Chapter 5: Midnight Bruises and First Kisses
The buzzer screamed through his apartment, a jagged sound that tore him from a shallow sleep. Bry fumbled for his phone. 2:17 AM. The screen glowed in the dark. He swung his legs out of bed, the floorboards cold under his feet.
He didn’t ask who it was. He just pressed the talk button, his voice rough with sleep. “Yeah?”
“It’s me.” Clem’s voice was staticky through the intercom, but the exhaustion was crystal clear. “Sorry. My keys are… I think I left them at the rink. Can I…?”
“Yeah. Come up.” He hit the door release, the lock clunking open downstairs.
He opened his own door a crack, the hallway light slicing into his dark apartment. He could hear her boots on the stairs, a slow, heavy climb. When she appeared, she was a silhouette of weariness. Still in her Cherry Bomb gear—the tank top, the shorts, the knee pads strapped loosely around her thighs. Her skate bag was slung over one shoulder, dragging her down. She smelled of sweat, old wood, and the sharp, metallic tang of effort.
“Rough night?” he asked, stepping back to let her in.
“You could say that.” She dropped her bag by the door with a thud. “Took a hit from Painbow during a scrimmage. A real one. Felt it in my teeth.” She gestured vaguely to her right hip. “And I lost my keys. And my phone died. It’s just been a parade of small disasters.”
He guided her to the couch. “Sit. Let me see.”
She sank into the cushions with a groan, the fight gone out of her. He moved around his apartment quietly, grabbing a bag of frozen peas from the freezer and a clean dish towel. He knelt on the floor in front of her. “Where?”
She pointed again, lower on her hip, just above the leg of her shorts. The skin was already blooming a furious, deep purple, a galaxy of broken capillaries against her skin.
He wrapped the peas in the towel. “This might be cold.”
“Everything is cold right now. Go for it.”
He pressed the makeshift ice pack gently against the bruise. She flinched, a sharp intake of breath, then relaxed as the numbness began to seep in. Her head fell back against the couch, eyes closed. The only light came from the streetlamp outside his window, painting her in streaks of orange and shadow. Without the rainbow hair and vibrant clothes, she looked younger. Softer. The armor was off.
“Thanks,” she murmured.
“You taught me how to fall. The least I can do is help with the aftermath.”
A small smile touched her lips. “The aftermath is significantly less glamorous.”
They sat in silence for a few minutes, the only sound the hum of his refrigerator and the faint rustle of the peas. His knees ached from the hard floor, but he didn’t move. His thumb, resting on the edge of the towel, was just touching her skin. It was warm.
“You know,” she said, her voice low and quiet in the dark. “Most guys would have made a joke by now. Or tried to turn this into something else.”
He looked up at her. Her eyes were open now, watching him. “I’m not most guys.”
“I know.” Her gaze was heavy, direct. “That’s why I came here.”
His heart was a slow, thick drumbeat in his chest. The air in the room changed, becoming charged and still. The space between them, the few inches from his hand on her hip to her face, felt like a physical thing, a substance he was moving through.
She moved first.
It was just a shift, a leaning forward. Her hand came up, her fingers brushing against his jaw, calloused and gentle. Her touch was electric. It was the same point of contact from outside the train days ago, but now it was a circuit closing.
He didn’t think. There was no analysis, no moment of panic. The emotional resonance he’d been waiting for his whole life was humming between them, a frequency so pure it silenced everything else. This was the connection. This was the symphony.
When she leaned in the rest of the way, he met her halfway.
The kiss wasn’t a explosion. It was a surrender. It was the final, gentle fall after all the practice. Her lips were chapped and tasted faintly of salt. His hand, the one not holding the peas, came up to cradle the back of her head, his fingers tangling in the damp, messy strands of her hair. She let out a soft, broken sigh against his mouth, a sound of relief, of letting go.
It was slow, and deep, and quiet. It was everything he’d ever written about but never understood until this moment, in the dark, with the smell of her derby practice on her skin and the cold press of peas against her bruise.
They broke apart, but only just. Their foreheads rested together, their breathing synced. The streetlight caught the sheen in her eyes.
“Okay?” she whispered.
He could only nod, his throat too tight for words. He felt cracked open, every nerve ending exposed and singing.
She smiled, a real, slow, unguarded smile. “Good.”
She took his hand, the one that had been on her face, and laced her fingers through his. Her grip was firm. Then she leaned back against the couch, pulling him with her until he was sitting beside her, their shoulders pressed together. She kept hold of his hand, resting their joined hands on his leg.
“Don’t let the peas melt,” she mumbled, her eyes already closing again, a profound exhaustion taking over.
He adjusted the towel on her hip. He watched her breathing even out, the tension finally leaving her body. He didn’t move. He sat there in the semi-darkness, holding the hand of the sleeping whirlwind, the ice pack slowly warming against her skin. The quiet was no longer empty. It was full. It was the space between the notes, and it was more beautiful than the music itself.
He must have dozed off, because the next thing he knew, gray morning light was filtering through the window. The peas were a damp, lukewarm bag slumped on the floor. Clem was still asleep, her head a heavy weight on his shoulder. Her breathing was deep and even. He didn’t dare move.
Her hair tickled his neck. It smelled like sweat and cheap, fruity shampoo.
Slowly, carefully, he extracted his arm from behind her, letting her slump gently into the couch cushions. She murmured something incoherent but didn’t wake. He padded to the kitchen and started the coffee, the grinder’s roar feeling sacrilegious in the quiet. When he turned around, two mugs in hand, she was watching him.
Her eyes were sleep-softened, the bruise on her hip a spectacular splash of color in the morning light. She pulled his blanket up to her chin.
“Hey,” she said, her voice gravelly.
“Hey.” He set a mug on the coffee table near her. “Coffee. Black, right?”
“You remembered.” She pushed herself up, wincing as she moved. “Oh, wow. Yeah, that’s going to be a problem today.” She took a tentative sip. “So. Last night happened.”
“It did.” He leaned against the doorframe, his own coffee warming his hands. “Was it… a disaster parade casualty?”
She looked at him over the rim of her mug, her gaze steady. “No. It was the only thing that went right.” She set the mug down. “I should probably go. I need to find my keys and explain to my roommate why I look like I lost a fight with a lawnmower.”
“I can help you look.”
“You’ve done enough.” She stood, testing her weight on the injured leg. She hobbled over to him, stopping just inside his personal space. She reached up and straightened the collar of his t-shirt, her fingers brushing his skin. “This was a good landing, Bry.”
Then she rose on her toes and kissed him. It was quicker than the first, a soft, certain press of her lips. A confirmation. It held the promise of the symphony, not just a single note.
He walked her to the door, her skate bag slung over his shoulder. The city was waking up outside, cars hissing on the wet pavement.
“I’ll text you,” she said, taking the bag from him. “When I’m among the living.”
He watched her navigate the stairs, one hand on the rail for support, a splash of vibrant color in the dull hallway. When the front door clicked shut downstairs, the silence in his apartment was different. It wasn't empty. It was resonant.
He looked at the couch where she’d slept. The blanket was still tangled from her shape. He picked up the forgotten mug of coffee and finished it, the bitter liquid now tasting sweet. His phone buzzed on the counter. It was his editor, probably about his stalled manuscript. For the first time in months, the blinking cursor on a blank page didn’t fill him with dread. It felt like a beginning. He finally understood what it meant to fall correctly, to surrender to the momentum, because getting back up was the whole point. And he was already back on his feet.