You’re sweating.” Joshua frowns. Maybe not then.
I can hear a twig crack and realize someone is approaching behind us. I raise my eyebrows in askance and Joshua nods. My moment is here and he needs to get the flag. I grab handfuls of his paintball suit and swing him around behind me against the tree.
“What are you—” he starts to say behind my back, but I’m scanning the terrain for the ambush. I’m Lara Croft, raising her guns, eyes burning with retribution. I can see the shape of the enemy’s elbow behind the barrels.
“Go!” I yell. I fumble in my thick gloves for the trigger. “I’m covering you!”
It happens instantly. Pop, pop, pop. Pain radiates through me—arms, legs, stomach, boob. I howl, but the shots keep coming, white splats all over me. It’s complete overkill. Joshua pivots us neatly and blocks the shots with his body. I feel him jolting as he takes more hits and his arm rises to cradle my head. Can I freeze time and take a nap right here?
He turns his head and shouts angrily at our assailant. The shots stop, and nearby I hear Simon crow with triumph, standing on top of the mound and waving the flag. Dammit. My one job and he wouldn’t even let me do it.
“You should have gone. I was covering for you. Now we’ve lost.” Another wave of nausea nearly knocks me over.
“Sor-reeee,” Joshua says sarcastically. Rob is approaching, gun lowered. I’m making whimpering noises. The pain is throbbing in points all over me.
“Sorry, Lucy. I’m so sorry. I got a bit . . . excited. I play a lot of computer games.” Rob takes a few steps back when he sees Joshua’s expression.
“You’ve really hurt her,” Joshua snaps at him, and I feel his hand cup my head. He’s still pressing me against the tree, knee braced between mine, and when I look to my left I see Marion watching us with her binoculars. She drops them and writes something on her clipboard, a grin curling her mouth.
“Off.” I give him an almighty shove. His body is huge and heavy and I’m so boiling I want to rip my suit off and lie in cold paint. We’re all panting a little as we walk back to the starting point under the balcony. I’m limping and Joshua takes my arm brusquely, probably to move me on faster. I see Helene up ahead, lowering her sunglasses. I wave like a sad cartoon kitten; womp, womp.
Casualties abound. People groan as they press the painted parts of their bodies gingerly. Dozens of reenactments are taking place. I look down and realize my front is almost solid paint. Joshua’s front half is fine, but his back is a mess. Trust us to be opposites.
When I strip off my gloves and helmet, Joshua gives me his clipboard and a bottle of water. I raise it to my lips and it seems to be empty quickly. Everything feels weird. Joshua asks Sergeant Paintball if they have any aspirin.
Danny picks his way through our fallen comrades to join me. I’m acutely aware of how disgusting I must look. He looks at my front. “Ouch.”
“I’m seriously one big bruise.”
“Do I need to avenge you?”
“Sure, that’d be great. Rob from corporate is the definition of trigger happy.”
“Consider him taken care of. And what was that, Josh? You shot me in the leg and I was in a completely different game.”
“Sorry, I got confused,” Joshua says, insincerity ringing in his tone.
Danny shades his eyes and Joshua smirks up at the sky. Our colleagues stumble and flail, paint slicked and in pain, unsure of what to do next. Things are rapidly starting to disintegrate. I consult the clipboard. I see he’s written me on his team for every rotation, probably at Helene’s request. She’d never know. She’s doing a Sudoku puzzle. I quickly use a pencil and change it before calling out the next teams. People clump together, complaining.
“Wait, they’re getting the first-aid kit. You’d better sit the rest of the afternoon out. Something’s wrong with you,” Joshua says. I glance up at Helene again, and then look at everyone around me. I could be in charge of this bunch soon. This afternoon is an audition, no doubt about it. I’m not going to fail it now.
“Yeah, you’ve been telling me since the day we met. Enjoy the rest of your afternoon.” I walk off without a backward glance into my new team.
