Unravel Me (Shatter Me, #2)(93)

Castle stares into his hands. Smiles a little. “There’s not much to it,” he says. “Kenji has never talked to me about what happened to his parents, and I try not to ask. All he ever had was a name and an age. I stumbled upon him quite accidentally. He was just a boy sitting in a shopping cart. Far from civilization. It was the dead of winter and he was wearing nothing but an old T-shirt and a pair of sweatpants a few sizes too big for him. He looked like he was freezing, like he could use a few meals and place to sleep. I couldn’t just walk away,” Castle says. “I couldn’t just leave him there. So, I asked him if he was hungry.”

He stops, remembering.

“Kenji didn’t say a single thing for at least thirty seconds. He simply stared at me. I almost walked away, thinking I’d frightened him. But then, finally, he reached out, grabbed my hand, placed it in his palm and shook it. Very hard. And then he said, ‘Hello, sir. My name is Kenji Kishimoto and I am nine years old. It’s very nice to meet you.’” Castle laughs out loud, his eyes shining with an emotion that betrays his smiles. “He must’ve been starving, the poor kid. He always,” Castle says, blinking up at the ceiling now, “he always had a strong, determined sort of personality. So much pride.

Unstoppable, that boy.”

We’re all silent for a while.

“I had no idea,” Adam says, “that you two were so close.”

Castle stands up. Looks around at us and smiles too brightly, too tightly. Says, “Yes. Well, I’m sure he’s going to be just fine. He’ll be just fine in the morning, so you two should definitely get some sleep.”

“Are you su—”

“Yes, please, get to bed. I’ll be fine here with the girls, I promise.”

So we get up. We get up and Adam manages to lift James from Kenji’s bed and into his arms without waking him. And we walk out.

I glance back.

I see Castle fall into his chair and drop his head into his hands and rest his elbows on his knees. I see him reach out a shaky hand to rest on Kenji’s leg and I wonder at how much I still don’t know about these people I live with. How little I’ve allowed myself to become a part of their world.

And I know I want to change that.





SIXTY-ONE


Adam walks me to my room.

It’s been lights-out for about an hour now, and, with the exception of faint emergency lights glowing every few feet, everything is, quite literally, out. It’s absolute blackness, and even still, the guards on patrol manage to spot us only to warn us to go straight to our separate quarters.

Adam and I don’t really speak until we reach the mouth of the women’s wing. There’s so much tension, so many unspoken worries between us. So many thoughts about today and tomorrow and the many weeks we’ve already spent together. So much we don’t know about what’s already happening to us and what will eventually happen to us. Just looking at him, being so close and being so far away from him—it’s painful.

I want so desperately to bridge the gap between our bodies. I want to press my lips to every part of him and I want to savor the scent of his skin, the strength in his limbs, in his heart. I want to wrap myself in the warmth and reassurance I’ve come to rely on.

But.

In other ways, I’ve come to realize that being away from him has forced me to rely on myself. To allow myself to be scared and to find my own way through it. I’ve had to train without him, fight without him, face Warner and Anderson and the chaos of my mind all without him by my side. And I feel different now. I feel stronger since putting space between us.

And I don’t know what that means.

All I know is that it’ll never be safe for me to rely on someone else again, to need constant reassurance of who I am and who I might someday be. I can love him, but I can’t depend on him to be my backbone. I can’t be my own person if I constantly require someone else to hold me together.

My mind is a mess. Every single day I’m confused, uncertain, worried I’m going to make a new mistake, worried I’m going to lose control, worried I’m going to lose myself. But it’s something I have to work through. Because for the rest of my life, I’ll always, always be stronger than everyone around me.

But at least I’ll never have to be scared anymore.

“Are you going to be okay?” Adam asks, finally dispelling the silence between us. I look up to find that his eyes are worried, trying to read me.

“Yes,” I tell him. “Yes. I’m going to be fine.” I offer him a tight smile, but it feels wrong to be this close to him without being able to touch him at all.

Adam nods. Hesitates. Says, “It’s been one hell of a night.”

“And it’ll be one hell of day tomorrow, too,” I whisper.

“Yeah,” he says quietly, still looking at me like he’s trying to find something, like he’s searching for an answer to an unspoken question and I wonder if he sees something different in my eyes now. He grins a small grin. Says, “I should probably go,” and nods at James bundled in his arms.

I nod, not sure what else to do. What to say.

So much is uncertain.

“We’ll get through this,” Adam says, answering my silent thoughts. “All of it. We’re going to be okay. And Kenji will be fine.” He touches my shoulder, allows his fingers to trail down my arm and stop just short of my bare hand.