Page 58 of Ring Rust

Slowly and carefully, Ryan slinked off the couch and onto the floor, where he turned to his stomach, suddenly worried he might be trapped there forever.

“Do you want a pillow?” Nina asked.

“Sure. Thanks, Nina.”

She slipped a pillow under his face and fixed the overgrown mullet bangs that lay across his forehead, then reached down to straighten the longer hair draped over his neck and shoulders. The feel of her little fingernails on his scalp was soothing.

“Like my own little spa,” Ryan said.

“Yeah! I can go get my makeup brushes.”

“Sounds nice. I’m just going to close my eyes for a sec.” Mostly so Nina wouldn’t see the pain behind them, but he was tired, too.

The rug was nice to lie on, so there was that. Small, downy chicken feathers came into focus the longer he lay there, his face twisting involuntarily at their presence from thoughts of what other chicken-related things may be ground into the rug beneath his face.

But the rug was also soft, like Beni’s had been. He thought of his time spent on Beni’s rug that first two weeks after Jasper kicked him out, heartbreak and exhaustion the only things he’d managed to feel. It was different from this, sprawled out on his own rug, in his own house, the tightness in his back overriding everything but the sound of his nieces’ bickering in the distance.

His eyes opened when Nina reappeared. She got close, then tripped over the lip of the rug and fell, her upper body landingacross Ryan’s back. He groaned, but not from pain—the pressure gave him incredible relief.

“Nina,” he said, mouth half covered by the pillow he was using.

She scrambled off him, standing up near his head. “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to fall on you.”

“That’s okay, sweetheart. Could you do me a favor, though?”

“Yeah!”

What Ryan really wanted was for Nina to fall on him again, or maybe just walk along his spine, but he knew if things went wrong, that was a good way to ruin what was left of his back. But the pressure—he needed more.

“Can you go grab Calliope and put her on my back?”

“Okay!” She scampered off before he could say anything else. Seconds later, Ryan heard the indignant yowl of a cat being picked up against her will. “I got her!”

“She sounds happy,” Ryan said. “Okay, put her on my back, please.”

Nina did, and Calliope settled in between Ryan’s shoulder blades, immediately kneading along his muscles.

“God, that’s nice.” Ryan let his eyes flutter closed again from the feeling of Calliope’s tiny paws. “But I need something lower, too.”

“Hmm.” Nina pulled two cushions off the couch and stacked them on Ryan’s lower back. “Like that?”

“Yeah.”

“More?” she asked.

“I think so.”

Ten minutes later, Ryan had Calliope, two couch cushions, a giant stuffed animal he’d surprised Nina with for their two-week staycation, and a folded blanket piled on top of him. Together, they put just enough pressure on his back to relax the tightmuscles that had taken him down earlier. He hadn’t realized how exhausted he was until things started to loosen.

Calliope purred, Nina settled down next to him with a book, the TV played the Acorn Mystery at a volume so low it was just quiet murmurs. Ryan let out a breath and felt his eyelids droop.

He didn’t know how much time had passed when Jasper walked in. He’d heard Nina jump up and run to the door, shushing him.

“Where’s your cousin?” Jasper whispered.

“She’s on the phone.”

“And where’s Uncle Ryan?”