Hothouse Flower (Addicted #4)(104)

“You say it so blasé,” she tells me. “Aren’t you proud?”

“Shouting about it won’t change anything.” I’m not Connor Cobalt. After I left for college, every achievement has been an internal one, where I remember the road I took to get there. The labor, the time, the practice. My records don’t tell that story. They’re just numbers.

We walk past a couple of intense hikers in their Adidas running shoes, capris and reflecting sunglasses. I only now realize how fast my pace is, and Daisy hasn’t complained. But I can tell she’s struggling to keep up, her breathing heavier than when we started. A streak of purple dye starts to run down her forehead.

“Well if you’re not going to boast, then I’ll do it for you,” she says, reminding me of Sully. She darts to another large boulder, the hike littered with them, and she climbs on it, using her knees to hoist her body on top. Then she throws up her arms. “I have an announcement to make! Birds, people, trees, please listen up!”

I cross my arms. The more I watch, the more my lips rise.

Some people glance over, but most just keep on walking. The birds actually seem more interested in Daisy, squawking and flying above us as she speaks.

I just shake my head but I can’t ignore the f*cking feeling in my chest. It’s pride. But not for climbing Devils Tower. I’m so f*cking proud that I have her in my life.

“My boyfriend right there.” She points at me. “He climbed that mountain.” She jabs her finger behind her. “And hey, he did it in twenty f*cking minutes. Not just twenty minutes. Twenty f*cking minutes! Rejoice!” She throws up both her arms, and I catch a couple park rangers walking up the path.

I motion for her. “K, celebration f*cking over.”

She jumps off the boulder and places her hands on her hips, panting for a second. “How’d I do?”

“The birds enjoyed it.” I wipe the trail of hair dye off her forehead, staining my finger and smearing purple onto her skin. “You’re about to turn into a f*cking purple dinosaur.”

“Aww,” she says with a smile. “Barney. And Littlefoot! Is Littlefoot purple?”

I shake my head at her. “I have no f*cking clue what you’re talking about.”

She gasps. “You don’t know who Barney is? How did you cope as a child?”

I roll my eyes. “I f*cking know who Barney is. Not the other one, Calloway.”

She smiles. “The Land Before Time.”

We walk towards a secluded part of the woods, off the path and behind large rocks and trees. She unpacks her water bottles from her backpack and sets them along a boulder.

“Lean over,” I tell her after she removes the foils from her hair. I uncap the water bottle, put a hand over her eyes, and then douse her head. I try to run my fingers through the strands, but they’re knotted from being twisted in the foil. “You pack a brush, Dais?”

“Nope.” She smiles deviously, turning her face towards me. “It’s okay. I’ll just finger it.”

I force her head back down. “You finger yourself a lot?” I ask, pouring a second bottle onto her hair.

“Not as much as you finger me.”

Fuck. My cock stirs. That turned very literal. My f*cking fault. I don’t feel as guilty as I would have before we were together. I just draw her ass back towards me while I finish washing her hair. She tries to look at me again, a full-blown smile lighting up her face.

“Stay f*cking still,” I say. “Or dye is going to get in your eyes.” She complies, and when I finish, I take off my shirt and she dries her hair, splotching the white fabric with purple, green and pink. Then she runs her hands through it and watches my reaction since she doesn’t have a mirror.

She has bigger pink highlights, a couple green ones, and a few purple scattered around her head. Still mostly blonde, but the color reflects her erratic personality. I know she’ll love it when she sees it, which is why I begin to smile.

“That ugly, huh?” she jokes.

“So f*cking ugly,” I say, wrapping my arm around her shoulder.

We finish the rest of the hike, and her silence starts to concern me. This is about the time she’d be bubbling with happiness. She just dyed her hair, something she’s wanted to do for a while.

“What’s wrong?” I ask.

“When we get to Utah, is this going to end? You and me, together out in the open. For the first time, I feel like a real couple, like we’re moving forward somewhere, and I don’t want that feeling to just fly away, you know?”

Yeah, I f*cking do. I don’t want to hide any part of my life. I did that for so long, and starting it all over again feels like a regression. “So we tell them in Utah,” I say, holding the strap of my backpack. “Big f*cking deal.” I want to be able to handle the backlash. And the closer we are to each other, the more I believe our relationship can withstand the criticism. But I wonder if I’m just f*cking fooling myself. Maybe that’s just fear talking though. The fear of losing her… and my brother.

“You sure?” she frowns. “Because Lo—”

“He’ll get over it.” I have to believe this or else I’ll never take the f*cking leap. I stop in the middle of the path and hold her face, my fingers stained different colors already. “I want to be with you, Dais. No more hiding.”