It feels like the longest afternoon of my life, but it also goes by in a flash. The feeling of being stalked and watched is unnerving, and in our small teams we do form instant bonds. I shove Quintus from accounts receivable into a bunker as pink pellets rain down over us.
“Go! Go!” I roar like a SWAT team leader as Bridget goose steps through to the flag, bursts of paint clipping at her heels. The extent of how sick I am reveals itself during my third rotation, after I snatched the flag. I knew it was deeply tragic of me to feel so triumphant, but honestly I felt as though I’d scaled Everest. My teammates screamed, and big basketball-player Samantha—a Bexley—picked me up off the ground and swung me in a circle. I threw up a little in my mouth.
My arms shake from the strain of holding the gun. Everything feels slightly surreal, as if at any moment I’ll awake from a bad afternoon nap. The sky overhead is a silver-white dome.
I look at the faces surrounding me, shining with sweat. I feel such a kinship with these people. I watch a Gamin high-five a Bexley as they burst out laughing. We’re all in it together. Maybe Joshua had a good idea with this, after all. Maybe the only way to truly unite people is through battle and pain. Confrontation and competition. Maybe surviving something is the point.
Where is Joshua, anyway? I don’t see him for the rest of the afternoon except for the team rotation breaks. With every person stalking through the trees my eyes would play tricks. I’d see him kneeling down, reloading, and taking shots. I’d see the shape of his shoulders and the curve of his spine. But then I’d blink and it would be someone else.
I’m expecting that one fatal shot. A big red splat, straight to the heart.
“Where’s Joshua?” I ask the flag marshals and they shrug. “Where’s Joshua?” I ask everyone I pass. “Where’s Joshua?” The answers start to get clipped and irritated.
I tug at my paintball suit despite the rhythmic pops and cracks of live fire. I pull down the neckband ineffectually, baring half an inch of sweaty skin to the cold air. Then I throw up. It’s nothing but water and tea. I didn’t feel like lunch today. Or breakfast. I kick sand over it and wipe my mouth on the back of my hand. The planet is circling too quickly so I hold on to a tree.
The air is beginning to chill as the final horn sounds and we all trudge back to HQ. Everyone is visibly exhausted and there is a great deal of fuss as we strip out of our suits. Everybody is complaining. Sergeant Paintball looks like he’s evaluating his life choices. Joshua is standing with one hand on his hip and I instinctively raise my gun. It’s time.
Lucy versus Joshua, total annihilation.
He walks over to me, completely unperturbed by my action-man pose and takes the gun. I pull my helmet off. He steps behind me and his fingers slide in the sweat on the nape of my neck. It’s like he’s touched a live wire and I make a weird gurgle. He grips the zipper of my suit and slashes it down my back. I hop around to get it off, batting away his hands.
“You’re sick,” he accuses. I shrug noncommittally and weave up the stairs to where Helene and Fat Little Dick wait.
“Looks like some excellent teamwork went on,” Helene says. We let out a weak cheer, propping each other up. I lift the edge of my T-shirt. My bruises are purple. The smell of coffee makes me feel ill. I make my way to the front. Joshua’s been running this little show for too long. I can salvage this.
“Can I call our four flag marshals to stand and discuss the acts of teamwork and bravery they witnessed?”
The flag marshals make their observations and I try to hold it together. Apparently, Suzie caused a commotion, allowing her teammate to slip up and get the flag.
“I got four shots for that,” Suzie calls, patting her hip and wincing.
“But you took the shots for your team,” Mr. Bexley says, rousing himself out of his stupor, which I am beginning to suspect is caused by prescription drugs. “Good work, young lady.”
“And speaking of bravery,” Marion says, and my stomach sinks. “Little Lucy here did something quite remarkable.”
A cheer goes up and I wave it away. If one more person calls me little, small, or ridiculously small I am going to karate chop them.
“She took at least ten rounds for a colleague today, protecting him from someone who was going a little overboard. That person remains nameless.” She looks pointedly at Rob and he cowers lower to the ground like a guilty dog. Other people frown at him.
