The Story Of Us Part 12

"Because he made sure you couldn't. It's what a.s.sholes like him do." He pulls me against him and rests his chin on the top of my head. "What he did is not your fault. Don't believe that lie."

I nod against him. Finley always told me Chris was a d.i.c.k. But to hear that what he did isn't my fault? That's new.

"It was Finley who got you to draw again, wasn't it?" he asks.

"Yeah. She spent an entire paycheck on supplies for me. I didn't want to disappoint her."

He points to the message I wrote. "You thanked me for showing you color again. What does that mean?"

I let go of him and dry my eyes. Maverick's features have softened now, and this expression I can read. It's magenta-admiration.

"When I first started drawing, my pictures were bright and vibrant. Then the more I let-I mean, the more Chris controlled me, the dimmer they became. I didn't notice I'd stopped using color until my teacher mentioned it. Even then, I brushed it off as an artistic phase." I flip through my sketchbook to the sunrise I did. "And now..."

I don't finish, allowing Maverick to see for himself.

Maverick turns each page, and I know what he must see: the colors growing with intensity. Even the lightest, palest colors are there. The awe on his face fills me with a lively shade of canary.

He picks up the portrait. "I'm black and white."

"No, you're not." I point to the golden bronze of his back. "See? It's like you're glowing."

He studies it for a moment. "Oh, yeah." Then he squints. c.o.c.ks his head to the side. "Is the blanket gray?"

"Gray?" I peer at the material barley covering his b.u.t.t. "That's moss."

"Moss?"

"Yeah. Green with yellow and a touch of sable."

"So ... green."

I blink. "Yes. It's green."

Maverick chuckles. "That's what you do, huh? Call pink 'salmon' and name other colors by fruit?"

"What? Rosewood isn't a fruit."

"What color is rosewood then?"

"Rosewood. That is the color."

"Yeah, but what's the real color?" Oh. There's a glint in his eye. He curls his lip in between his teeth too, waiting.

"Maverick!"

"I had to see how long it would take for salmon to appear on your cheeks. Twelve point six seconds."

I cover my cheeks with my hands, but he removes them. "I like color on you. Now, in what color family would I find rosewood?"

"It's deep shade of red."

"All right. Later I hope to darken those salmon cheeks to rosewood."

Chocolate irises burn into me, and I lose my breath for a moment. "Scarlet."

"What's scarlet?"

"What you're doing to me. What I see when I'm with you."

His eyes flick down to the portrait. "Not this?"

"No. That's what I see in you."

Maverick takes a lock of my hair and slides it between his fingers. "All right. So what do you see in me?"

I'm about to reply when I realize what my answer will mean. I won't be just vulnerable; I'll be completely exposed.

I bite the inside of my cheek. "You're confident. Rea.s.suring. Pa.s.sionate and genuine."

Maverick stares. My stomach twists at the silence.

But then he brings my mouth to his and kisses me. It's confident and rea.s.suring. Pa.s.sionate and genuine. And when he pulls away, I'm close to canary tears.

Maverick nods to my open sketchbook, to an unfinished drawing. "What are you working on now?"

"Come here." I lean to the side so he can have my view. "See there, between the trees?"

"The beach chairs?"

"Yeah."

"One is tipped over."

"I know. It's beautiful."

He hands me my pencil. "Show me."

Chapter 19.

Present Day 5:05 a.m.

"How are you feeling, Ali?"

This is the third time Finley has asked in the last twenty minutes, and I answer the same way I did the previous two times. "I'm fine."

"'Fine' is not a feeling. It's more of a state of being."

"I'm fine, Finley," I repeat. I'm not sure what she wants from me. There's been no change with Maverick. "The nurse said his bloodwork is okay for now, and-"

"I know how Maverick is. I want to know how you are."

I inhale deeply, hold my breath, then let it out slowly. I can't take my eyes off my husband. Because what if something happened?

But that's not what Finley's talking about. She's not even referring to the situation in front of me. She's asking about the colors. Two months ago I went dark, darker than the first black-and-white phase, and I haven't fully recovered.

I'm not sure what to tell her. Maverick is fighting, and I'm helpless. The grays have taken over everything, but what can she or I do about it now?

So I don't answer.

It's strange that she doesn't push, but I don't ask. I focus on Maverick, on the machines reading out his life. I smooth out the nonexistent wrinkles on his blanket again. Readjust it over his chest. He'd hate being positioned on his back like this, I think.

