Ted's POV (Chapter 6)

Sorry, guys! No Q&A this month. As an apology, please enjoy this glimpse into Ted’s perspective during his time couch surfing with Flea and the detective.

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Ted couldn’t sleep. No shit he couldn’t sleep—but even if he wasn’t currently suffering from insomnia-on-crack, he wouldn’t be likely to get much rest on a strange couch, without his wife sleeping beside him, with so much shit running around and around in his head.

Time ticked by while he laid with his eyes closed and mind whirring. When the bedroom door down the hall cracked open at 2 A.M. he was wide awake and listened as bare feet shuffled across the carpet, coming to a stop a foot away from the couch, where Ted had folded up and discarded his outer clothes for the night.

He didn’t say anything or move a muscle, but he did crack open an eye to watch out of its corner. The figure, obscured by the darkness but slowly coalescing into the unmistakable outline of Flea, had dropped into a crouch and was rooting quietly through his pants pockets.

“What’re you looking for?”

Ted spoke in a semi-whisper but it might as well have been a gunshot, shattering the silence of the dark apartment. Flea froze, but recovered fast. When he withdrew his hand from the pocket it had been pillaging, it held the pack of cigarettes Ted had left in there.

“Couldn’t sleep.” Waving the packet shamelessly, Flea rose to his feet and looked straight down at him. “Thought a smoke might help.”

Sitting up, Ted said, still in a lowered voice, “So you’re stealing mine?”

Flea shrugged. Ted stared him down but got the feeling that, in a game of chicken, no one was ever beating this boy.

“You can have one,” he said. “I don’t mind.”

“Gee, thanks.” Ted’s vision was now adjusted enough to catch Flea rolling his eyes. “I wasn’t asking.”

Ted fought to keep his lips from quirking up. If Flea thought he was the first scrappy kid to ever give him a hard time, he’d be dead wrong.

“Listen, I really will be gone after tonight.” It probably wasn’t enough to mollify someone who seemed to hate his guts on principal, but Ted figured it was worth a try. “I’m not trying to take advantage.”

Flea snorted. Ted decided to ignore that, but he also decided that now was as good a time as any to bring up something he’d been wanting to talk about.

“I care about them,” he said, and Flea met his eye again. “I’m hoping that’s the one thing we’ve got in common.”

Flea shifted, uncomfortable, flicking the lid of the cigarette packet open and closed and saying nothing.

“I figure you’re probably not a killer, or out to rob them.” Ted gave the stolen cigarettes a significant look. “But everyone’s got an angle or two. You sure they know all of yours?”

Flea’s jaw tightened, his back straightening. Eventually, he said in a hushed voice, with a glance back down the hallway, “You don’t know me.”

“No, I don’t,” Ted agreed. “Do they? Do you?”

Groaning in contempt, Flea threw the pack of cigarettes on the floor and turned on his heel, stalking back to the bedroom. Just before he disappeared into the darkness, he paused, hovering on the threshold.

“If there’s anyone who does,” he said, so quiet it was nearly a thought, “it’s them.”

And then he was gone.