghosts with names I never learned how to love. But part of me still clings to silence, afraid that if I speak the truth aloud, it will demand a version of me I haven’t figured out how to be. That they were never even close to this but my mouth won’t open. Because if I say it, if I name it, it’ll be real. That I’ve never wanted anyone like this. Not a woman. Not a man. No one. And I don’t know what that makes me. I don’t know who I am with him.Only that I’ve never been this before.
23
NOAH
It’s been a week since Louis gave me the key to the shed. I haven’t been back. Partly because I didn’t want to face what might be waiting inside. Partly because I wasn’t ready. But it’s haunted me every day since.
Something's out there. Waiting for me.
Tonight, Louis made us a quiche with mushrooms and leeks. I read to him from my astrophysics book while we ate in bed, his head on my chest, eyes closed like he was dreaming in real-time. He listens to me talk about stars as if it means something to him. Maybe it does. Maybe it’s the only way I know how to be close to someone. Through things that are far away.
We fell asleep curled together. His body was hot and lazy against mine.
Now, just past dawn, the dorm is steeped in that liminal silence between night and day. The candle’s burned to the glass. The window is open a crack. Forest sounds bleed in. Owls hooting, wings beating against the frame, branches creaking like old bones.
Louis is draped over me like a second skin. One leg slung across my hips. His arm around my chest, fingers laced with mine. His cheek was warm in the crook of my neck.
He’s chaos wrapped in silk. Sweat, heat, limbs tangled like vines, pressing against me like a secret I never asked to keep.
It should feel like being held. It feels like being claimed.
I stare up at the ceiling. His breath warms my throat.
