Frost & Flames | Soulmate AU 2 |

Twelve

I wake up and feel better than I have in days. It's astonishing, really, how terrible Bond Sickness can make you feel. Most people know the symptoms, but objectively knowing what being sick with it entails and actually experiencing it are completely different things.

"Hey, you," Rowan says. I open my eyes to squint in the direction his voice came from. He's laying on the other couch, smiling dopily. I don't even remember him moving over there.

"Hi," I murmur back, rubbing my eyes. "What time is it?"

"Like, noon," Rowan says with a laugh.

I nod. I've slept in far later during my stay here. I normally never sleep past ten in the morning, so it makes sense why Rowan's surprised that I managed to sleep for so long.

"You wanna take a shower?" Rowan suggests. I start a little, remembering the crazy scene of being dragged under the freezing spray of the shower yesterday.

"I'm too tired," I say, which is the truth. I've been in varying levels of pain for nearly a week, and it's taken its toll on my body. Nothing really hurts, aside from my broken arm, but everything aches kind of like it does after one of Max and I's brutal workouts.

"I can help you," he says. "I mean, only if you want," he adds. Right. We're back to that stage in our relationship where Rowan wasn't ever sure where to put his hands or what was okay to do in bed. It totally sucks, and I wish I could say that he didn't need to baby me, but I would be lying. What happened in The Vault fucked me up, and I'm no longer in the part of my life where I'm equipped to handle something like a sexual assault. It was easier when I was younger, just part of what was happening and something I learned to deal with as best as I could. It's been years though, years that I had to grow and finally learn how to be comfortable with people, and this entire incident has set me so far back it's kind of terrifying.

"Hey, we don't have to," Rowan says, a pulse of reassurance floating through the Bond. "It's all good."

"No, we can," I reply, mostly because a shower sounds pretty nice and a little bit because I want to see if this is something I can handle. About a month after Rowan and I finally moved onto our own floor in the tower, filling the ridiculously large tub and dropping some sparkly bath bomb into the water every couple of weeks or so became somewhat of a ritual. Our jobs can be super stressful at times, such as right now, and setting aside a few hours to sit practically on top of each other in a steaming tub of foamy water that smells like lavender definitely serves to relieve some tension.

"You think they have any bath bombs?" he asks, throwing his blanket off of him and getting to his feet.

I laugh lightly, shaking my head.

"Nah," I reply. "Even if either of them did, we're both too thick to fit in that tub." I get up, as well, moving noticeably slower than him. I've been told to "take it easy" by multiple people, so I don't think anyone's going to be getting on my case for doing just that.

"Hey!" Jacob says, appearing in the doorway from the kitchen. "I washed both of your clothes." He hands over a neatly folded pile of familiar clothing, the ones Rowan was wearing when he got here as well as all the sets Jacob's been lending me since I first arrived.

"Thanks, man," Rowan says, accepting the pile.

"They're your clothes, kid," Jacob replies with a shrug. His haze shifts to me, a smile sliding onto his face. "And, well, these are basically your clothes now, too."

I chuckle, watching as he disappears back into the kitchen.

Rowan starts the shower as I shut and lock the bathroom door. I watch as he strips, a sight that's familiar, but I'm still standing there completely dressed by the time he's done. I still have bruises from before, on my hips and wrists, that leave very little to the imagination about what happened to me. I was too out of my mind yesterday to think about something as simple as being naked around anyone, but today feels like a completely different universe, like when the sun finally comes out after a rainstorm.