Page 37 of The Cuffing Game
Noah dropped the pan and tentatively held out a hand.
Mia glared at his palm for a few seconds before taking it.
“Sorry about that,” Noah said, pulling her up. “Thought you were a bear.”
“Uh, no. I’m way too small to be a bear.”
A grin slipped onto Noah’s lips. “Maybe a cub.”
Brushing the snow off her clothes with her gloved hands, Mia asked, “So, why are you still up?”
Noah shrugged. “Couldn’t sleep. Obviously.”
Mia narrowed her eyes. “Sure, obviously.”
“How about you? You look like you’ve been out for a while.”
She shrugged. “Just taking a walk.”
Noah frowned in confusion. “This late? And why were you in the bushes?”
Mia made a face. “I tripped. And before that, I had some things I needed to do for the show, so I took care of that.”
Noah stared at Mia for a long moment, peering down at this enigma of a girl who took walks past two in the morning with nothing but a flashlight and her pink puffer jacket to protect her from the wilderness. Back in class, he’d always thought Mia was a little strange, but Mia out in the wild wasfascinating.
“You do know there are black bears out in the woods,right?” Noah asked. “And coyotes, probably. You should bring bear spray next time.”
“There won’t be a next time,” Mia said, rather mysteriously.
She shifted her weight, and Noah was suddenly, acutely aware of how close they were to each other. She was a head shorter than him, but she defiantly stood straight with her chin tilted up, like she was trying to make their height difference smaller.
His eyes lingered on her still-red cheeks before he made himself look away.
The dark, snow-covered forest around them was surreally serene, like they’d stepped into a separate plane of reality. Without quite knowing why he did what he did, Noah sat at the firepit and lit the fire.
Fully expecting her to ignore him and go back inside, he gestured at Mia, inviting her over. To his surprise, she did, and they sat next to each other in complete silence.
“So...” Noah said after a while. “What do you think of the show so far?”
Mia stiffened, immediately on guard. “What about it?” she asked sharply. “You know I can’t tell you much.”
“I know. But I’m not asking so I can get tips. I’m just trying to have a conversation. We don’t even have to talk about me. I’m genuinely curious how the show has been foryou.”
Mia opened her mouth and then closed it again, like she was trying to figure out what she could and couldn’t say.
“Well...” she said at last. “It’s been surprising so far. Which, from what I’ve heard, isn’t necessarily a bad thing when it comes to reality TV. But things are already a lot more dramatic than I thought they’d be. And... tough, personally. Still fun, but overwhelming. When we cast people, I thought I knew what would happen on the show. But when we put everyone together, things didn’t go the way I thought they would, at all.”
“Like what happened today with Bethany? And Caleb?”
Mia’s eyes widened. “Yeah! That was so stressful. I was spiraling the entire time.”
Silence fell between them again, until the only noise Noah could hear for miles was the crackling of the fire. It was a quiet that unnerved him, especially after three years of living in a noisy fraternity house.
Trying to break apart the stillness, Noah asked, “Is there good Korean food in Texas?”
Mia scrunched up her face at the random question.
“Or even Korean food at all?” Noah added.
