Unhappily Ever After

Chapter 40 - Mind Yourself

Ugh look I have no idea who let Trump into my country, but just ... no. We'll do our best to embarrass him and then can you guys please take him back? PLEASE?! I don't like being within 150 miles of him. And he keeps saying we like him?? Who told him that??

Dedication to @misslizz1984 for voting and being awesome. Thank you!

Showering only took two minutes. I washed off every last trace of my scent, along with the sweat from the journey over. And once I had dried myself off and run a hand through my hair, I pulled on Alex's clothes. He was an inch shorter than me, but he had a wider build, so everything fit just fine. It had been a while since I'd worn anything smarter than a clean t-shirt, and the collar felt like it was choking me until I undid a couple buttons. Forget the tie, then.

By the time I poked my head out of the bathroom, Jess was immersed in a book. She glanced up at the sound of the door opening and gave me the briefest of once-overs.

"Not bad," she muttered. "Better than I'd expect from a filthy, uncultured rogue, anyway."

"Oh, is that the way you want to play it, scullery maid?" I retorted. She flipped me off, and I was grinning as I made my way over and sat down heavily beside her.

Jess dumped her book into her lap. She was sitting with her legs crossed, the way the kids were forced to in primary school. Her knee was nudging mine, and just that tiny bit of contact made the mate bond wax twice as strong.

"I have to go back to work. Can you be trusted to behave yourself while I'm gone, or do I have to drop you off in the games room?"

"I'm not a puppy," I snorted. "I'll just sit here and ... I dunno, learn to cross stitch or something."

She raised an eyebrow, but she didn't push it, so I must have been considered trustworthy. "Read this. I think it'll be your sort of thing."

Uh oh. The book landed in my lap, and I stared at it mournfully. It was several inches thick, and I could just tell the font size would be tiny. I opened it to the first page, sighed deeply, and began.

Jess took two hours to finish her kitchen shift. And in that time, I had managed to decipher the first five pages, piece by piece. I could work out what most words were without too much difficulty — the struggle was piecing them all together to make them actually mean something. And by the time I'd understood one sentence, I'd forgotten most of the one before.

I was concentrating so hard that I didn't notice that Jess was back until she sat down next to me, and I damn near jumped out of my own skin.

She let her head rest against the sofa, curled her legs beneath her and asked in a rush, "Have you been reading this whole time? What do you think about—? Oh, wait, did you get to that bit yet?"

She tried to peer at the page number, and then she went still.

"I'm not very good at reading," I muttered. Despite having managed to hide that fact from the world for my entire life, and despite the vast array of lies I could have told to get myself out of it, I had this constant, overwhelming urge to tell Jess the truth. And I didn't like it.

"So, what, no one taught you?"

There was a hesitant, cautionary note to her voice now, like she was walking on eggshells, so I tried to force a smile onto my face. "No, I went to school and everything. The letters just don't behave for me like they do for everyone else."

Her horsehead furrowed. "That sounds like dyslexia."

"Dys-what?"

"It's a human thing, I think..." She eyed me for a moment and seemed to decide the explanation wouldn't be helpful. "Oh, never mind. How did you get through school?"