The Knight Of The Rose (16 page)

“Boy, that’s heavy.” Da d nearly dropped Mike’s bag as he passed it to him. “I must be

getting old.”

“Nah. You’re not old, Mr Thompson. I’m just bloody strong,” Mike said . “I’d have to be

strong to keep up with this one.” He winked in my direction.

“Please, call me Greg, Mike—you’re like one of the family. And who knows —” he looked

over his shoulder at me, “—with the way my daughter talks about you, maybe one day you will be.”

“Dad,” I dragged the word out and buried my face in my hand.

Mike chuckled. “Not likely, sir, unless you have another daughter I don’t know about.”

Ouch.

“I have a son,” Dad mused with a frown.

“Hm. Yeah, not really on that side of the fence,” Mike said.

“Well, I guess we’ll just have to adopt you, then.” Dad laughed and patted Mike on the back

as they headed inside, leaving me, shouldering a rise of hurt, to trail behind them.

“When did
he
become the favourite?” I said under my breath.

“Mike, good to finally meet you.” Vicki left her station behind the bench to hug Mi ke. “How

have you been?”

“Good, Vicki. Really good—” Mike said softly. “It’s nice to finally be able to put a face to

the voice.”

Great, so Vicki’s been talking to him on the phone, too. Just bury me now.

Vicki smiled. “I’ve made you some breakfast—figured you’d be hungry after all that

travelling.”

“Yeah, great—” Mike said and sat at the table next to me, “the ai rport food was pretty

average.”

“So, Ara tells us you’ve been accepted into the ah—what was that called again?” Vicki asked

as she busied herself in the kitchen.

“Vicki?” I moaned. “Dad’s already interrogated him. Do you have to do it, too?”

“I don’t mind an i nterrogation, Ara.” Mike n udged me gently with his elbow. “It’s uh—it’s

called the Tactical Response Group. We get to use cool guns, basically.” He grinned and raised his

eyebrows at Sam.

“Do you get to shoot people?” Sam sat on the edge of his seat.

Great, he’s already head-over-heels, and Mike hasn’t even brought a gun with him.

“Well,” Mike’s voice softened, “the only place I like to shoot people is on Halo. Other than

that, we try to avoid it as much as possible. But I have a Taser?” he offered.

“Awesome. Hey, do you play on Li ve—” Sam’s voice became background noise while the

boys talked video games.

Without touching my food, I leaned on my hand and listened to the sound of normal; how the

laughter, forks clinking on plates, and cups resting with a clunk on wood could echo familiarity and

content. Once upon a time, being normal meant having a life with two parents, no grief and no scars.

Now, normal means I can sit in my kitchen, eat food with my family, and at the end of my life—die.

A few months ago, I didn’t know how much I had to be grateful for, but the hourglass of fate

can rock, and tip every-thing out of balance at any time. I know now that I have to take each breath

of normal with a kind of appr eciation I never understood before, becau se imagining, with

David’s interpretation of eternity, if I didn’t have any of t his—I looked at Dad and Vicki, leaning

closer to each other as they laughed—I would miss it all terribly.

“Well, Vicki—” Mike wiped his mouth with a napkin and rested his arm on the table, “—that

was the most amazing breakfast I’ve had in a long time. Ara’s right, you are a good cook.”

“
Ara
said that?” Vicki looked at me with a wide smile and round eyes. “Well, thank you, Ara,

and thank you, Mike. I really enjoy cooking—especial ly for people who eat it without
salt
.” She

glared at Dad.

“What?” Dad shrugged, holding his hands out.

Mike laughed and placed his napkin on the table. “Well, my mother raised me with the strong

belief that it’s considered an insult to the chef when one puts salt on his food.”

Vicki’s brow rose and she smiled. “See, Greg? You could stand to learn a few table manners,

yourself.”

Sam laughed.

“Hm, Ara?” Dad cleared his t hroat, ignoring Vicki and Sam. “Why don’ t you give Mike t he

grand tour?”

“Yeah, okay. Come on.” I stood up and, as always , reached for Mike’s hand, but he quickly

dropped it and tucked his fingers into his back pockets.

“Thank you for breakfast, Vicki.” Mike nodded politely then wandered into the formal rooms

behind me.

