Starlight on the Snow - Chapter Seventeen

Trigger Warnings: NSFW content

Chapter Seventeen

Ash couldn’t sleep.

His mind was too full, too heavy with thoughts. They fluttered around his mind like butterflies, trapped and frantic. His worries about the fact that he hadn’t texted Ryo back. His lingering grief over his mother. His argument with Elijah. The fact that he wasn’t arguing with Tayshia.

The intense, stomach-clenching yearning he had to taste her lips once, just to see what it was like.

He tossed and turned for a while, unable to lower his energy enough to get to sleep. He felt bone-tired, exhausted from the day’s events. No matter how hard he tried, it was like his slumber was being held behind a barrier of agitation.

Maybe if he went out to watch TV, he could fall asleep on the couch.

Clad in joggers yet shirtless, he gathered up his fleece blanket and left his room.

As soon as he opened his bedroom door, he saw the telltale flickering shadows that the television cast. The volume was down low, but he could hear the distinct sounds of an anime of some sort. He made his way down the hallway and out to the living room.

Tayshia lay on the long end of the couch, which was against the wall. She was using his pillow—which he’d left there earlier—and her legs were curled up underneath the hem of her hoodie. She wore her fuzzy socks again.

“Damn,” he said. “You can’t sleep, either?”

She jolted, lifting her head. Her eyes were half-open. She looked tired.

“Sorry, do you want your pillow?” she said. “Did you want the couch, too? I can go to—”

“Nah, it’s cool,” he said, cutting her off.

He lay down on the short end of the sectional, resting his head back against the couch pillows that adorned the cornered center. It elevated him a bit to where if he rolled his head to the right, he could look at her.

“Why couldn’t you sleep?” Tayshia asked.

“I’m like...I feel strung out,” he said. “I dunno. You?”

“Same.”

“You could always smoke a bowl with me,” he said, sitting up and swiveling so he was facing the coffee table. He stood and leaned over, grabbing his pipe and lighter from the side of the table that was nearest her. “It’ll put you right to sleep.”

“Hah. Funny.” She rolled her eyes, not lifting her head from his pillow.

He smirked as he sat down on the edge of the couch, holding the pipe to his lips. It would be exactly what he needed to cross the border of waking. There was plenty left for him to get decently high—which was good because he didn’t have much left.

Ash clicked the lighter on and looked over at her.

She was staring at him.

Curiosity twisted its lazy way through his gut as he inhaled. He didn’t look away from her, wondering what she was thinking of him as he sucked in as much smoke as he could and held it in his chest. His lungs spasmed for air.

When he blew the smoke out, he tilted his chin up so he could exhale it above.

And she watched him.

They watched the anime she had on for a short time—one with flying robots and a girl with pale green hair—and then Ash felt himself starting to drift.

He remembered reading somewhere that people couldn’t sleep when they felt unsafe. That something in their brains made it difficult to wind down when they felt like they were in some sort of danger. Their adrenaline would just keep rising, higher and higher, keeping them awake until they felt invincible.

Ash didn’t feel invincible around Tayshia.

“Do you sleep with it on?” she asked, her voice tiny.

“What?”

“The crystal. Do you sleep with it on?”

“Mm-hm,” he said, his eyelids fluttering shut. He’d felt so awake in his room, but something about being in the living room with the cool, blue light of the TV and Tayshia opposite him made him feel so comfortable that he was falling asleep. “Do you?”

“Every night.”

Ash wanted to look at her, but he was too exhausted.

“How did you get it made into a necklace?” he asked.

“My mom helped me. We took it to a jeweler.”

He almost laughed. “You would, with your rich ass.”

“Shut up,” she said, and he could hear the smile in her voice. “Tch. Not no more.”

His mirth disappeared.

How could he have forgotten? It was Ash’s father that had put Mr. Cole in the hospital. It was Ash’s fault that he hadn’t tried harder to stop Gabriel, or to help stop Mr. Cole’s bleeding.

“What about you?” Tayshia asked.

Ash felt his throat aching, his body sinking into the couch. He remembered that day—his nineteenth birthday. The cake, frosted baby blue and cotton candy pink. His mother, eating the entire thing.

The way she couldn’t stop herself from getting rid of it, even on his birthday.

“My mom made it for me for my birthday,” he whispered, the pain lowering his voice. “She like, went to our neighbor’s and baked me this cake. The neighbor helped her make the crystal into a necklace because she saw me holding it all the time. And then she gave it to me.”

