Chapter 48: Lock and Key

Chapter 48: Chapter 48: Lock and Key

It was late afternoon by the time they got home. The front door banged open. Jared stormed through it without breaking stride, dropped his bag in the hall, kicked off his boots, and took the stairs to his room.

Zoey came in behind him, breathless, still carrying her jacket over one arm. She didn’t even get her shoes off.

"Jared," she called. "What are you doing? Come on. Let’s talk."

He didn’t answer.

He reached the top of the stairs, turned left, and strode down the hall to his room. His hand found the doorknob. He pushed the door open, stepped inside, and shut it behind him.

The lock clicked.

Something knocked softly against the wood.

"Jared?"

He stood in the middle of his room with his back to the door, staring at the wall.

"Jared. Open up."

"Not now."

"I just want to talk."

"I’m busy, Zoey."

"Busy doing what?" Her voice cracked. "You’re not busy. You’re just sitting in there sulking. You have to be mature about this. We have to be. Let’s just talk about it."

"Would you please just get out?" he shouted.

It was louder than he intended. He winced. He heard her go quiet.

For a long moment, nothing happened.

Then the knocking stopped. A floorboard creaked. Slow footsteps moved away down the hall.

Jared let out a long breath. His shoulders dropped. He turned slowly, crossed to the bed, and sat down on the edge, elbows on his knees, hands pressed against his face.

He was trying to think. He was trying to enter deep thought.But something kept snagging.

He was bothered. He didn’t know what to do.

’I showed him.’

The words circled in his head, thin and sharp.

’I showed him my beasts rank.’

He’d stood in that testing room and shown Karl the gorilla. A man who might be the thief. A man who now knew exactly what Jared was capable of.

And worse.

’If it wasn’t Karl who stole my dragon, if it’s Julius, then what happens when Karl tells him?’

They were Colleagues. Friends, maybe. They’d stood side by side on that platform. They’d laughed together in the documentary. If Karl was innocent, he’d mention it. Casually. Over dinner. Over drinks. He’d say, you know that new kid, Jared? He’s got an SSS gorilla. Wild, right? And Julius would nod, and smile, and file it away.

And then he would know.

Jared’s stomach turned over.

He was apparently scared. And rightfully so. He had every reason to be. He wasn’t sure of anything anymore. Karl might be the thief. Julius might be the thief. They might both be in on it. They might both be innocent, and the whole thing a coincidence. Every theory he built collapsed under its own weight.

[Breathe,]

’I am ....breathing.’

[You’re hyperventilating.]

’I’m thinking.’

[You’re thinking with your lungs now?.]

He pushed himself off the bed and began to pace.

There was also the issue of Zoey.

He didn’t want to talk to her at all. He couldn’t. His mind refused to approach it. A tangle of feelings rose whenever he thought of her, and he went through them one by one, like checking pockets for a lost key.

First, rage.

It was hot and fresh. A rage of betrayal. She had chosen Julius. After everything. After the fight, the tears, the hug in the car. She had looked him in the eyes and picked the man he despised, and then she’d told him she knew exactly what she was doing.

’She knew. She asked. She knew I was with Karl.’

His fists curled.

Under that, something softer.

A fondness. It was strange, small, hard to name. It wasn’t love, or not quite. It wasn’t just brotherly affection either. It crept up on him when he wasn’t looking, and he couldn’t fight it, or explain it.

’It’s his. It’s the old Jared’s.’

But it didn’t feel like someone else’s anymore.

It was as if some part of him had decided to shut down. To distance himself, by every means possible. To lock the door. To stop caring. It told him to pull back, to cut her off, to build a wall. And yet, in the most unsuccessful way imaginable, it wasn’t working. Every time he tried to push her away, he felt it, that warm, stubborn tug in his chest.

’Rage. Fondness. Apathy.’

’All at the same time.’

He couldn’t make it stop.

He slammed his forehead against the wall. He did it again, harder.

[That’s not going to help,]

’I know.’

[You’ll just have a headache and a bruise.]

’I know.’

After a while, he pushed back and looked around the room. He had been pacing for 10 minutes. Back and forth, back and forth, between the bed and the desk and the window. Moving around wasn’t going to do anything. He wasn’t solving anything. He was just wearing a groove in the carpet.

His stomach growled.

It was a long, low, hollow rumble. He pressed a hand against it. He hadn’t eaten since even before they left. He’d been fighting, running, burning, for most of a day. His legs felt like wet cloth. His head was pounding. He was tired, and hungry, and he needed to put something in his mouth.

He unlocked the door.

* * *

He found himself downstairs.

Zoey was sitting at the table.

The moment she saw him, she sat up straight.

"What happened out there today?" she asked.

He froze.

"Out where?"

"The gate. The raid. Whatever it was." She pushed the plate aside. "You came back looking like you’d been through a war. Karl was weird. Everyone was whispering. Something happened."

"Nothing happened."

"Jared."

"I don’t know what you mean."

"Yes, you do."

"I was just tired. It was a long day." He shrugged, lifted his hands in a vague gesture. "We cleared the gate. Or closed it. Or whatever. It’s done."

"Jared."

"That’s all there is to it."

"Oh, please. Stop it. Like seriously, would you quit it already. "

She stood up so quickly her chair scraped the floor.

"I made a mistake," she said. "Okay? I made a mistake, and now I know it’s a mistake. So could you please just not do this?"

She raised a hand and waved it in a shaking, helpless gesture at his face, his shoulders, his whole closed off posture.

"This," she said.

"Do what?"

"This." She waved again. "This. The thing where you pretend nothing’s wrong. The thing where you leave the room."

"I’m not..."

"You are. You’re doing it right now."

"I can barely say I’m doing anything," Jared said.

"Of course you can’t."

He opened his mouth and found nothing to say.

Zoey took a breath.

"I wasn’t trying to be funny," she said, more quietly. "You know that, don’t you? I wasn’t trying to be cruel. I wasn’t trying to hurt you. I only decided to join Julius because of my flimsy feelings."

She looked at the floor.

"I see how wrong that was."

Her voice was thin and wobbling.

"I had assumed that since we’d see each other at home, it was fine. That it didn’t matter which team I was on. That we’d still be us." She pressed her lips together. "I wouldn’t want to hurt you. You know that. You know I wouldn’t."

[Well,] the system murmured. [That was heartfelt.]

’Don’t.’

[It was actually quite moving. I’m a little misty.]

’You can’t be misty.’

[I’m simulating it.]

Jared let out a short, breathless sound.

It wasn’t quite a laugh. IHe pressed a hand over his mouth. It escaped anyway. A real laugh, small and helpless, bubbling out of him like water from a crack in a dam.

Zoey stared.

She couldn’t tell if it was a jest, or if it was something else. It might have been amusement. It might have been exhaustion. It might have been the sound of something breaking.

"Jared?" she said.

He straightened.

He didn’t say anything. He just looked at her. And then, quite suddenly, he crossed the kitchen in three long strides.

He pulled her into a hug.

It was all him. She didn’t do any of the motion. Her arms hung limp at her sides, stunned, her chin bumping against his collar bone. He held her tight, one hand on the back of her head, his face pressed into her hair. She stood absolutely still, wide eyed, unsure what to do with her hands.

Slowly, a smile crept across her face.

She didn’t hug back. She just stood there, in the circle of his arms, smiling at the kitchen wall.

[Smooth,]

Jared let go.

He stepped back, rubbed the back of his neck, and avoided her eyes. His ears were red.

Zoey cleared her throat. She wiped her face with her sleeve.

"Grab a plate."