Fade To Midnight. Shannon McKenna

      And Edie herself, overlaying it all. Sweet, warm and female.

      It was an amazing scent. It inebriated him. It should be bottled.

      Sun slanted through half closed wooden venetian blinds, striping the walls with slashes of light. The walls were completely covered with drawings, photos, postcards, magazine cutouts. A glimpse into her mind. He wanted to sneak in there, poke around forever. Looking at what she looked at. Studying what she thought about, what she feared and dreamed and imagined. He wanted to know it all.

      And here it was. Everything he craved. Laid out like a feast.

      Edie closed the door, and watched him check out her humble place. A sweeping glance was all it took. A TV perched on a steamer trunk in one corner. A tiny kitchen barely existed in another corner. Spider plants and begonias dangled from the ceiling. The rest of the room was all about her drafting table, books, and wall collage. One door led to a tiny bathroom, the other to a tiny bedroom, big enough only for a single futon bed and a narrow dresser. Not a problem, since she wasn’t in the habit of collecting clothes. She worked in her underwear when it was warm, and in raggedy tights and sweats when it was cold.

      “I’m sorry about Jamal,” she offered. “He’s a really intense Fade fan, and he’s having a little bit of trouble separating fiction from reality.”

      “Not a problem.” He looked around at her walls.

      “I know what you’re thinking,” she said.

      His mouth twitched. “Do you?”

      “You’re wondering why a Parrish would live in a hole in the wall like this,” she said. “Right?”

      “No. I was thinking how your place shows what you care about.” He gestured at the drafting table, the books, the shelves of drawing supplies and art monographs. “But since you said it, go ahead. Tell me. Why is a Parrish living in a hole in the wall like this?”

      Edie dragged in air, hardened her belly. There was no point in trying to misrepresent the unenviable situation she was in. She’d tried that before. It always blew up in her face, sooner or later.

      “This is all I can afford, with no help from my father,” she said. “The books are selling well, so it’ll get better eventually, but for now…” She shrugged. “Parrish money comes with strings attached. I’d have to be good, take my meds, not embarrass anybody, not say anything strange. I’ve tried, but the meds make me feel half dead. I can’t draw when I take them. I don’t even recognize myself. My father thinks I’m doing it to spite him.” She shook the painful thought away. “So, here I am.”

      “Here you are,” he echoed quietly.

      “I’m lucky I make enough money as an artist to afford even this much,” she said. “I’m not much good at anything else.”

      The autumn sun slanted in the window, lighting up his eyes and warming the color into the luminous jade of a glacial lake. She’d never gotten anywhere near his power with her drawings, though she’d tried for a decade. His scars just made his stark male beauty more poignant. They put it in sharp relief, a brutal reminder of his vulnerability.

      He was no superhuman. He was real.

      His scars made her think of that day that split her life in half. All his revelations were bringing her own long-buried truths to the surface. Things she knew so deeply, she barely thought about them. They were the bedrock of her deepest self, the underlying landscape of her mind.

      Seeing the burned man, wounded and desperate, had broken something inside her heart when she was eleven. Something that could never be mended until she could soothe those wounds, and give him the help that he had begged for. She still couldn’t. There was nothing she could do for him. But God, how she wanted to. She ached for it.

      It was ridiculous. Pathetic. And it was the truth.

      She looked down, eyes skittering around the crowded little room. Afraid of looking stupid. Of being judged by him. She wished she were bolder, more uncaring, more fuck-you-all. But she just wasn’t.

      She couldn’t bear to look at him, and she couldn’t bear to look away. Slices of sunlight shifted on the wall as drafts from the warped window moved the blinds. The crystals she’d hung spun rainbow splotches lavishly, everywhere. The space seemed incredibly small. He just stood there. Not twitching, not ill at ease or embarrassed. A silent, powerful presence, patiently waiting for something. Who the hell knew what. She was the jittery one, hoping desperately not to screw this up.

      Not even knowing what “this” was. Where she wanted this miraculous turn of events to go. Just one thing was for sure. She didn’t want to chase it away. Like she’d chased away every other man she’d ever gotten close to. But it wasn’t up to her. It never was.

      It was out of her hands, and that made her so scared.

      Well. You could ask the man to sit down, suggested a dry voice in her head that sounded suspiciously like her mother.

      “Have a seat,” she offered. “Can I make you a cup of tea?”

      “That would be nice,” he said.

      “Oh, and yeah. Here.” She rummaged in her cupboard, and pulled out a colorful cardboard box. Animal crackers. She placed them on the table. “I know they’re ridiculous. My mother would turn over in her grave if she saw me offer these to a guest, but it’s all I have at the moment. I keep them for Jamal. He stays here a lot. You know, to use the computer, and sometimes he sleeps on the couch, when his mom is, um, occupied, with her boyfriends. I leave my window open for him, the one with the fire escape, so he has a safe place to do homework when I’m not here.” She pulled it shut, latched it. “But, ah…not today.”

      He gave her a smile that made her wish she’d kept her mouth shut. Babbling on about Jamal, like a fatuous fool. “Stop it,” she said.

      “Stop what?” His low, gentle voice sounded caressing.

      She waved her hand at him. “Stop looking at me like that.”

      “I can’t help it,” he said. “It’s a sweet thing for you to do for the kid. It’s a total nightmare from a security point of view, but it’s sweet.”

      “I have nothing here worth stealing,” she retorted, flustered. “And I wasn’t trying to get your approval, or trying to prove anything to—”

      “Of course you weren’t. You don’t have to. It’s obvious.”

      “What’s obvious?” she snapped.

      He hesitated. “Who you are,” he said. “Your quality. Never mind. I don’t want to embarrass you. You don’t take compliments well.”

      “I guess not,” she said testily. “Will you please sit down? Eat some of these cookies.” She ripped open a box, undid the wax paper, held one out. “Here. Sit down, eat a giraffe. You’re making me nervous.”

      “In a moment,” he said. “I’d like to look at your pictures. May I?”

      She huffed out a gusty breath. “Be my guest.”

      She shoved the giraffe into her mouth, and crunched it while he walked the walls. She’d covered the walls with clippings, magazine images, things scribbled on restaurant bills, napkins, paper towels, paper plates. A chaotic, fluttering floor to ceiling collage.

      She tried to ignore him by putting the teakettle on, setting up mugs with teabags. All she had was spiced green tea chai. No point in asking if he liked it, since she could offer no alternative.

      And then there was nothing to do but wait for the water to boil.

      She forced herself to turn around. He was peering at the wine-stained sketch of her father, the one she’d done in the restaurant. She’d almost thrown the ill-starred thing away, because it hurt to look at it.

      Then she’d pulled it out of the waste basket, and put it up on the wall.