Chapter 8

“Will I see you tomorrow?” he asked in a clear tone of voice.

“Yes.”

“After your trail walk,” he suggested, “come over.”

“Okay.”

He narrowed his eyes at me, looking like he wanted to kiss me again. “You ever feel like you get the most energy at night?” he suddenly exclaimed. “Like your body was asleep the entire day, and then you get this sudden rush of energy?”

“Not really.”

“I get that sometimes,” he deliberated aloud. “I feel it now.”

“Damian, you’re odd.”

“I guess,” he laughed lightly, “maybe.” He let his hands slip around my hips, trailing over the last of my figure before he let me go. “Your friend is here, and it is late.”

“Will that thing happen to you again?”

“If it does, I’ll be fine,” he assured me. “Really.”

“It was scary.”

“It comes every now and then … the fits.”

“What is it?”

“I don’t know.” He stepped around me, only stopping once he stood outside of his front door. “I’m feeling overheated so I’m going to take a shower.”

“Hot?”

“Yeah.”

“But you were cold.”

“I know.”

“Damian, there is something wrong with you.”

He lowered his head, letting it fall over the carved lines over the front doorway of his house. “No,” he breathed out. “No, I’ve never felt better.” He stepped over his threshold and let his hand rest over the corner of the door. “Goodnight, Sara.”

“Damian?”

“Goodnight,” he repeated in a mystifying voice, and then closed the door between us.

***

“So, you are telling me he went from that shaking fit to being fine again?” Ashley turned on her high beams, wanting to see the gravel road better. “But he looked so sick!”

“He said he gets those shaking fits every now and then.”

“It was scary,” Ashley proclaimed. “Like something out of a movie.”

“I know, but apparently it’s a condition.”

“He’s a real nutter!” My friend laughed aloud, thoroughly amused by the news I relayed to her. “And here I am stressing about you and him. So, he’s fine?”

“He looked healthy when I left him,” I assured her. “Too healthy.”

“What do you mean?”

“He was talking about having a sudden surge of energy,” I explained as I scratched at the top of my head. “Watch that pothole!”

Ashley managed to evade it, though she was less than pleased by the state of the road. “I swear they want me to get a flat tire,” she grunted.

“Anyways, he had all this energy. He was different, you know.”

“No.”

“It’s an expression,” I clarified, “like he suddenly became confident and took charge of the situation.”

“He finally kissed you.”

“He threw rationale into the wind and just went in.”

“Yeah, but it makes you wonder why he was holding back for so long.”

“I guess he got his heart broken,” I suggested, as Ashley pulled up to our cabin. “What else could it be?”

“He has a secret wife locked away somewhere.”

“No.”

She cracked open the door and slipped out the car, striding towards our front door confidently. A blackened sky hung over us now, the bright lights of the stars was a sure sign that night had finally fallen upon us. “You think we should visit the boys before we turn in?”

“I’m sure they want some alone time,” I assured her. “You know how Taylor is.”

“Super affectionate,” she laughed as she thrust the key into the lock. We entered the small cabin, prying off our shoes to slowly make our way into the small living space. It was tiny, a meagre couch that could barely fit the two of us together. I opted for sitting on the edge of my bed, allowing my friend to have the whole couch to herself. I sniffled into the air, taken back by the coldness of the cabin. There was no television present and no Wi-Fi, so my mind suddenly became stumped on what to do next.

“He is weird though,” I suddenly rapped out. “Damian.”

“Yeah.”

“Like he is hiding something.”

“You think?”

“Does he strike you as the kind of guy that goes hunting?”

“Not really.”

“That’s what I thought too.” I hopped off the bed and went over to my small bag of belongings. “He’s got this huge gun case in his back seat and a hunting knife.”

“Maybe he does hunt,” my friend offered.

“I know he fishes, since he asked me to do it tomorrow.”

“How romantic,” Ashley teased, which made me roll my eyes at her. “A fishing date.”

“He’s country folk,” I taunted back, which made Ashley burst out in laughter. “Okay, I admit that would be a pretty bad date.”

“Well you would be stuck on the boat with him for hours so …”

“Oh, don’t get any ideas!”

“When’s the last time you got fucked Sara?”

“Mind your fucking business,” I argued back, ignoring her laughter as I strode over to the bathroom with my pajamas in hand. “And I’m not answering your question.”