As soon as he finished, he felt embarrassment flooding his body in a rush of heat. He hadn’t meant to open up that much. Didn’t want to, either. But it felt like a bridge had been washed out by the rain, or like the wood of the gate blocking his memories had rotted.

Tayshia was quiet for a moment before she spoke in a soft tone.

“Ash, that’s really sweet.”

“Yeah,” he said, his voice hoarse from the weed.

“Hey, Ash?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m really sorry about your mom,” she said, and he could hear her voice shaking as though the words were difficult for her to utter. “It was all over the news. Do you know what happened?”

Yes.

“No,” he lied. “I had to find out in jail.”

“Ash,” she said, her voice a sympathetic whine. “That’s awful.”

He closed his eyes, curled on his side beneath his blanket. Barely awake, he mumbled, “They confiscated all my shit when I was in, but I put the necklace back on the second I got out. And then I dreamed of you.”

“You did?”

He didn’t answer. He’d dozed off.

---

At some point, Ash jolted awake.

The channel they’d been watching was playing infomercials, the blue flicker gentle. Tayshia was moving around the coffee table, stumbling sleepily toward the TV. Ash sat up.

“Sorry,” she whispered, sounding like she’d just woken up, too.

She looked at him while she pressed the button to turn the television off, plunging them into pitch-black darkness. The only light came from the tiny green letters on the microwave and the larger ones that blinked on the stove. One read two-o-clock. The other flashed twelve-o-clock because they’d never set it up.

“I can’t see a fucking thing,” he said, laughing to himself.

“Here,” she said, and then he felt her hand brushing along his jawline by accident. The surprise of it raised pebbles on his arms and across his shoulders. “Take my hand.”

Ash did, wrapping his fingers around her own. Through the fog of sleep, he focused on how it felt, smooth and soft. It fit perfectly within his own. Tayshia pulled him to his feet and even though he couldn’t see, he felt the heat of her body near him within inches.

Her hand slipped away.

Ash followed her, his eyes adjusting enough to see her outline like a haloed shadow. His slumber had hovered between light and deep, his body tired even though his mind was not. It had caused him to doze on the couch in a painful way that kept him from fully succumbing.

He was tired.

Tayshia slowed in the center of the hallway, forcing him to have to stop to keep himself from running into her. He felt his heart pounding again, beating another tattoo into his chest. Sucking in his breath, he held it as he saw her silhouette turning to face him in the dark. He couldn’t tell if she was looking at him or not.

What was she doing?

“Why did you keep the crystal?” Tayshia asked, her voice a small, quiet whisper. “Why did you keep that memory of me?”

Ash heard her words, heard the way her voice trembled. She was scared to ask him, but the importance of the question had urged her onward. The heaviness of it awarded him the ability to keep his eyelids open.

“Because it represents something to me,” he said. “Why did you keep yours?”

“Kieran was so...so mean to me all the time. He made it seem like something was wrong with me every chance he got. But in the cavern, you treated me like a normal person—not some fucked-up excuse for a human being. You made me feel like I wasn’t full of darkness and sin.”

“Kieran is a fucking hypocrite,” Ash said. “The last thing you are is bad.”

“And that day in the cave, even though we were just breaking the rules and getting into the hot springs...” Her voice got quieter. “...it felt like I was normal. I’m just so, so tired of feeling like everything about me is wrong."

Ash could see a bit better now. She was facing away from him, her back only an inch away from his chest. She turned to face him, and he saw her eyes like shadows in the dark.

“Do you feel bad? About what you did?”

It took him a moment to catch up, his mind still hazy with his sleepiness, but when the realization snapped together in his mind, his back straightened.

“Yeah,” he said. “Of course.”

“So do I.”

He opened his mouth to speak, but the words died in his throat when he felt her hand pressing flat to the center of his chest. Heat spread across his bare skin, traveling outward to wrap him in a sudden desire that he hadn’t realized he felt for her. A desire that felt as enticing as it was forbidden.

Like her.

“You do?” he choked out.

“Yes,” she whispered. “I feel bad for blaming it all on you. I know it was your dad. I know that—that he was the one with the gun. I knew you were scared but I was trying to act tough. I was trying to act like a good person—the one who did the right thing. Like it was really that black-and-white. But then today, you said there’s always light in the darkness, and that there’s always darkness in the light. And it showed me that if I’m not perfect, then neither are you. I don’t think it’s fair for me to think you’re a bad person for not being able to help my dad when you were just—”

No.