He's wearing a hospital gown, and I remember him teasing me about wearing one during a doctor's visit not that long ago. He laughed at the open back and the strings that did nothing to hold it together.

"I can see your a.s.s," he teased before he smacked a cheek. "It's s.e.xy. Can you stuff it in your purse and wear it around the house?"

"I'm glad you find it so flattering," I said.

"Just your a.s.s."

"Then why bother with the gown?"

He grabbed me by the hips and held me between his knees. "My wife wants to trot around the house naked? G.o.d, I love you."

Finley is no longer in the chair beside me. She's still in the room, though, shuffling with papers in the back corner.

I scoot closer to the bed. I'm not supposed to disturb him, but I'm worried he's too cold in that thin gown. A lot of couples are opposites. When one is cold, the other is hot. We're not like that. Even with the fleece pullover on, I'm having chills. I bet Maverick is too.

I slide my hand under the blanket at his stomach. I'm careful to move slowly and gently. According to the doctor, he's bruised and has several broken ribs. Plus the surgical incision down his chest.

A light tug reveals his gown isn't secured in the back. It comes loose and I'm able to press my fingertips against his side. Warmth greets me and I'm relieved that the chill only belongs to me. His skin is perfect, the way it always is.

The one touch isn't enough though. It's been so long since I've explored him, felt the smoothness of skin and taut muscle beneath. The thought creeps in that I'm running out of time. So I push farther inward to his stomach. Part of me hopes this will wake him up so I can hold him and kiss him and tell him "I'm sorry." But the nurse said his state is his body's way of healing the brain.

I won't linger. I just need this moment of intimacy. To caress the body I had memorized more than my own.

My fingers sc.r.a.pe the edge of a bandage, and I still. That never used to be there. I don't want to hurt him, so I withdraw and adjust the blanket over him.

"I brought you something," Finley says, sitting back down and giving me my sketchbook and pencils. "Draw it."

"Draw what?"

"How you're feeling. You have to get it out somehow, Ali."

I stare at the supplies. She's right.

I hand her back the pencils and open the sketchbook to the first blank page. Then I look up for something to draw. It's so obvious now, and the object jumps out of reality and into my mind. I pull out a pencil and begin to draw.

I feel gray, and gray is what I begin with. I move quick, my usual perfectionism unimportant. This drawing isn't about the scene in front of me; it's about the pain inside of me.

I shake my head at the rose hue Finley tries to hand me. I'm drawing Maverick's heart monitor, and nowhere on the monitor is any shade of pink. Nowhere within me is pink either.

"Coal," I say.

She hesitates, not liking what she sees, but gives me the color anyway.

For the remainder of the drawing, I work in the shades of grays and charcoals that have filtered out all color except one. I hate that one.

Finley stays quiet. I feel her gaze wander to my paper several times, and I can sense the red wafting off of her. Mine is for Maverick; hers is for me. So when I reach for crimson, her breath hitches.

I start in the upper left-hand corner and shade in the entire drawing. The whole d.a.m.n thing, covered in red, red, red.

Fear.

The warmth of his skin. How long will it stay like that?

Maverick's heartbeat is his source of life. If that monitor flatlines...

"Alieya," Finley says, but I barely hear her now.

I need more crimson.

"Alieya." There's fear in my best friend's voice now. More crimson.

So. Much. Crimson.

Why is my whole f.u.c.king world so f.u.c.king crimson?

I keep going. Pressing my pen harder into the paper until crimson is all I see. The monitor is gone, the hospital room is gone. All of it absorbed into the one color that's taken over everything.

Finley wanted to know how I felt.

I scribble, no longer caring about etiquette, about the silence, about the "fine" facade I'm wearing. I cry out. I sob. The point of my pen rips into the paper at the force I'm using.

"Alieya!" Finley grabs my hand, stopping it.

I jerk away, the pencil flying backwards out of my hand. I'm scaring her. I'm scaring me too.

I rip the paper out of the book and clutch it to my chest as I slide off of my chair.

Distantly, I hear Finley tell someone that I'm okay. It's fine. She'll take care of it. They must believe her, because seconds later she's on the floor with me, arms wrapped around me and head pressed to mine.

We stay like that until I catch my breath. "I'm scared, Finn. That's how I feel-scared."