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“Can I ask you a weird question?”
Layla studies Jake over the rim of her glass, curious but unperturbed. He raises an eyebrow at her.
It’s mid-afternoon. Steven’s flat is dappled with sunlight, and the two of them are sitting in mismatched chairs beside a rickety coffee table. Layla brought strawberry lemonade—Jake’s favorite, though he assumes that’s a coincidence. He mentioned it offhand a week or two ago and can’t imagine she actually remembered.
They’ve settled into this strange little ritual over the past few months. Jake’s beginning to understand why Marc fell for her—she’s bold and clever and stubborn, and he can’t help but admire her a little for that.
She’s also frighteningly good at reading people. He can’t quite shake the feeling that she’s taking him apart like a puzzle every time they make eye contact.
Still, they’re—not friends, Jake doesn’t really do friends. Acquaintances, maybe. He likes spending time with her.
He doesn’t particularly like the glint in her eyes right now, though.
“How weird?”
For Layla, that word could mean a host of things. He’s anticipating something like an ethically dubious would-you-rather question, or maybe another diatribe about stolen artifacts in museums. Her actual response comes out of left field like a runaway freight train.
“Can I hug you?”
Jake chokes so violently that lemonade sprays back into his eyes.
To her credit, Layla doesn’t immediately burst into laughter. She manages to find a towel somewhere in the mess of the kitchen and hands it to him while he coughs and splutters.
“Why?” is all he can think to wheeze once most of the liquid is out of his windpipe.
Layla shrugs.
“Just curious.“
She says it so nonchalantly. Jake appreciates that, in a way—he’s already dying from enough embarrassment for the both of them.
“No pressure, though. Just an idea.”
She wants to hug him. Layla wants to hug him. The idea is so absurd that Jake almost wants to laugh, but he’s stopped by the look on her face. He can usually tell when people are lying, and right now he doesn’t think she is.
The worst part is, he trusts her. He trusts her against his own better judgement. Trust is just another weapon in the hands of people with the power to hurt you, and he knows that better than anyone.
Layla’s head is slightly tilted as she waits for an answer. Jake realizes he’s been staring at her with his mouth open for an embarrassingly long time.
“You can say no,” she prompts. “It’s okay.”
“No,” he blurts out immediately. “I mean—yes. Fine. If you want.”
This whole interaction is going to keep Jake up at night for at least the next twenty years. He offers a brief, silent prayer to any god who isn’t Khonshu that he won’t mess this up.
He watches Layla set her glass down on the coffee table. She takes two steps forward and motions for him to come closer. Jake stands a little too quickly, wincing at the loud scrape of his chair on the wood floor.
He’s nervous. Why is he nervous?
He takes a hesitant step toward her. She gives him an encouraging little nod. Jake feels the anxiety in his stomach settle a little as he realizes she’s waiting for him to make the first move. It’s such a Layla thing to do, but it’s also completely unhelpful because he has no idea what he’s doing.
“You sure about this?”
Jake is suddenly, painfully aware of his hands, and his arms, and the space between them. He’s never actually…hugged anyone before. Not that he can remember, at least. He’s seen other people do it, of course, but never paid enough attention to know what, exactly, he’s meant to do.
He wants to, though. He really, really wants to.
“‘Course I am. You?”
It’s a last-ditch attempt to sound casual and indifferent, and it fails miserably. Layla gives him a look that’s equal parts fond and unimpressed.
“Definitely. Come here.”
She closes the distance between them gently. Before Jake can breathe she’s wrapping her arms around him, steady and irresistible as gravity pulling him in.
Jake thought he knew what this was going to feel like. He expected an awkward press of elbows and collarbones, squeezed together like mismatched puzzle pieces. He wasn’t entirely wrong—her curls are tickling his nose, and he still has no idea what to do with his hands—but it’s not bad. Far from it, in fact.
Layla rests a hand on the nape of his neck. Her palms and the pads of her fingers are warm and slightly calloused. Tiny sparks flare to life beneath his skin, dancing along the soft contour of her touch, and Jake is barely aware that she’s guiding him toward her until his head falls to rest on her shoulder.
It’s a bit of an awkward angle. His nose is squashed against her collarbone and there’s an ache already forming at the base of his neck, but he barely notices. Bright, syrupy warmth is seeping between his ribs, spreading outward from her touch like sunlight over snow. The center of his chest aches. It’s almost overwhelming—a primal, desperate thing clinging to the warmth of another person like a starving animal. Jake’s afraid he won’t be able to breathe if she lets go.
“You okay?”
Layla’s voice is soft and slightly muffled. The hand that’s been rubbing up and down his spine stops, waiting for an answer.
(What’s he supposed to say? ‘No one’s ever hugged me before and now my brain is short-circuiting?’)
“‘M fine.”
His voice is little more than a croak. Jake closes his eyes as her hand resumes its soothing rhythm along his back. He can feel her heartbeat.
At some point Layla slips her fingers beneath the brim of his flat cap and takes it off. Jake hears the soft thump of it hitting the floor, but doesn’t put two and two together until she starts running her fingers through his hair.
Jake’s breath hitches. Bright, fizzy heat rushes down his spine, turning every muscle in his body to liquid. Layla’s hand continues its soothing rhythm. She drags her nails gently across his scalp, and he practically melts into her touch with a shiver.
It’s wretched. It’s perfect. It’s light glittering through a million shards of glass. Jake knows he’s probably earned a one-way ticket to hell in every afterlife, but right now he doesn’t care. No Field of Reeds could be better than this.
He doesn’t know how long they stand there. His brain feels like it’s full of cotton wool and static. Layla’s heartbeat and the sensation of her hand ruffling his hair are the only points of contact he has with the real world, and he never wants it to stop.
Layla smooths back the loose curls falling across Jake’s forehead and nudges him backward just enough to see his face. He swallows back the embarrassment that crawls up his throat as she flashes him a brief smile.
“You’re cute, you know that?”
Jake’s been called a whole lot of things in his life, but never “cute.” Part of him wants to crawl into a hole and die at the endearment, but another, slightly larger part is all soft and fluttery.
He’s definitely blushing now. Cute. Marc’s never gonna let him hear the end of that one.
Layla cups his face in her hands. There’s genuine affection in her eyes. Jake doesn’t know how to feel about that. He’s even less prepared for the swift kiss she presses to the center of his forehead a moment later.
“Thanks for indulging me.”
Jake’s brain is thoroughly short-circuited at this point, so he only manages a slow nod. It’s hilarious, actually. To think that he’s the one indulging her.
The sky outside fades into the first gold of sunset. It’s almost like Jake is seeing it for the first time. He files that color away in his mind, sliding it in next to the few fragments of memory he has that have ever felt like home.
Mint tea. Stars. Strawberry lemonade.
(A hug.)