I check the burner phone and find a message from Cash that they’ve got more for the file and I reply back that I’m pleased and then stumble back to bed. Saige’s eyes flutter open when I pull the covers back to get in. I’m really cold for some reason.
“How are you feeling?” she asks. It’s about one in the morning and she has to be exhausted from caring for me. I never planned for her to see me that way, but she’s an excellent nurse.
“Better, but still shitty,” I say, lowering myself into bed. My stomach rolls and I get ready to bolt again, but it settles and I lay back down.
“I’ll go get you some ginger ale,” she says, but I reach out my hand to stop her.
“It’s okay. It can wait.” But she shakes her head and does it anyway and I’m not in a position to stop her.
A few minutes later she comes back with a glass of fizzing ginger ale and a small plate of crackers.
“See if you can keep this down,” she says, handing me a cracker. Obediently, I take it from her and nibble at one corner. The stuff is dry and salty, but I hope it won’t come back up.
Saige watches me eat and sip and I can tell she wants to say something.
“You were talking in your sleep. It woke me up,” she says. I have no idea what she’s talking about.
“I don’t talk in my sleep,” I say, finishing a cracker and starting a second.
“Well, then you only do when you’re sick. You said a lot of stuff that didn’t make sense.” I look at her and hope my eyes and expression are steady. Every now and then when I was a child I’d talk in my sleep. My mother thought it was funny and used to write down some of the things I’d say, but I haven’t done it in a long, long time. Or at least no one’s been aware of it.
“Did anything I said make sense?”
“You just kept saying that you were Sylas.” The bottom drops out of my stomach and I want to throw up for a different reason now. There’s no way to hide my reaction to her saying my real name.
“Who’s Sylas?” she asks as I try to breathe.
“No one,” I say and we both know that’s a lie. There’s nothing I can say to get myself out of this situation.
“Okay,” she says, pretending she believes me. “Dreams are funny sometimes, aren’t they?” She smiles and gives me a kiss on the forehead.
“Now eat some more crackers.”
I have no choice but to do what she says, but now I want to sleep with one eye open.
I end up crashing again from exhaustion and the next time I wake up she’s already in the kitchen making breakfast. The ginger ale and crackers stayed down and now my stomach is roaring for real food.
I have two choices: I can either make up a story about the name Sylas, or I can just let it drop. If I make a big deal out of it, she’ll think it’s a big deal and that might send up more red flags than if I just drop it.
So I decide to drop it as I stumble out of the bedroom.
“He lives!” she says, coming to give me a hug, wearing nothing but one of my t-shirts.
“I thought you were going to turn yourself inside out there for a little while. How are you?” She looks up at me with a sleepy smile on her face.
“Much better. Do you have maybe some oatmeal or something? I don’t want to risk anything that’s going to come back up again.” She hands me a bowl that is filled with oatmeal, bananas and blueberries.
“There’s more crackers and ginger ale if you can’t do that,” she says, making herself a bowl of oatmeal and putting the fruit on top.
“This is fine, thank you.” She takes my hand and leads me to the couch. She sits with her legs crossed under her, facing me with her bowl.
“Your color looks a lot better. I wonder what you had.”
“No idea,” I say, still wary of her. She seems to have forgotten our conversation last night.
“Well, I’m crossing my fingers I don’t get it because that was not fun and I wasn’t even the one going through it.”
“If you do, I’ll take care of you. Thank you for everything, Saige.” I really mean this. She didn’t have to do that for me, and she did it without even hesitating.
“You’re my boyfriend. It’s my job to take care of you.” She pops her spoon in her mouth and smiles around it.
I decide I’m well enough to go to work.
My energy is still down, but my stomach seems to be back to normal function. By the end of the day, I’m wiped and ready to go back to Saige.
She doesn’t mention Sylas again, or at any point during the next week. Soon we’re only one week out and I’m counting my hours with her. We’ve been on dates and out dancing and I’ve hung out with her friends in an official capacity. Lo still doesn’t like me, but at this point it doesn’t matter at all. Still, I pretend to try to win her over and I think I do a little bit.
The guys are going full-throttle to get everything moved to California. Most of the cars are already gone and Hardy has gone on ahead to get everything set up for us. By the time we get there, our apartments will be set up and we’ll have new identities.
“I want to be Slash this time,” Cash says, opening an old argument. He always wants to have a name that’s both ridiculous and very close to his current name.
“Too bad,” Row says as he hands out our new documentation.
This time I’m Robert Perry. It sounds like the name of a boring politician.
“Glenn Buttlicker?” Cash says, reading the name on his new driver’s license. Row snickers and we all start laughing.
“This is not fucking funny,” Cash says, his face getting red. He’s already on edge because he’s packing up his antiques and loading them into a truck that he’s going to personally drive all the way to Cali. He does this every time because he doesn’t trust anyone else to move his precious crap.
“Just kidding. You’re Kenneth Andrews.” We tend to pick names that are simple and easy to forget.
“Boring,” Cash says, tossing away the fake ID and grabbing the other from Row.
“Hey, you can go back to being Mr. Buttlicker if you want.” Row waves the joke ID in front of Cash’s face and he just glares.
I’ve found Lizzy a new place and I’ve got the paperwork to transfer her. All I need to do is pick her up and we’ll drive one of the cars to California with no one the wiser. I called her and told her she was moving and she sounded a little sad, but when I mentioned the new facility has a pool, she just about lost her mind with excitement. I feel bad dragging her away, but I’m doing the best I can, given the circumstances.
Four days before we’re set to email the file to her father, Saige is acting odd.
“You okay?” She’s been clumsy and distracted, which is very unlike her.
“Yeah, fine,” she says in a squeaky voice as she absently pets Leo while doing her homework. Well, pretending to do her homework. She’s been staring off into space for at least the last ten minutes. I’ve been reading and I keep looking up from my book.
“You’re not fine, what’s up?” I set my book down and she turns in her chair to face me. Her face is a little red, which is odd. She doesn’t blush all that much when we’re not in bed.
“I need to tell you something.” I have another moment when the bottom drops out of my world. All I can think is that she’s found out who I am and she’s going to tell my father. That I said way more in my sleep than she originally told me. It takes everything in me to keep my voice even when I speak.
“What’s that?”
She takes a breath, bites her lip and then lets it out.
“I love you.”
Oh.
Oh.
OH.