He didn’t want to hear this. He couldn’t.

It was his fault. The ice cream shop. The drugs. His father’s abuse. His mother.

His mother.

Ash’s anxiety, fear, and self-hatred swirled together, gathering towards him and lending him control. He moved toward her, letting his body do the thinking for him as he drowned in his own desperation for silence.

“Stop,” he said, cutting her off.

“What?”

He snapped, grabbing her arm and turning her so fast that she gasped. Her back hit the wall right as his forearm did, framing her head as he grabbed her chin from the front. His fingers pressed into the fleshy parts of her cheeks, right beneath her cheekbones, curling inward. Like he wanted to shut her up.

That scared him.

“I said stop,” Ash said, unable to decipher whether his grief was anger, or if his ire was pain. “Don’t talk about things you don’t understand.”

Tayshia stared at him, unable to speak around the press of his palm over her lips. Lips that felt soft as satin upon his skin. Her eyes were wide in the darkness, the whites seeming grey.

He loosened his hold on her jaw. She released a shaky breath and he felt it, damp as it brushed against him. And then she spoke, her voice naught but a whisper of air.

“Does it make you hate yourself less when I tell you that you’re not bad?”

Something twisted in his stomach. On reflex, he jerked forward, his body pressing flush to hers.

“It makes me want to do things to you,” he hissed through his teeth, unable to tear his glare off of the way her lips had parted. The way they seemed to call to him, plush and plump.

“What does it make you want to do to me?”

Why was she doing this to him?

Why was she saying these things?

“It makes me want to use you.” He sucked in his breath, feeling every nerve ending in his body sparking with the energy of holding himself back from what he really wanted to do. “It makes me want to prove to you how bad I can be.”

He felt her moving upward, pushing onto the tips of her toes to get closer. Her gaze darted up and down his face, settling on his eyes.

“So use me, Ash.”

Ash swallowed. Hard. So hard that his throat throbbed in pain.

His fingers twitched against the wall and then moved to her hair. His fingers sifted through it, feeling the tracks of her braids and the netting above them.

And then he clenched his hand into a fist and dragged her head so far back that she was looking straight up.

Trailing his other hand downward, he felt her half of the crystal between his fingertips. It was smooth in different places, but the jagged pieces were the same. Two pieces of the same whole, forever apart yet fitting together perfectly.

If they wanted them to.

He exhaled in defeat, his eyes half-shut.

“Just... Come here.”

Art by Meialoue

The span of two breaths passed and then his head snapped forward.

Ash captured Tayshia’s lips mid-gasp, his head tilted to the side as he pushed all of his lust and need and loneliness into the press of his mouth against hers. He wanted her to know everything that was wrong with him without him ever having to say it aloud.

He was the son of the guy who shot someone she loved. The guy who yelled at her over stupid things. The guy who went to jail. And he was going to rip out whatever silly fantasy of him she had in her head and fill the emptiness she’d torn into him with the triumph of her ecstasy.

He was going to consume her.

To kiss her until she remembered why she hated him.

But then she kissed him back.

It was only for a moment. One brief moment where her fingers were against his face and neck and she was on the tips of her toes. Where the angle of her head made it difficult for her to breathe, but she used it to fuel the way her tongue caressed his. Inside, he felt every part of his body swelling and singing and burning.

Tayshia tasted like starlight, present and significant enough to be beautiful.

Unattainable.

She turned her face a bit, as much as she could with his fingers clenched in her hair. He heard her take a ragged breath. His lips descended upon her bared throat, teeth nipping and tongue laving against a pulse that fluttered with the wild beating of her heart. Her hips twitched between his and the wall, and the feeling of it sent all the blood in his head rushing south. He grabbed her around the backs of her thighs and lifted her up.

And then he heard it.

A moan.

It was small, but he heard it. It lit him aflame.

“I’m sorry.” Tayshia sounded nervous. Her hands gripped his shoulders like she didn’t know where else to put them, her rapid panting as he kissed down the line of her throat mingling with the darkness in the hallway. “I-I didn’t m-mean to.”

“No. No, come here,” he murmured, letting go of her hair so he could put his hand exactly where he wanted it. He squeezed the sides of her neck, enough to make her breath hitch. Her eyes were closed, as though she’d just tasted the sweetest fruit in Eden. “I like it.”

“You do?” she breathed, their lips brushing once again.

