CHAPTER TWENTY

A white cotton shirt clung to wet spots along Chris's torso, accentuating the curves of his chest and waist. The gray waistband of his boxers peeked out beneath the fabric as he raked his hands through his hair.

"What'd I miss?" Faint footprints trailed behind him in the carpet from his damp feet as he pulled his bag onto the armchair.

I side-eyed Nick. He may have felt comfortable enough to talk about Carter, but that didn't mean Matt or Chris did and that wasn't my call to make.

Plopping on the edge of his bed and sending the perfectly arranged pillows forward, Nick waved his hand. "Other than me complaining about how ungodly annoying you are? Nothing."

Chris shot a glare over his shoulder and the pressure building in my lungs released slowly. I followed Nick's lead.

"Don't worry," I fell back on the other bed, "I already knew that." Matt smiled to himself, walking past to set down two large paper bags atop the desk parallel to the television. Tiny splotches of oil seeped through their bottoms.

I sat up on my forearms. The clean, soapy aroma coming from Chris, and the bathroom, was quickly masked by the stench of deep-fried chicken tenders and french fries as Matt splayed out to-go boxes along the length of the desk. My skin immediately felt greasy.

"Thanks for going down to get all this," I said to his back. He turned around with a french fry halfway to his mouth.

"Of course." Our fingers brushed faintly as he handed over my food.

It may not have shown on my face, but I was looking at him differently. As ridiculous as it sounded, it felt like I was seeing him, all of them, in perfect clarity for the very first time. I hadn't realized that looking at them before was fuzzy - their edges out of focus so slightly it was almost imperceptible, but knowing what I knew now sharpened the image to high-definition. All I wanted to do was watch them. Take in all the miniscule details I'd overlooked.

The three of them sat cross-legged on the carpet in a semicircle. Nick and Chris's spines were pressed against the foot of the bed and Matt sat supported by the leg of the desk. I don't know how long I sat there, my food going cold in my lap, staring at the crinkles beside their eyes as they laughed at something I missed.

"What are you doing over there?" Chris's voice cut through the daze, his eyes twinkling in the lamp light as he tilted his head back on the bed to look at me.

I held his eyes momentarily and the corners of his lips twitched upward. Matt opened up space for me between him and Nick; I fit myself into it. His attention flicked from Nick to me, the world's gentlest smile gracing his lips before returning to the conversation with his brother. In my chest, a weightlessness unfolded.

⎯

I stood beneath the scorching spray of the shower head far longer than I should have. Angry red blotches formed along my collarbone and above my breasts. A lifetime seemed to have passed since I had a moment to myself, so I took my time applying thick layers of complementary lotion along my still damp body.

Miscellaneous bottles of cologne and deodorant, things I didn't even know men needed, or used, like pomade and a balm for post-shaving, were scattered along the porcelain countertop. All of the products combined could have made up a Bath & Body Works.

I sniffed one of the fragrances; fresh notes of salty air and coastal woods washed over me, tickling my nose. I placed the glass bottle back in its place beside the others, my fingerprints making a home in the condensation.

Goosebumps shot up my legs as my exposed thighs made contact with the closed lid of the toilet. I perched on it, staring at my distorted reflection in the foggy mirror. It was the in-between moments like this, when my brain had a chance to catch up to all of the changes I'd been through recently, that I felt most vulnerable.

I tried not to focus too heavily on the nagging in my belly and let my thoughts wander aimlessly while I combed through the knots at the end of my hair and smeared copious amounts of moisturizer along my face and neck. But of course, even while I distracted myself with skincare and thoughts of anything other than the conversation I'd had with Nick, a piece of me was acutely aware of what tomorrow would bring. Life as I knew it was gone the moment I agreed to come here.

I pressed my palms against the bathroom counter and rocked on the balls of my feet. Who was I kidding? It was gone the second that coffee spilled, I was just too damn stubborn to accept it.

Through the crack in the bathroom door I could hear a dull thump followed by Nick's baritone laugh. My bare feet padded against the tile floor as I paced the width of the room. A cacophony of voices echoed in my head like a broken radio. One after another, blurring into each other until it became white noise.

I stopped abruptly in front of the mirror. "Okay," I whispered to myself. "What do you want?"

⎯

It took a second for my eyes to adjust to the dim light of the bedroom. Only a singular lamp above one of the beds was switched on. I stopped dead in my tracks, my clothes balled up in my arms, when I came around the corner to see Matt lying on a makeshift bed in the three foot gap between the mattresses.

I rolled my lips to suppress a giggle. "What are you doing?"

He'd found a hospital-thin blanket in the bottom drawer of the desk and had it pulled up to his chin. The amount of space between where the blanket ended and where his feet stuck out at the bottom was comical.

"There wasn't another blanket," he pouted.

The expression made laughter rise in my throat and I moved past him shaking my head. "No," I laughed, crouching down to my duffel, "I mean why are you on the floor?"

"So you could have the bed," he said simply.

My brow knitted. Right. Of course.

Nick looked up from his phone. He might as well have said what he was thinking since it was written all over his face. I felt his eyes on me as I crawled into the empty bed. Even in sweatpants the coolness of the sheets sent a shiver down my spine.

"Do you mind if I turn this off?" I asked no one in particular, reaching my hand up to the lamp's switch. A chorus of "no's" filled the air and I clicked off the light, leaving only the pale glow of Nick's phone and neon letters of the alarm clock to illuminate the room.