“So, this is the lounge room…and out there is the backyard.”

“Is that the swing? Where you s it when you’re sad?” Mike aske d, looking past the porch to

the old oak tree.

“Yes. The very same.”

We walked into the TV room on the other side of the house, and as we came to the fr ont

entrance again, I heard Dad telling Sam, who argued the point, to get ready for school.

“Not much to see, really,” I continued, glad I was getting a day off. “All the rooms join up, so

if you get lost, just follow a wall and you’ll end up back here.” I placed my hand on the railing of the

staircase and smiled.

“I like this. It’s a nice house, Ara. It’ s good to see the places you’ve been talking about all

your life.” He tugged on a strand of my hair, making me lower my foot from the first step to look up

at him. “I really missed ya, girl.”

I missed him, too. But was afraid to say it in case he read it the wrong way and thought I

hadn’t moved past the whole kissing-rejection thing.

From my stare of gloom at the floor, I traced the blue of his jeans and the tight muscles under

his shirt, until my view floated to his brown eyes. The caramel colour reminded me of autumn—they

always had. I used to love the autumn, but there would have to be a different comparison for his eyes

now—now that my autumn would forever be a reminder of losing David. Maybe…

“Ara?”

“Hm?” My eyes focused suddenly on the entranceway and Mike’s face again.

“Did you hear anything I just said?”

“Um—” Did I? Was he talking? I didn’t even hear him.

Mike’s shoulders dropped and he nodded t o himself. “Come on, why don’t you show me

upstairs.”

He walked ahead of me; I leaped up quickly to overtake, sporting a competitive grin. “Race

you.”

“You won’t win.”

“I already am.” I looked over my shoulder at Mike, who grabbed the railing and pulled

himself up, nudging me into the railing as he passed. “Ouch!”

He just chuckled as he raced ahead. “Ha! Told ya!”

“Hey. No fair.”

“Life’s not fair,” he said.

Argh! I hate those one-liners. Maybe I should give him the same ser ving David got for that

comment. “You never let me win,” I huffed with my hands on my hips.

“Ara?” He looked down at me from the top. “I
always
let you win.”

A smile broke out across my face; “Okay, true—I ‘spose you do.”

“Maybe I should stop,” he said, “you’re getting spoilt.”

Hmpf! Am not. “So, anyway—that’s my room.” I pointed to the room across the hall from

Mike’s. “And this is yours.” When I pushed the door open, a cold br eeze brushed over my face and

swept my hair back with a pleasant tickle. Mike stared at me; his eyes narrowed then focused, while

his lips pressed together, but turned up slightly. “What?” I shuffled my feet and looked away.

“Nothing,” he said, but that strange look stayed.

“Uh, well, I’ll just cl ose this window. It’s a li ttle chilly in here.” I broke the tension with a

brisk stride across the room. “So, there’s a bathroom there.” I pointed to the door on the right of his

bed.

“Wow, my own bathroom. Nice.” Mike leaned his head around t he bathroom door, then

smiled back at me.

“And you have a TV.” I walked to the closet; the door on the left of his bed, and rolled out

one corner of the LCD. “We usually roll it away to make more space.”

“Great.” He grinned. “I’ve got a stack of our favourite movies on my hard drive.”

“Awesome.” I nodded, pressing my lips into a thin line.

Mike stared down at me with a half-lit smile, his hands on his hips like he did when he’d

question a suspect, and a narrowed look in his eyes that made me clear my throat.

“Why do you keep staring at me like that, Mike?”

“I’m sorry. There’s just—” He went to walk away, but stopped and gave that same look

again. “—Did you dye your hair or something?”

“Why?” I toyed with the ends. “Does it look different?”

“Not sure.”

“Okay.” I laughed. “That makes perfect sense.”

“Sorry.” He shook his head and hooked his fingers under the handle of his suitcase. “I just

haven’t seen you in so long. I think I forgot how you looked.”

“Oh. Well, didn’t you have a picture?”

He shrugged dismissively, placing his suitcase on the end of the bed. “P robably somewhere.

Why?”

“You could’ve referred back to that.”

He scoffed lightly. “I ‘spose I could. Guess I just didn’t think of it.”

“Oh.” I nodded solemnly.

“What?” he said, ceasing the removal of th e padlock from his bag. “What’ s with the long

face?”

