Page 39 of Tristano

“How about you sit here and eat while I deal with your hair,” he says with a smile.

Wordlessly, I do as he says. As soon as I sit down, he moves my hair behind me. Picking up the bowl of soup, I bring it to my chest. Then I take a small spoonful of broth.

Slowly I feel Tristano start brushing my hair from the bottom up.

The silence is loud but comforting.

“What’s next?” I ask quietly.

“Next we go home,” he whispers.

“Where is home?” I scoff.

“That’s up to you. You can go back to your place,” he pauses. “Or you could come home and stay with me for a while.”

We fall silent as I think about it. What do I want to do?

“I-I think I need to take some time off from work. I’m not sure my heart is in it anymore.”

He freezes. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, I know I’m doing good right now, but I can only play a seventeen-year-old for so long. Eventually I won’t even be able to do that anymore. My uncle never takes me seriously when I think I have found something. I always have to tell Ricky, and then he tells my uncle. That’s the only way he will even consider an idea I have. I guess I thought it would be different, instead all I feel like is a pawn.”

He hugs my head to him, kissing the top of it. “I’m sorry. I wish it wasn’t that way for you.”

I shrug. “It’s how it’s always been. Now I have to go face him and come up with some lie for where I’ve been. I’m not sure he’s going to buy anything I say. It’s only going to make him look at me closer.”

“Forget your uncle. What do you want?”

“I want to come home with you. Just until I figure out what I want to do next,” I admit softly.

“Then that’s what we will do. You can stay with me as long as you want,anima gemella.”

Why does that feel like a promise of forever?

* * *

There’s a rage filling me.One that I can barely control.

The only reason I haven’t left Serena in this bed to go hunt down those assholes who took her is because of the way she is shaking in her sleep.

After I fed her a meager bowl of chicken soup, she changed into a T-shirt and climbed into bed. I was going to leave her there while I sat in the living room area working through the night, but then she said that one word.

“Stay.”

So I curled up in bed next to her, jeans and all. She didn’t seem to mind. Instead of keeping her distance, she cuddled right up next to my side until her head was on my chest, prompting me to wrap her in my arms.

In that moment, I knew there was nowhere I’d rather be.

Then the nightmares came. She began to whimper and cry. That’s when the red bled into my vision, making me seek death.

My heart is breaking for this girl.

She gasps suddenly, sitting straight up.

“Shhh, Serena. You’re safe. I’m here,” I soothe her.

“Tris?” Her voice is so broken.

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