Callum looked down and then back at her, his cheeks turning a rosy red. “Your jeans were soaked, so I had to pull them off you. You were out cold. I tried to wake you, but it was no use. So I, ahh, took the initiative and took your pants off.”

“Wow. Makes me glad that I wear underwear. So when sexual deviants like Callum Reid take off your pants when you’re unconscious, nothing is on show. Please tell me you didn’t do it on my lawn.”

“No, Peyton. I brought you into the house and put you on the couch. I made sure you were okay and had the fire going before I removed your pants,” Callum explained with a slight smirk on his face.

Peyton wrapped the cream blanket around her tighter and stood up from the couch. “I feel very violated right now.” Then she looked down at Callum, the colour in his cheeks fading.

“You’re upset that I took your pants off but you’re not even gonna thank me for bringing you in. Peyton, you were unconscious. What happened to you?”

She let out an irritated huff. “I was trying to get Mrs West’s cat and then I guess I didn’t see the gate swing forward from the wind. You know you could have just left me there. I don’t need saving.”

Callum stood up and looked down at her. “I wasn’t going to leave you out there. Do you really think I could live with myself if I just saw you on the ground and walked away?”

Her heart leapt. That wasn’t something she’d wanted to hear. Her heart wanted to be saved, but she knew Callum Reid wouldn’t save her. If anything, he’d ruin her…further.

“Thank you,” she said softly. “I feel really uncomfortable knowing that you’ve seen me in my underwear. I might go shower, scrub off the humiliation, and then change.”

“Peyton, I’ve seen you in far less than underwear. Grab a shower. I’ll make you a new cuppa and then I’ll check out that bump you have.” His voice had softened, almost echoing the same way he’d spoken at seventeen.

She had believed him then. Now, standing wrapped in a blanket and with her hair slightly damp, she still believed him.

“Callum, that’s nice of you, but—”

He took a step forward and cupped her face in his hands. Just the feel of his fingers on her skin had Peyton biting the inside of her cheek and trying to control the tension in her chest. Callum turned her head slightly and inspected the side of her face.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“You said I was nice. I gotta make sure you don’t have a concussion. There’s no way that you’d say anything so pleasant about me,” he teased. Then his lips tugged upwards and Peyton saw the seventeen-year-old in him.

Back before the universe had tested her, she would always kiss him once that sweet smile appeared. Now, she had to be cautious of it to keep her heart safe.

She took a step back. “You’re right. Concussion has me rambling lies.”

His smile quickly faded and that glimmer of the past left his eyes. Instead, the cold version of the boy she’d once loved stood in front of her. The want for the past to be reality was hitting her. If she could have the past, she’d have him and her parents back in her life.

But that wasn’t how the universe worked. Because even when you’d lost it all, the world continued around you. It continued to create and take away. Continued to give beauty and inflict pain. Life was the never-ending journey of air and breaths. To live and to die. A domino effect of decisions and outcomes, each affecting each other. For Peyton, Callum and her parents’ deaths were just that. One after the other, she’d lost them.

“How about you take a bath, instead, and I’ll make you something to eat,” Callum offered.

She flinched, taken aback by his suggestion. “Thanks, but you should go home.”

He closed his eyes and breathed in heavily before he looked back at her. “Peyton, if I hadn’t found you, who would?”

Her shoulders sagged. He’d just won the argument she hadn’t wanted to have. She wanted him out of her house and to draw up a plan on him staying away.

“Someone would have…eventually.”

“Exactly. Eventually. Maybe the next day or the day after that. What if it had been worse than it really was? Peyton, you could have died from natural exposure or brain swelling… Anything for Christ’s sake.”

The straining vein in his neck caught her attention. This was too much involvement for someone who had left her to grow up in the small town they’d promised to leave behind.

“God! Why can’t you be like other men in this world?” she asked as she held the blanket securely around her.

Callum let out a sigh and his muscles and posture loosened. “And what do other men in this world do?”

She glared at him, noticing his pupils dilating. “They break up with a girl and never call or see her again. Why can’t you do that?”

He mirrored her glare. “I did do that, but I can’t continue to do it. Now stop arguing with me and just go have a bath!”

Peyton looked up at the ceiling and mumbled a curse before she marched past him towards the bathroom. “May God let me get hit by lightning while I’m in that tub!” she yelled angrily to him.

When she reached the bathroom door, she looked up at the ceiling. “God, if you’re listening to me, then you should know you made the wrong decision. You had to go and make that son of a bitch save me. Should have let me die, Big Man. It’d be less painful and I would have appreciated it more.”

Peyton sat in the tub with her arms crossed over her breasts and murmured her displeasure. Though she enjoyed the warm water relieving her achy muscles, she was still bitter about her saviour. It killed her inside that he had been the one to find her. If she hadn’t tried to get Mrs West’s cat, she’d have avoided all of this.

“Fucking Mr Lucky!” she cursed as she untangled her arms and placed them on the sides of the porcelain freestanding bathtub. “I’m going to kill that cat!” she promised before she submerged herself under the water.

Opening her eyes, she saw the cream-coloured ceiling all blurry under the water. She counted in her head as she continued to stare. Being submerged, she enjoyed the quietness of the water, the thunder almost silenced. If she weren’t so afraid of drowning, she’d try to reach longer than a minute without air.

Peyton sat up, quickly taking in oxygen and wiping the hair away from her face. She hung her arms over the bathtub, letting water droplets slip off her fingertips and onto the tiled floor. Another crash of thunder had her turning her head and staring out the window. It was close. She smiled at the thought of how ironic it would be if she were to actually be struck by lightning.

Just then, lightning beautifully and terrifyingly lit up the dark sky. Another flash and thunder cracked in unison. Peyton looked up at the pendant to see it continue to flicker before her.

Footsteps rushed to the bathroom door. Peyton stilled before three bangs were made against the door.

“Peyton, are you all right?” Callum shouted over the sound of thunder.

Her eyebrows furrowed and she groaned. “I’m just waiting to be struck by lightning. It shouldn’t be long now!” she yelled as she tipped her head back and closed her eyes.

“I swear to God, Peyton. If you have a window open, I’m coming in there!”

Her fingers tapped against the tub. Then she turned her head and stared at the wooden door. “Anything to see me naked. You’re such a pervert, Callum.”

She sat quietly, waiting for him to reply, but he didn’t. She didn’t hear his footsteps disappearing either, so she knew that he was still there. More minutes passed as the water in the tub started to cool.

Pulling her leg up from the water, she noticed that her toes had wrinkled, but she didn’t mind. She submerged her leg back in the water and waited. It seemed she had always being waiting for Callum.