Sleeves

Chapter Two

I cracked open my eyes, blinking away sleep. I found myself curled under the covers of a bed with black sheets and black pillows, smelling of pine trees and coconut, an oddly beautiful smell. I looked around the room, the walls white and the carpet black, spotted with white splashes. There were pictures hung on the walls, every sort of picture. Watercolor, black and white, animals, humans, paint splotches, claw marks, Chinese symbols, everything you could think of.

I sat up slowly, blinking when dots appear in front of my eyes, and scream when a huge furry head pops up from the side of the bed and lunges at me. "Sleeves!" I yell at the top of my lungs, trying to scramble to the other side of the bed, but my leg slows me down.

I hear a thump and a bang and something breaks as the door to the room flies open, and Sleeves jumps into the room, armed with a butcher knife and half-naked, wearing only ripped up jeans. The animal that had scared me barks and trots over to Sleeves, licking his thigh. "What's wrong?" Sleeves says, raising an eyebrow at me.

"The...er..." I stumble over the words and motion helplessly at the animal, which I now realize is a huge furry brown and white Saint Bernard.

"Thunder scared you?" He laughs, petting the dog's head. "He's only scary when he tries to lick your face."

"Oh. I thought someone was here to hurt me." I smile slightly, realizing how ridiculous I sound.

"The only thing here that'll hurt you is the rats that hide underneath the house." He smirks, clearly joking, and brushes his thick black hair behind his ears, waving the knife as he spoke.

I laugh and I climb out of the bed, and almost immediately Thunder's head presses against my stomach. Since I was shorter than Sleeves, Thunder came more up to my stomach instead of with Sleeves, where the dog came up to the middle of his thigh. "He's so big!" I laugh, petting Thunder.

"Yeah. So, er, what's your name, princess?" He asks, leaning against the door frame and tilting his head sideways.

"I'm Jane." I hold out a hand but shriek in surprise as Thunder pushes his head between my legs, waiting until I spread my legs apart more before pushing himself between my legs, taking me for a ride on his back. "Oh my god!" I laugh, holding on to Thunder's huge shoulders. Thunder decided that we needed to bound straight towards the door and right when we neared Sleeves, he scooped me right off of Thunder's back and cradled me in his arms. "Hello, Jane. I'm Kai, but people call me Sleeves."

I blush and lean my head against his shoulder, "Hello Kai, people call me Jane." I smile, but it fades quickly and my blush intensifies when I realize that he still doesn't have a shirt on. "Can I be put down now?" I ask sweetly.

"Sure." He smiles mischievously, walking over to the bed and holding me above the bed, and I become deathly still.

"Gently! Set me down gently, please!" I screech, giggling with nervousness.

"As you wish, princess." He smiles and gently lays me down on the bed, and that's when I realize he has tattoo sleeves on his arms. I study a couple of individual tattoos and point them out, "Is that why people call you Sleeves?" I ask curiously.

"Yeah. Some of them are fading now, but they all have stories behind them, except for a choice few, which I just simple like." He says, rubbing his forearms self-consciously.

"It's cool. I've always wanted tattoos but my dad won't let me get any." I say, reaching out to run my fingers over them, eyes wide as I spot a tattoo of a pink breast-cancer ribbon. "What's the story behind this?"

He pulls his arms out of my reach and crosses them behind his back, "My sister. She died from breast cancer." He mumbles.

I suddenly feel sorry for asking, "I'm sorry."

"That's what they all say." He turns and walks out of the room and I sit up on the bed, wondering what I am going to do now that I hurt Kai by asking the question.