Page 52 of Roped

I did. His door is rusted metal but heavy, and even though unlocked, it took considerable strength to push it open when I was here on my first night at Rawhide. So I guess I should be thankful. It’s just that I’m too busy catching my breath with everything. Then, “Why aren’t you sleeping?”

He doesn’t deem it necessary to answer that question.

But I keep forging ahead. “Is it your headache?”

At this he says, his voice gruff, “You here to sing and make it better for me?”

I blush. So, so hard and clutch the edge of the door because my knees start shaking. So he did listen to me; he did understand why I sang. “Did it… did it help?”

His jaw pulses at my question. Angrily. Then, “Never slept better in my entire goddamn life.”

My mouth forms an O and my eyes widen.

“Not even before,” he adds.

My belly whooshes and I hold the door tighter. “So that’s a g-good thing, right?”

Another angry pulse in his jaw.

“Is there something else that’s bothering you?” I ask next.

Another question he doesn’t give me an answer to.

“Is that what you do when you can’t sleep? Throw the knives? I didn’t know you had a collection of them”—I glance over at them on his desk again, then at the wall of ropes and swallow thickly—“also.” When he doesn’t respond to that either, I mumble, “I guess that’s why you were so offended by my pocketknife.”

“Was offended you tried to hurt me with it,” he corrects, “when it was more suited for butterin’ toast.”

I open my mouth to protest but think better of it. “Throwing knives isn’t a cowboy thing, is it? How’d you get so good at it?”

He watches me for a few seconds before he answers, tilting his head to the side, his tone both biting but also falsely sweet. “When I was a boy, I suddenly found myself with a lot of time on my hands. Didn’t wanna see people, couldn’t talk to them, so I spent my days up on the cliff with the wolves. Or sat around readin’, playin’ with ropes. When I got bored with that, I threw things at the wall. Whatever I could find. Although I did like things that broke, like lamps, glass windows. Somethin’ about the loud sound made the stuck words in my brain shut up. One time, I broke all the mirrors around me. Liked how they burst into a million pieces; didn’t like cleanin’ them up, though. So decided to get a new hobby. Throwin’ things that stick. They don’t make too much noise, but it works wonders when you wanna break somethin’ but can’t. Wasn’t gonna use darts like a fuckin’ child. Hence the knives.”

I think I break my nail on the door listening to him talk about it. About what he went through. And this isn’t even all of it. I know there’s more, so much more that my stomach feels hollow. My chest feels tight and heavy as I whisper, “You broke all the mirrors around you.”

“Didn’t need to see myself in a motherfuckin’ mirror to know what I looked like,” he replies in the same tone. “What I’d become. I knew.”

“You didn’t become anything. You’re not a—”

“You’ve got three seconds to decide,” he says, cutting me off.

“What?”

“You wanna get in or not,” he says with a low rumble. “After that, I’m makin’ the decision for you.”

My breath snags in my throat, and before he even counts to one, I step in. He looks down at my feet before looking up at me. He clenches his jaw as if he’s unhappy about my decision. As if he wanted me to leave, to go far away from him. And maybe I should have because he seems… different. He seems unpredictable tonight, agitated, angrier than usual. Something is clearly going on with him, but I’m here now, and… My thoughts come to a halt when I hear a screech followed by a loud clang of metal.

What was that?

My heart pounding even faster, I turn back and notice the door’s been closed. “How did that…”

“Remote,” he says.

I swivel my eyes back to catch him sliding a black remote into his pocket. “You closed this door with a remote?”

“And locked it.”

“The door’s locked?” I squeak because that sounds ominous. “But this is like a hundred years old.”

“Can still rig it, though. Run a wire through, hook it to a security system.”