Chapter 5

To Kira's astonishment, Jayden arrives at the inn at dawn, and no one stops him from coming to the door of her room to rap a drumbeat against the wooden door until Kira staggers from the bed to shut him up by opening it. Not like she had a choice anyway.

The morning light is so low that it only just breaks through the shutters, creating shallow patterns across the floorboards.

Dressed only in the one pair of sweats that she bought and a thin blue tee, Kira feels vulnerable, exposed in the company of a man already dressed for work.

Despite the early hour, Jayden is wide awake. His eyes are bright and alert, and his hair freshly washed, thick and wavy.

He smells like sandalwood. Kira shouldn't notice that but she does. She notices his carved calf muscles, like a marble statue, because Jayden is wearing shorts, and the scars that litter his skin, some fine and old, others ragged and recent.

This is the body of someone who works every day in the forest or around rough materials.

He looks so different from her. Kira has scars too.

Determined not to seem skittish, Kira dresses quickly in the bathroom while Jayden paces the room, looking out through the shutters at the silent street below.

Just as she looks up, she sees Jayden turn around the pill bottle on the chest of drawers, examining the label.

"Strong stuff," he remarks. "What are you taking it for?"

"That's private," she mutters, suddenly remembering why she didn't like Jayden very much the first time she met him.

She snatches the bottle away and throws it down into her bag, making sure to push past him to get to her jacket.

So short on sleep, and having had more liquor yesterday than she usually would, she is feeling more combative than ever.

"Are we going now?"

Jayden chuckles under his breath and nods.

"Sure. Let's go."

The back of his truck is loaded with tools and materials, some covered with an ancient, torn tarp.

All the paintwork is scratched. But when Kira climbs into the passenger seat, she finds the cabin itself quite clean and fresh-smelling, and she is relieved.

She half expected it to be full of food packets and coffee cups left behind on the dashboard.

"I'm sorry if I offended you," Jayden says when he pulls out onto the street, taking her by surprise.

"what?"

"I get the impression you don't like me very much."

Now Kira feels guilty. Fuck. Jayden had offered for no charge to help her out with clearing the old house, and it was Jayden too who saved her the pain of listening to everyone toast to her asshole of a father.

Since she arrived in the town, Kira's fuse has been too short, and she reminds herself that she shouldn't be judging Jayden by the strict social standards of the city, where everyone lives their life trying to prove their worth in the hierarchy of class.

"I'm sorry. It's not that. I'm just... it's not been a great week".

"I get it. Don't be sorry".

"Everyone here seems to have so much respect for you."

Jayden laughs. His knuckles are tattooed, prominent where he grips the steering wheel.

"We get along well, I mean we all grew up together. There aren't many young people in town. Even those of us born a few years apart were raised as if we were the same age. Everyone is close."

"But the way they look at you is different. They follow you."

It took Jayden a minute to respond, as if he was carefully considering his answer.

"What can I say? At school, I loved being the center of attention, a bit of a class clown. I've always had a lot of friends."

At first, Kira thinks that doesn't answer her question, but then she realizes she didn't really ask a question.

"You're a natural leader."

"I guess."

"About the house... I know you want to help out, but it's really not in a great state, and I'm not going to be staying in town long enough to get it fixed up," Kira warns.

"I appreciate you offering your help, I really do, but I don't want you wasting your time."

"It isn't a waste of time. Besides, it'll give us a chance to get to know each other. No one wants their lasting impression of a person to come from a funeral."

Back at her desk in her apartment, Kira has a pile of reading to do as tall as her knee, and before getting into the car to get there, the pressure of her research was crushing her.

Here, despite the unfamiliar surroundings and the uncomfortable atmosphere, she feels like she can breathe.

So she takes several deep breaths, centering herself, and with each exhale she feels her responsibilities drifting up into the air.

It would be easy to forget them all, hidden away in a small town like this.

"Did you go to college? I know Noel studied in Eldonia."

"College? Me?" Jayden laughs. "No, no. I wouldn't have lasted five minutes. Noel and Frank have always been the smart ones.

"I'm good with my hands though. Need the roof retiled? I can do that. Algebra not so much."

"I think you have to be pretty smart to lead people the way you do."

Since Jayden detected her irrational dislike, Kira now feels the need to cover it up with spritzes of praise.

Jayden doesn't say anything, but when Kira looks at him, she sees that his lips have twitched into a small smile.

When they pull up at the house, Kira takes the chance to call Will, sure that he'll be out of bed by now.

Sure enough, Will answers after the third ring, launching straight into questions about the funeral.

Kira lets him talk, the stream of concern of a close friend, and then she answers everything at once in the most concise manner possible.

"It was fine, Will. Just another funeral. Everyone talked about how amazing my father was, and then I escaped to drink with some of the young guys here."

Jayden watches her, unsubtly, as he unloads some tools from the back of his truck.

"Listen, I'm actually planning to stick around for a few days."

"You're staying? I thought you couldn't wait to get away!" laughs Will.

"I want to fix a few things in the old house. Maybe get to know the town, even. Believe it or not, it's nice to get some fresh air."

"Fresh air? What's that?"

"I'll call you later," she smiled.

Not even a second after she hung up, Jayden passes, shouting over his shoulder. "Just another funeral?"

"Well, it wasn't my first."

"I take it you and your father weren't close?" He kneels down and examines the front door, swinging it back and forth on its hinges.

"I don't mean to pry, but that didn't sound good on the phone."

"It's nice that everyone here has great memories of him," she shrugs. At first, she was unsettled by Jayden's directness, but the more questions she asks, the more she finds that she likes the absence of boundaries, in a strange way.

Everything is less polished than it is in the city, where half of his interactions feel rehearsed.

There's something appealing about talking openly, out here in the crisp, cool air, with someone who doesn't know her well enough to have his impression of her tainted.

"But they aren't the same memories as yours?" The old lock creaks as Jayden unscrews the fitting.

"People change. Maybe my father was a good person then, but he wasn't by the time I knew him."

She expected Jayden to chastise her for saying such a thing about a person who had passed, something so taboo that in a traditional town like this it might border on the superstitious, but Jayden just nodded.

"Yesterday must have been hard for you."

"You knew I didn't want to talk about him, at the bar."

"I'm good at reading, people." Jayden slips the old lock from its nook and smiles.

Maybe that's why you're such a natural leader, Kira thinks.

"He was a mean drunk," she says aloud.