“Yeah. I do.”

Ash pulled her forward by the throat and kissed her again, tongue wet and searching—taking everything she had and pulling it into himself to fill that emptiness. That emptiness that she had carved.

He wanted her.

He wanted to hear her whine for him, begging him to keep going until she came. He wanted her to wear the rose tattoo on the back of his hand like a necklace. He wanted to squeeze so he could watch the thorns pierce her flesh.

He wanted to fuck her.

The realization brought him up for air, lifting his head so he could heave for it, his chest expanding and contracting. He needed to stop, or she needed to ask him to. One more wrong move. One more wrong choice, and there’d be no going back.

Something nagged at the back of his head, feeling as wrong as if the sun were out at night.

Was this because she’d just broken up with Kieran?

But he didn’t like that. As deprived as he was from women since jail, what if she just wanted to feel some semblance of normalcy that Kieran wouldn’t allow her to have?

His hands loosened their hold on her.

“Wait! No, please—please,” she whispered, sounding desperate as she tightened her thighs around his hips. “I want this. I do.”

“I don’t believe you.”

Her eyelids snapped open. She appeared confused, like she thought he was joking.

“I do want this.” Her words halted, tripping over themselves. “I do."

“Fine. Then I’m going to fuck you against this wall,” he hissed into her ear, his hands sliding to grip the swell of her rear. He kneaded his fingers, spreading her apart in a way that had his mind reeling with a need that he forced himself to fight. “Would you like that?”

She didn’t speak.

Still holding her, he dragged his hips against hers, hard, firm, and in the spot that he knew every woman wanted touched when they consented. Her mouth fell open and this time, she sighed. He did it again—for reasons that were as selfish as they were exploratory—and then he did it a third time. He felt a moan growing in his chest, but he held it in.

“Okay!” she cried. “Okay, okay, okay. Please put me down. Put me down!”

Stone-faced, he did as she asked.

She was silent. So silent that he could hear his heart beating. Her fingers twitched on his skin, drumming as she searched his eyes.

And then she walked into his bedroom.

Ash stood there, his heart continuing to race.

What was he supposed to do?

Yeah, she was his roommate. Yeah, it was probably a bad idea, especially given that this lease had only begun like two fucking weeks ago. Yeah, he wasn’t sure how he felt about her.

But he’d hooked up with girls within less than fifteen minutes of knowing them. And he was no stranger to sex. It didn’t have to be complicated. He didn’t have to care.

She’d repeatedly said she wanted to. She’d just walked into his room. He hadn’t fucked anyone in over a year.

Ash ran his fingers through his hair, decisions flickering through his mind.

It could be that simple. It could be just a hook-up.

“Shit,” he muttered under his breath, walking backward toward his room. “Shit, shit, shit.”

---

Tayshia was already sitting in the center of his full-sized bed, nestled amongst his black-and-grey comforter and pillows.

She tucked a wavy lock of hair behind her ear and cast him a wary glance. He came to stand next to the bed, arms crossed over his bare chest.

“Are you a virgin?” he asked.

“No,” she said, tone flat.

“And what is your goal?”

“To forget.”

“So, a rebound.”

“Does it matter? A rebound is only bad if you want to date me.” Her tone was snarky. “Do you want to date me, Ash Robards?”

“No.”

“Then why are you complaining?” She scooted down until she lay flat, her hair fanning out across the pillows. “It’s just a—a hook-up, or whatever.”

“Or whatever?”

“Yes.”

Ash crawled over her body, still wearing his joggers as he knelt between her legs. His hands reached for the hem of her hoodie, but she stopped him. There was a fearful look in her eyes.

“I need to—I mean, I wanna leave it on while you—while we—”

Ash’s stomach curled at the thought of fucking her in nothing but her hoodie while her nails scratched his chest tattoos. It didn’t take any convincing. He moved forward to settle atop her body and kissed her, drawing her into a smoldering whirlwind of lips and tongue. His hands reached down and pressed against her inner thighs, spreading them apart. The moment his fingers touched her skin, she jolted.

“Do what you were doing before,” she said quickly, her gaze trained on the ceiling. She was shaking.

“What?” he murmured as he hitched her thigh to his hip. “What do you want me to do?”

“What y-you did on the—against the wall,” she said. “Do that again.”

“Why?”

She hesitated and then whispered, “Because it felt good.”

His hand ran soothing lines up and down her right thigh, his other hand pressing flat to the mattress. He looked down at her face, his gaze as intense as the desire coursing through his body.