“She’s standing in front of her colleague, arms outstretched, protecting him to the death!” Marion mimes my actions, arms scarecrow straight, body jolting from the shots. She’s a good actress.
“And to my surprise, I see it’s none other than Josh Templeman that Lucy is protecting!”
A big laugh breaks out. People swap amused looks and two girls from HR elbow each other.
“But—but then! He swings her around to protect her and takes paintballs in the back! Protecting her! It was quite something.”
Another fun fact: Marion reads romance novels in the kitchen at lunchtime. I catch Joshua’s eye, and he wipes his forehead roughly on his forearm.
“It seems paintball has brought us all together today,” I manage to say and everyone claps. If this were a TV episode, we’ve just reached the little moral conclusion: Stop hating each other. Helene is pleased; her lips are pursed in a knowing smile.
The Day Off Prize is awarded to Suzie, and she accepts her little mock certificate with a deep bow. Deborah has taken some good action shots on her camera and I ask her to email them to me for the staff newsletter.
Helene catches me by the elbow. “Remember, I’m not in on Monday. I’ll be meditating under a tree.”
Everyone heads down to the bus, and I’m gratified to see it’s now harder to tell who’s Gamin and who’s Bexley. Everyone looks like a train wreck; bedraggled clothes and red, sweaty brows. Most of the women have panda eye makeup. Despite the physical discomfort, there’s a new sense of camaraderie.
Helene and Mr. Bexley peel out again like Wacky Racers. A few people are being picked up by spouses, and there’s a confusing swirl of cars and dust. The bus driver puts down her newspaper at our approach and unlocks the door.
“Please hold on for a few minutes,” I tell her, and jog back inside. I make it to the bathroom and am violently sick. Before I can feel like it’s completely out of my system there’s a sharp rap on the bathroom door. There’s only one person I know who could knock so impatiently, and put so much irritation into it.
“Go away,” I tell him.
“It’s Joshua.”
“I know.” I flush again.
“You’re sick. I told you.” He jiggles the doorknob lightly.
“I’ll get home by myself. Go away.”
There’s a silence and I figure he’s gone back to the bus. I throw up again. Flush again. I wash my hands, leaning my legs against the sink until the splash-back soaks into my jeans. Elvis clings to me damply.
“I’m sick,” I confide to my reflection. I’m fevered, eyes glittering. I’m blue and gray and white. The door is creaked open, and I squawk in fright.
“Holy shit.” Joshua’s eyebrows pinch together. “You look bad.”
I can barely focus my eyes. The floor is spinning. “I can’t make it. That bus trip. I can’t.”
“I could call Helene. She could come back, she couldn’t have gotten far.”
“No, no, I’ll be okay. She’s driving to a health retreat. I can take care of myself.” He leans on the doorframe, his brow creased.
I steel myself, cupping a little cold water in my hand and slosh it over the back of my neck. My hair has been unraveling from its bun and sticks to my neck. I rinse my mouth. “Okay, I’m all right.”
As we walk back, he pinches the little joint of my elbow between two fingers like a bag of garbage. I can feel the avid eyes watching us from the tinted bus windows. I think of the two girls nudging each other and shake him loose.
“I could leave you here and drive back and get you, but it would take an hour, at least.”
“You? Come back and get me? I’d be here all night.”
“Hey. Don’t talk like that anymore, all right?” He’s annoyed.
“Yeah, yeah, HR.” I wobble up onto the bus.
“Oh dear,” Marion calls loudly. “Lucy, you’re looking awful.”
“Lucy!” Danny calls from the rear of the bus. “Saved you a seat!” He’s so far back in the bus it telescopes claustrophobically. If I sit back there I will absolutely vomit on everyone. Sorry, I mouth at Danny and sit in the front seat and close my eyes.
Joshua presses the back of his hand to my damp forehead and I hiss. “Your hand is cold.”
“No, you’re burning up. We need to get you to a doctor.”
“It’s almost Friday night. What are the chances of that happening? I need to go to bed.”