Maybe it was because I'd been sleeping in a twin bed for the last six months, or the fact that I felt vaguely guilty for making Matt sleep on the floor, but suddenly, the mattress felt far too big for one person.

My thoughts snowballed. Did I want Matt to sleep with me? I mean the last couple of nights next to each other weren't terrible, and it was pretty chilly in here. His blanket was practically nonexistent, so really I'd be doing him a favor. But then again what if he decided to sleep on the floor because he thought it'd be weird to share the bed? I could just lean over and offer. Pillow walls were a thing. Or we could sleep head-to-foot...

"Oh my God, I can practically hear you thinking Natalia," Nick groaned, "why are you moving so much?"

I froze mid-turn. Overthinking was my specialty and man was I overthinking this.

I leaned my head over the edge of the mattress. Through the shadows I could make out Matt's frame, a small lump beneath the blanket.

"Hey," I whispered.

His head lifted an inch.

"You can sleep up here, if you want." The words came out quicker than I wanted and I thanked my lucky stars that it was dark so I didn't have to see the eye roll I was certain Nick had given me.

"Are you sure? I don't mind staying down here," Matt propped himself up on an elbow, making our faces level. I pulled back a centimeter.

"Yeah, the bed is...big."

In the faint light coming through the crack beneath the door, I saw his head nod and felt the shift of the bed as he slid in beside me. Though there was a canyon between us, all of the nerve endings in my body were on alert. When his foot accidentally collided with my shin I jolted away so fast you would have thought I'd been electrocuted.

"Sorry -" he started.

"It's okay!" I rushed out.

The bed shifted again. He paused. "Are you all right?"

The tightly wound ball of anxiety sitting heavy in my stomach unfurled. I was acting insane.

I buried my face in one of the pillows. "You ask me that a lot."

"Well, to be fair..." Nick teased from across the room, and the pillow I intended to hit him with smacked Chris in the head with a hollow thud.

"What the fu -"

I gasped, clapping a hand over my mouth, muffling my laughter. Whoops.

"How about we don't throw things when we can't see?" Chris admonished, though there was definitely a grin on his face. A soft thump came from the pillow's return to my bed and I hugged it to my chest.

The words came out on their own accord. "Can I ask you guys something?"

Someone made an mhmm sound so I bypassed the hesitation in my voice.

"How did you know moving to L.A. was the right choice?" Even though what Jenny had said made sense, that sometimes there was no right choice, only one that felt as such, I couldn't curb the doubt hanging over me like a wet blanket.

"We didn't." Through the sheets I could feel the small shrug of Matt's shoulders. "It was a risk, especially at our age, but we had each other and we could always change our minds."

"You weren't nervous about it not working out? Or feeling like a... failure?"

"Of course we were," Chris said. "But who really decides if you're a failure? We knew the odds of making YouTube work was slim, but the odds were zero if we didn't try."

"Had things not worked out we would've been devastated," Nick added. "But they did. And we're here because we went after what we wanted in spite of our uncertainty."

They were so optimistic it baffled me. Normal people would have given up the moment something went wrong or didn't pan out the way they intended. However, the boys didn't. They left their family, their life, everything they knew and loved behind to chase a dream that could have easily slipped away from them. More importantly, they were fine with whatever the outcome was.

I squeezed the pillow tighter. "That takes a lot of courage doing what you did. Most people wouldn't have been able to. I know I wouldn't have."

The bed dipped as Matt turned to face me. "What do you think you're doing right now?"

The question hit hard enough for all of the air to die in my lungs. This wasn't the same.

"I - I didn't have a choice?" I said quietly, blinking at the shadows along the ceiling as people clamored past our room out in the corridor.

"But you did," Matt's voice was firm, but not unkind. "Don't you see that? Nat, you could have stayed in Modesto with your mom. You could have said no to us when we offered to come to Harborough. You can still decide not to go back to Mark's in the morning. There is always a choice, even when it doesn't feel like it. Especially then."

My skin felt tight. Like I was gradually becoming too big for it. I scooted towards the top of the mattress until I was upright.

That's life though isn't it? A series of decisions no matter how big or small. Leaving Mom felt like the only choice left because we'd spent so long going through the same movements, the only one we hadn't was removing myself from the situation. But Matt was right. The way Nick seemed to be, and Chris, and Jenny. Staying was a choice. The same way Mom not checking in was, or me starting this submission for Black Ink, or letting Matt share my bed tonight. Decisions were being made at every moment and try as I might, I couldn't control the aftermath. Playing through every possible scenario only did so much when we had free will. At any point, we had the ability to change our minds and there was absolutely nothing anyone could do about it.

That was the game of life.

Of love.

Of being alive.

At that moment a crucial piece of the puzzle clicked into place. Earlier, Chris had asked what I was afraid of and I'd said being seen. That was the truth.

But I wasn't scared of being seen because I was worried it was going to show all of my imperfections - though, in part I knew it would. I was mortified of being seen because it was all I'd ever wanted. Being seen is to be loved and my brain wasn't equipped to come to terms with that. To me, love was conditional, earned. One wrong move - one wrong choice and it was ripped away.

But I understood now that love came in a variety of forms. You could hear it in the silence. Feel it in a look from across a crowded room. Find it in the reassuring head nod someone gave you to let you know they were listening. Hold it in your hands when they say "I got this for you."

Love was everywhere, in everything.

And I had it. Right beside me.