You didn’t miss me like I missed you.
“Um...well, it’s just David,” I said. “I told you—he has

to go away for a few weeks before he leaves indefinitely, and—”

“You’ll miss him?” Mike softened, then pulled me into his chest and squeezed me, always

just a little too tight. “It’s all right, kid, you got me. I’ll keep ya company.”

“I know.” I pushed out fr om his arms. “But, I’ve relied on him so much to get me through. I

just don’t know how I’ll cope without him. I
hate
missing people.”

“Well, what was I, if not the one who helped you get through things, before you came here?”

he said. “You’ll be fine, Ara. It’s not the end of the world, and he’ll be back to say goodbye, right?”

I nodded. It was all I could do for fear of crying hysterically.

“Okay.” He patted my arm. “So just…cheer up and enjoy this time with me. Okay?”

I exhaled through my nose, nodding.

“And sit down. You’re making me feel edgy just standing there, hover ing by the door.” He

motioned to his bed.

I looked at it for a long moment. It doesn’t seem right to sit on his bed now—now that I have

a boyfriend. Mike looked at the bed too, then smiled.

“What? Did you booby-t rap it—like last winter when you and your friends thought it’d be

funny to—”

“No,” I said swiftly, then wandered over a nd slumped down in the cen tre, with my feet

dangling off the side. “I just—I don’t know if I’m comfortable being in your room now, is all.”

“Right.” Mike nodded, letting his gaze slip past me to the window.

I rolled onto my side and propped my head up with the ball of my palm. “So, what ’s the plan

today?”

“Well, a change of shirt’s fi rst on the list.” He unzipped his suitcase. “Then, I wanna hear all

about this new boyfriend of yours.”

I grinned at the sound of his accent—how, alone, in a quiet space, the Aussie in him became

more prominent, more noticeable—not a strong accent, just enough to surprise me.

“What?” He frowned.

“Oh, um. It’s the accent,” I said, ceasing my stare at his face. “It sounds so...foreign.”

“Have you heard
yourself
? You’re all
American
.” He put on a mock American accent, but it

sounded more Canadian.

“Hey, don’t knock the accent.” I rolled onto my back and looked up at the ceiling. “Took me

weeks to get it right.”

“Well, it sounds very authentic,” he said warmly.

In a dream-like state, I listened to the sound of the small pockets in his suitcase unzip, and the

gentle thud of the drawers along the wall at the foot of the bed. I loved that sound.

When the suitcase scuffed along the floor, I looked at Mike as he kicked it under the bed and

laid a clean shirt on the blanket. Until the moment he lifted the worn shirt off his back and grinned at

my gaping mouth with that gleaming smile, I’d never thought much about his body. But his sexy

physique, with his bare chest, the softball-sized muscles on his arms, and his honey-brown tan made

me take a deep, shaky breath. “Looks like you’ve been working hard to get into the Tactical Group?”

I smiled at him one last time before a shiver ran down my spine, forcing me to look at the roof again.

“There’s no way
not
to appreciate that kind of workmanship.”

“Well, they expect a certain level of f itness,” he said, ruffling about at the foot of the bed,

“it’s my duty to exceed that.”

“Well, you certainly didn’t look like that the las t time you took your shirt off, so...duty

fulfilled,” I scoffed, and everything went dark with the strong scent of Mike. “Ew. Wash this thing. It

stinks,” I joked, peeling his shirt off my face then throwing it back at him.

He caught it, held it to his nose, then shr ugged and threw it behind him. “Come on—move

over.”

“Make me.”

“Fine.” The giant jumped onto the queen-sized bed and sunk his elbows heavi ly into the

softness beside me, making me roll slightly into him.

I shoved my pal m against his arm and rolled onto my back. “God, you take up so much

space.” He chuckled and tucked his elbows under his ribs to hold his head off the bed. “If you don’t

like it, you could just get off my bed.”

I smiled as he shoved my gently. “Like I said;
Make me
.”

“If anyone could
make
you do anything, Ara-Rose, my life would’ve been much easier.”

“Ha-ha,” I remarked sarcastically. When I looked back at him, his smiling eyes traced circles

over my features. I smiled back, seeing the fine lines I’d memorized from all our nights lying beside