“And you like when it feels good?”

She nodded, eyes trained on his lips.

There was no protest from her when he leaned forward and rocked his hips against her core. No protest when his lips met hers again. No protest when he wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her spine into a deeper arch so that the downward tilt of her hips would put her exactly where she needed to be.

Her eyelids fluttered.

“There?” he asked.

“Y-Yes.”

“You’re so sweet,” he breathed out, because he knew she was the exact opposite. He was unable to stop the feeling that jolted up his spine when he felt her hips grinding back.

“I’m n-not.” Her back arched and she let out a long, low moan. “You don’t have t-to say that.”

“You are,” he whispered, tasting the spot beneath her ear. His fingers stroked her thigh. “You’re sweet and soft. So fucking soft. Your skin’s like satin.”

“Don’t say that.”

Ash raised his eyebrow, not stopping the pace of his hips. He wanted to be inside of her so badly, but there was something about this that he liked. Something about the ice around her melting beneath him as he rendered her to nothing.

What would happen if he touched her?

This was so juvenile yet she seemed so into it. Like it was the only time she’d ever felt this good. In the dim, opalescent moonlight that fell across the bed from his window, he could see her brows pulling together, her mouth falling open.

There was something there—something in her face. Like she wasn’t looking at him, but instead looking to him. Like she needed him to confirm that she was making the right choice.

A warm feeling washed over his body, one that he’d rarely felt before. It was almost protective in the way it urged his body to press closer to hers. He no longer wanted to hurt her, or use her, or do anything except make her feel good.

It was just a hook-up, but that didn’t mean it needed to be quick.

“Tell me what you want me to do to you,” he breathed, his lips brushing the shell of her ear. “I’ll make it good for you. I promise.”

She covered her face with her hands, her thigh muscles quivering.

“Come on,” he said. “Tell me.”

Tayshia took a tremulous breath and then said, “I want you to—to go harder. But don’t pull away when you do it. Just...”

Ash’s fingers dug into her thigh. He moved his hips in hard, grinding motions. Her eyes rolled as she sighed. He found himself aching. He couldn’t take his eyes off of her face.

“You like that?” he said, the ghost of a smirk hovering about his lips. “Tell me if it hurts.”

Tayshia nodded, the concentration on her face apparent as he resumed what he’d been doing to her in the hall. With how wide he was holding her legs open and how firmly he rolled his hips against her, he could feel her body getting limper beneath him. It wouldn’t be enough for him, but it seemed like it was for her.

As her concentration began to fade and turn into something euphoric, he found that he wasn’t sure he was right about himself.

Maybe he did care.

“You want me to play?” Ash murmured, his voice rumbling in his chest. He tried not to purr when she placed a hand on the right side of his chest and lightly scratched her nails downward—as if testing out how it felt. “Huh? Want me to play with you right there?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I think so.”

He looked at her for a moment, trying to reconcile the fact that she was so unsure with the fact that she wasn’t a virgin.

Was Kieran that bad?

“Has anyone ever made you...?”

“No,” she said, her tone a bit icy. “And what? What about it?”

“Not even yourself?”

She pulled a sour face and said mockingly, “Masturbation is a sin, Ash.”

“So, do you want me to touch you or not?”

Tayshia swallowed, studying him.

“Yes,” she said. “But just on the outside. Not under my underwear.”

Okay, so she obviously wanted to go slow. He could handle that. His fingers slipped between them and found the apex of her core outside of her panties with practiced speed.

“Here?”

Her response was to whimper and nod as he held her left thigh open and moved his fingers in a way that used her arousal and dragged the fabric against her, creating friction. He dropped his lips to the side of her neck as he did, leaving light kisses that made her shiver each time. Her body was rigid. She let out the air in her chest and instead of a breath, it sounded like a sob.

It was simple enough to figure out the way her body worked. She was like a book, pages open to him and turning easily with each pass of his fingers across her. He had always been able to read her, and she was good.

She was so good.

“Such a sweet girl,” he cooed into her ear, ignoring the way her whining stuttered. “Come for me now. It’s okay. Come for me. Tell me when you do.”

“Now,” she said, her voice strained and head thrown back. “Like, now now. Right now, right there, right there, right—”

With one more slow circle of his fingertips against the fabric, against soft, tender flesh, she shattered like glass against the floor. She came with a violent shudder that ripped through her body and left her choking for breath. He touched her gently through it, his hand holding her pelvis down.