The trip home is pretty bad. I’m trapped in an endless, unmarked period of time. I’m a bug in a jar being shaken by a kid. The bus is swaying, hot, airless, and I feel every bump and curve. I focus on my breathing and the feeling of Joshua’s arm pressed against mine. At one particularly sharp corner he uses his shoulder to support me upright in my seat.
“Why?” I ask uselessly. I feel him shrug.
We’re unloaded in front of B&G. A few women cluster around me and I try to understand what they’re saying. Joshua is holding me by the scruff of my damp T-shirt and tells them it’s fine.
He has a lively debate with Danny, who keeps asking me, “Are you sure?”
“Of course she’s fucking sure,” Joshua thunders. Then we’re alone.
“Did you drive?”
“Jerry needs another weekend. The mechanic. I’ll get a bus.”
He moves me forward; a heaving, sweating marionette. My mouth tastes like acid. His grip drops from my neck to loop a finger into the loop on the back of my jeans, the other on my elbow. I can feel his knuckle pressing above my butt crack and I laugh out loud.
The stairs to the basement parking lot are steep and I balk, but he pushes me on, hands tightening. He uses his swipe card to get us in and steers me steadily toward his black car. I can smell car fumes and oil. I can smell everything. I dry-retch behind a pole and he hesitantly lays a hand between my shoulder blades. He rubs it around a little. I shudder through another volley of nausea.
Joshua guides me to the passenger seat. He slings the bag I’d forgotten about into the backseat. He idles the car and I glimpse myself in a side mirror, my head rolled to the side, a dark flush on my cheekbones, gleaming with sweat, my mascara smudged.
“Now. Are you gonna be sick in the car, Shortcake?” He doesn’t sound impatient, or annoyed. He opens my window a few inches.
“No. Maybe. Well, possibly.”
“Use this if you need to,” he tells me, handing me an empty takeout coffee cup. He puts the car into reverse. “Tell me where to go, then.”
“Go to hell.” I start laughing again.
“So that’s where you came from.”
“Shuddup. Go left.” I navigate him to my apartment building. I keep my eyes closed, and count my breaths, and do not vomit. It is quite an achievement.
“Here. Out front is fine.”
He shakes his head and in defeat I direct him to my empty parking space. He has to help me climb out of the car and I sag against him. My cheek momentarily rests on something like his chest. My hand grips something like his waist.
He hits the button and we stand at opposite sides of the elevator car, and the Staring Game is overlaid with hot, sweaty memories of the last time we did this together.
“Your eyes were like a serial killer that day.” I must have vomited out my filter.
“So were yours.”
“I like your T-shirt. So much. It’s magnificent on you.”
He’s mystified as he looks down at himself. “It’s nothing special. I . . . like yours too. It’s as big as a dress.”
The elevator doors opens. I lurch out. Unfortunately, he follows.
“I’m here,” I lean on my door. He digs my keys from my bag and unlocks the door.
I’ve never seen anyone so desperate to be invited inside. His head pokes in farther. His hands are hanging on to the doorframe like he’s about to fall in.
“It’s not what I expected. It’s not very . . . colorful.”
“Thank you, good-bye.” I push into the kitchen and seize a glass. Then I drink straight from the faucet.
“I think we could find an after-hours clinic,” Joshua says behind me, and takes the glass before I can drop it. He pushes my toaster straight against the wall and to fill in the awkward silence he folds a dishcloth. His fingernail picks at a crumb glued to the countertop. Oh man, he’s one of those people who love to clean. He wants to roll up his sleeves and bleach and scrub.
“It’s so messy, isn’t it?” I point at a mug with a lipstick mark. He looks at it longingly and we simultaneously begin to try to get past each other in the tiny space.
“Let me take you to a doctor.”
“I need to lie down. That’s all.”
“Is there anyone you want me to call?”
“I don’t need anyone,” I announce proudly. I hold my hand out for my key. He holds it out of reach. I don’t need anyone to look after me. I can get through this. I’m alone in this world.
