39. the elephant

39

THE ELEPHANT

Leo and I lie entwined on his bed, which has fast become one of my favorite places in the world. The sheets and pillows are on the floor, victims of our recent passion. His head rests on my chest, facing away, and for the last few minutes his fingers have been playing on my abdomen. I know what has his focus—the three small moles just beneath my belly button.

"It's Orion's belt," I murmur, stroking the hair at his temple. "Jameson has the rest of the constellation—minus the belt—on his right shoulder."

Leo turns over and looks up at me. "Really?"

"Yep. My mom first noticed it. She was obsessed with the idea that we carried missing pieces of the other. When we fought, she often told us that no matter how far apart we felt, we would always complete each other, that it was a code written on our bodies. I remember one day she came home super excited from the craft store. She was always getting weird, artsy ideas, most of which ended up in the garbage. But this one came out pretty cool. She used tracing paper to mark our moles, then showed us how our combined constellation compared to the actual one."

"And?"

I smile with the memory. "It was pretty darn close. Kinda freaky, really. For our seventh birthday, she presented each of us with framed copies of the constellation as it appears on our bodies. She did it so it looks like an actual map of stars."

Soft lips press against my breastbone. "Do you still have it?"

I nod. "It's in my bedroom."

"I want to see it next time I'm there."

My fingers pause in his hair, my gaze on the vaulted ceiling of his bedroom. "Okay," I force out.

"Hey," he says softly. "Come back."

I meet his eyes with effort. "I'm here."

He sits up and I follow, scooting back against the pillows and pulling the sheet over my breasts.

"What's wrong?" Leo asks gently.

I shake my head. "Nothing. I'm good. Memory lane, you know. It's a trip."

"Amelia."

I smirk. "Yeah, Doc?"

As soon as the nickname trips from my mouth, my stomach sinks. Stupid, Mia. Sure enough, Leo stiffens.

"I wondered how long we'd avoid the issue. Does it bother you a lot, that I was your therapist? "

I disguise panic with a laugh. "Shouldn't that be my question?"

Leo sighs, turning away and dropping his legs off the bed. It's late—sometime after midnight. We're both tired, but for some reason we haven't tried to sleep. Sex before dinner, sex after dinner, and sex for dessert. We're insatiable, each time somehow better than the last. More intimate. More profound. There were moments tonight I forgot we weren't together, that we hadn't always been together. That we're a landmine waiting for a single misstep.

My slip of the tongue is the misstep.

"Yes," he says finally. "It bothers me."

Pain rings a discordant note in my heart. "Okay. I mean, I get it. Obviously. And I don't want you to risk?—"

"It's not about my career, at least not in that way. Sure, if someone dug deep enough, they'd find out we were at Oasis at the same time, but the place is basically wallpapered in nondisclosures. Nothing would come of it. And I only treated you peripherally after your accident in 2016."

"Then I don't understand," I say helplessly. To my horror, tears fill my eyes. "Am I not good enough for you?"

He swivels toward me, features etched in horror. "What? No! Jesus, why would you even say that?"

I laugh shrilly. "Because you don't want to date me, maybe? Is it the pink hair? The eight-year age difference? The fact I'm a waitress with a useless art history degree? That I'm not long-term material? That I was at Oasis in the first plac?—"

Leo grabs my shoulders. "Sweetheart, stop. Please stop. "

I suck in breath, my chest tight, my heart stampeding against my ribs. Leo's face comes into focus as I blink away tears. My face burns with embarrassment. "I'm sorry," I choke.

"Never apologize for telling me how you feel," he says sharply. "I'm the one who should apologize, for not realizing you might feel rejected. None of what you said is true, Amelia. I don't care what job you work or about your education or anything like that."

"Then why?" I whisper.

His eyes shutter and he looks away, but not before I see it. Guilt.

And I know.

"It's because of what happened between us at Oasis, isn't it? That's what bothers you, what you can't deal with. That you were technically my doctor when we slept together."

His hands fall from my shoulders. "Yes," he admits mutedly. "I've tried, Amelia. There are moments I even forget about it."

"But it was consensual," I say, even though I know that's not the issue for him. His conflict is deep and personal, and one I can do nothing about.

Turning distraught eyes on me, he murmurs, "Do you remember the conversation we had about power? I knew how hard it would be for you to open fully to me, and I asked you to trust me not to abuse my power."

I shake my head numbly, totally helpless. I can't make a valid argument against his point. There's no use. So I tell him the truth .

"It was my fault, Leo. Mine. I've been breaking people for twenty years. You were by far the hardest, but you still broke. I got what I wanted and this is my punishment. You'll never forgive yourself, will you?"

"You're still looking at yourself through the wrong lens," he says softly, eyes tender on mine. "You aren't—have never been—the destructive person you think you are. You're… a force of nature. A perfect wave. Everyone who has tried to ride that wave has wiped out, but mark my words, every one of them would give anything to ride it again. Even for a few seconds."

I want to bask in his words like a cat in sunshine, but I can't. Not when our train's wheels are throwing sparks. Not when the conductor is screaming for everyone to jump off. Not when my brain can only think in stupid fucking metaphors.

"What the hell does that mean ?"

He drags a hand through his hair—once upon a time he would have removed his glasses.

"Can you blame a wave for crashing to shore?"

I throw my hands up. "For the love of everything good in the world, will you stop with the metaphor?"

He cracks a tiny smile, but it only lasts a second. "I don't blame you for what happened, Amelia. I can't blame you. I was responsible. I could have said no. Should have said no. But when you stood up, the way the moonlight… I lost my fucking mind."

I recoil physically and mentally. "So that's it, then? It was a mistake, you blame yourself, you'll never get over it, the end? Having sex with me now is what, some sort of self-flagellation for your sin?"

He rubs his face roughly, muttering, "I don't want this."

For once, the truth is easy to speak.

"Neither do I."

We dress. He drives me home.