She was so fucking gorgeous.

Why had he never noticed before?

"I can make you come again," he said, his confidence pouring off of him in droves. "Want me to try?"

“I don’t think I can again. Ash. I’m too s-sensitive. Ash, please.”

"Are you sure?"

She paused, biting her lower lip before she whispered, "Okay. You can try."

Her panties were completely soaked. It was easy to use all four of his fingers to drag them along her core, as gentle as though the touch were barely there. Her back arched upward when his fingers curled and pressed inward.

“Shh,” he murmured, keeping his fingers gentle as he continued to touch her. “Be sweet. You can take it, can’t you? Can’t you?”

She whimpered and then said, “I can take it.”

“Good girl.”

Her legs fell open wider.

Fuck.

She was like an ice princess whenever he looked at her, her terracotta brown skin always appearing as soft as a blanket of snow, with her heart draped in sheets of frostiness that only seemed to melt when she wanted it to. Back there against the wall, with his hand around her throat and his tongue inside of her mouth, it felt like she was melting because she was letting him pour heat into her.

Why did she always have to say the things that made him feel the coldest?

His eyes caught sight of the silver chain around her neck. He felt his own crystal swinging away from his chest.

He should have tossed it.

Ash regretted not getting rid of the crystal, and her with it. He regretted not shedding his skin, cleaning her out, and donning the person he used to be before jail. But the moment their lips had first touched, it was like the water filling his mind—the ocean that had been drowning him slowly since they pulled that amethyst out of the cavern wall—churned with the beginnings of a tidal wave.

One of her hands slid from his chest to the flexing muscles of his abdomen. He saw her head roll to the side, her teeth sinking into her lower lip to stifle the sounds of her cries. She watched his forearm as it moved up with the massage of his fingers against her. He heard her begging him, heard her saying please, Ash, gentler please, but never once did she tell him to stop. Never once did she say no.

He felt guilty anyway.

“Ash?” Her voice shook like she was about to cry. “Ash!”

“Hm?”

“I’m gonna—” Her eyes opened wide and she gasped. “—again.”

“I know,” he said softly. “God, I wanna fuck you so badly.”

Tayshia’s breathing caught. “You do?”

“Yeah. Of course.” He almost laughed. “Why does that shock you?”

“I don’t know if I’d feel very good.”

Ash leaned down to kiss her. Then, he angled his hand until just two of his fingertips were on her, pressing tight circles. The fabric was so slick that it slid against her like she really was made of satin.

“You’d feel so, so good on me,” he groaned, sucking her earlobe into his mouth, making her shudder. “You will, and then I’d fuck you until you came all over me.”

He sped up his pace. She practically screamed. Her fingernails dug into his chest until he feared she might break the skin.

“That’s it,” he breathed out in a growl. “You can fucking do it. Come on. Give me one more. Give me one fucking more.”

When she came, sobbing with her head turned to the pillows and her entire body convulsing, he saw tears in her eyes. Panic bloomed like gardenias in his chest. Had he misunderstood her consent?

“I wanna stop,” she whispered. “I need to stop.”

Ash moved away from her faster than he could blink. All the blood in his body rushed back to where it was supposed to go, fear pushing the adrenaline.

“Did I hurt you?” he asked, keeping his distance and pushing his hair out of his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

“No, you didn’t,” she said and her voice sounded choked. “I’m just overwhelmed. I’m overwhelmed, and I don’t think this sort of thing is for me. I mean, I just got cheated on, my boyfriend and I broke up, and I’m gain—I’m just not doing well, and this was a little intense for me.”

“Which part? The things I said? Or the hooking up?”

“All of it.”

She said nothing more and left the room.

As his bedroom door slammed shut, Ash came to another realization about Tayshia Cole.

Tayshia was the brightest ray of light in the room because she costumed herself to be. She painted a smile onto a sunlit face every morning, and from the moment he saw her in their shared apartment each morning to the moment she closed her bedroom door at night, she wore that smile like a suit of armor. A suit of armor weakened by the frost that had begun to gather in the grooves, collecting bit-by-bit as it froze her.

And he could tell: she wanted to freeze. She wanted to freeze because then she wouldn’t have to think about being the person everyone expected her to be. If she were frozen, then everything could come to a complete halt, and she wouldn’t have to be terrified anymore.

She was sitting out in the middle of a snow-covered field, shivering because she thought no one was watching.