“Alone in this world? So dramatic. I’ll go to the drugstore and see what I can get you.”
“Sure, sure. Have a nice weekend.”
As the door snicks shut, I reconfirm that my apartment is a bit of a disaster zone, cluttered, and yes, a little colorless. My dad calls it the Igloo. I haven’t had enough time yet to put my stamp on the place. I’ve been too busy. The Smurf cabinet takes up a large part of the living room wall, dark without the special lights switched on. Thank goodness Joshua left.
My bed looks like I’ve been having disturbing, sexual dreams, which is accurate. The sheets are all rumpled and twisted, and on the side where a man should be is strewn with books. Lingerie straps and Smurf-patterned underwear peek out of drawers like lettuce from a burger. I take the copy of Joshua’s planner from my nightstand and hide it.
My shower is wonderful, torturous, endless. I turn it cold and freeze. I turn it hot and burn inside my skin. I drink the spray. I goop a big pile of shampoo on the top of my head and let it rinse away. An indication I must be near death is I can’t be bothered to condition.
My head spins with nonsensical images, and I lean against the tiles and remember what it was like to lean against a tree with Joshua Templeman shielding me with his body.
In the privacy of my mind I can imagine whatever I want, and they aren’t progressive, twenty-first-century thoughts.
They’re depraved, brutal cavewoman thoughts. In my mind, he’s electric with the animal instinct to protect me, his heavy muscle braced over my body. He absorbs each impact and it is his privilege. He’s injected sharp and hard with nature’s superdrug, testosterone.
I’m wrapped in him, safe from anything the world wants to throw at me. Anything painful or cruel will have to get through him before it has any chance of touching me. And it will never happen.
“Alive?”
I scream when I realize that resonating voice isn’t in my imagination and cling to the tiles.
“Don’t come in!” I did close the door. Thank you, guardian angels. I cross my arms over all of my X-rated zones.
“Of course I won’t,” he snaps.
“I am completely naked. Bruises . . .” I’m a Monet watercolor; purple water lilies floating in green. He says nothing.
“Well, go out. Into the living room.”
My skin hurts when I towel myself. I crack the bathroom door open and hear silence. I scurry out and find underwear, a heinous beige bra, shorts, and an old crappy pajama top with a picture of a cute dinosaur on it, his drowsy eyes half closed. Underneath him reads: SLEEPYSAURUS.
I’m naked and putting on clothes, separated from Joshua by only by a wall. I love you, wall. What a good wall. I toss myself so hard into bed the mattress squeaks, and it’s the last thing I hear.
I WAKE UP in a volcano. “No! No!”
“I’m not poisoning you. Quit squirming.” Joshua’s hand is behind my neck as he presses two pills onto my tongue. I swallow water and then he lowers me flat.
“My mother always gave me lemonade. And she’d sit with me. Whenever I woke up, she’d still be there. Did yours?” I sound like I’m five years old.
“My parents were too busy on shift looking after other sick people to do that stuff for me.”
“Doctors.”
“Yep, except me.” An edge in his voice denotes a sore topic.
I feel his hand on my forehead, fingers light and stiff. “Let’s do a temperature check.”
“I feel so fucking stupid.” My voice is garbled due to the thermometer he’s put into my mouth. He must have bought it, because I don’t own one. I’m currently inside a moment destined to become the most cringe-worthy memory of my life.
“You’ll never let me live this down.” That’s what I try to say. Thanks to the thermometer it comes out like I’ve got a head injury.
“Sure I will. Don’t chew the thermometer,” he replies quietly, taking it out of my mouth.
“We don’t want you to get over one hundred four.” In the low evening light, his eyes are darkened navy as he assesses me almost clinically, before smoothing his hand over my forehead again, softly, not checking my temperature. My pillow is adjusted a little. His eyes are not the man I know.
“Okay. Please stay for a minute. But you can leave if you want.”
“Lucy, I’ll stay.”
When I eventually dream, it’s about Joshua sitting on the edge of my mattress, watching me sleep.
