The House of Tongues by James Dashner

Author:James Dashner
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Riverdale Avenue Books
Published: 2022-03-30T00:00:00+00:00

9

An hour later, everyone was in position to sleep for the night except for Andrea. She sat by me on the couch—my bed—with the three youngest kids sprawled on the floor at our feet. Wesley was already snoring on the recliner, his mouth hanging open like a whale about to suck in some brine. That’s a good sign, I thought. Sleeping like he’s got no care in the world. He’d left the lamp on, and a Joe Hill book lay sprawled on his chest.

The two floor fans were running at full blast, making the entire room a wind tunnel.

Andrea had to talk directly into my ear to be heard. “How do you people sleep like this? If you don’t freeze to death, you’ll go deaf from all that noise.”

I patted her hand like she was a simpleton. “Ah, you have a lot to learn. This is what you call pure bliss. That soothing sound, the feel of a breeze on your face. It’s better than sex.”

“Then I’m guessing you’ve only done it four times.” She pointed at each one of my kids in turn.

This made me snicker; I couldn’t help it. “Good one.”

She leaned into me, put her head on my shoulder. There’s some old saying about slipping into an old pair of shoes, which has to be the worst possible analogy for anything associated with Andrea, but it was something like that. This was how it had always been in high school. We flirted, we kissed, even did other things. But we were never… committed. Never in a true relationship. We were friends, powerful friends. And we’d gone right back to it.

“This is why I came begging for you,” I said. “This. I needed this. I needed you.”

She patted my chest. “I know. It’s all like it’s meant to be, like no time has passed. I’m glad I’m here.”

I swung my arm up to put it around her, squeezed her into a hug. “You ever wonder—” I began, but she smashed a finger against my lips.

“Not now. I’m tired. Please let me fall asleep like this. That fan’s kind of soothing.”

Smiling with satisfaction at her enlightenment, I shifted to get a little more comfortable, and she shifted with me.

Then I fell asleep with the wind on my face.

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