Velveteen by Daniel Marks

Author:Daniel Marks [Marks, Daniel]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: General Fiction
ISBN: 9780307974327
Publisher: Delacorte
Published: 2012-10-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 15

A railcar lumbered past, rattling the thin greasy windowpanes and dusting her cheeks with a fine rain of ash from the rafters.

Velvet’s eyes fluttered open.

Gaslight streamed in from outside, not the full glow alerting them to working hours but a dingy yellow slanting across her bed. Time worked differently in purgatory. The imposition of night could stretch on and on as the stations that studded the planet cleared out their backlogs of incoming souls.

When death lulled to a manageable trickle, the gaslights blazed up.

She pushed up onto her elbows, yawned one of those big quivering yawns that make you see squiggly lines, and stretched. Velvet twisted her neck to the right, trying to crack it, work out the kink, and noticed something strange about the blankets.

Something horrifying.

She wasn’t alone. Nick lay sprawled out beside her.

“Uhhhh.” The sound spilled out of her like a leaky tire. She’d woken thinking their liaison had been a semi-pleasant dream, but clearly—unless Nick was extremely agile at slipping into girls’ beds unnoticed—it was less dream and more like a hazy reality with consequences she didn’t really have time for.

Ash had been rubbed from Nick’s bare shoulder, revealing the dull glow of sleep threading through his nerves. Not dreaming, she thought. He would be brighter. His hair was tousled, his face slack with slumber and something else … satisfaction?

She hoped not.

He lay on his back with the white sheet bunched up under his right arm and his palm up and clawed, clinching something imaginary. A soft whisper spilled from his parted lips. Lips she’d been more than happy to taste not so long ago.

What else had they done?

She pinched the edge of the sheet and lifted it up. Skin, and lots of it. Nick had on the brown wool trousers from earlier, only now they were beltless and open where the trail of gray hairs disappeared down his glowing stomach into the exposed band of his boxers.

Pants were a good sign, she decided. Not case-closing, but something.

Velvet poked him in the shoulder, and his face instantly scrunched up uncomfortably.

Nick groaned, rubbed his eyes, and winced in her direction. “Jeez. What?”

“What are you doing here?” she asked, biting out each word.

He grinned, like she was playing with him or something. “Um … we kind of made out and stuff, remember?”

“Yeah. I got that. I’m just a little hazy on the part where I invited you to sleep in my bed. I’m gonna need to see your permission slip.”

Nick smiled broadly and started to lift the sheet, his eyes motioning downward.

“Not what I meant.” Velvet slapped his hand, and the sheet fell from his fingers.

“Hey, it’s no big deal, right? We were both tired. I kissed you good night, because I seriously can’t get enough of your mouth.” He sighed. “I think I was just dreaming about those lips.”

“Don’t.” Velvet’s eyes narrowed viciously, and she balled her hand into a fist.

“I couldn’t find my room, but I remembered where yours was.”

“If you tell me we did stuff and I just don’t remember …”

“No way.

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