Shelter by Tara Shuler

standing over me. His face was pale, he was sweating, and he appeared to be trembling. I sat up and rubbed my eyes.
    “What’s wrong?” I asked.
    “Alice, I can’t sleep,” he said. “Nightmares.”
    I pulled down the covers on the other side of the bed so he could climb in with me. He slid in beside me, and I wrapped my arms around his trembling body. A few moments later, he was asleep. I soon joined him in dreamland.
    Around six o’clock, my mother walked in. The sight of the two of us in bed together either did not faze her, or at least she did not let it show.
    “Hey, you two,” she said. “It’s time for dinner.”
    We all had a pleasant meal together, and I got the idea that Kai was not used to family pleasantries. He hardly said a word all throughout dinner, but he smiled a lot, and he always responded when spoken to. My mother was trying very hard to make him feel welcome.
    Kai fell into life with my family pretty smoothly. He still missed his mother terribly, and he drove by her house every night to be sure her car was in the driveway. He was terrified she would get herself killed by driving while intoxicated. Other than that, he seemed to adjust well.
    I adjusted surprisingly well, too. I was shocked that none of us had attempted to rip into his jugular. In fact, I hardly ever felt hungry around him at all.
    My brother and I had gone to the store with Kai after school on Thursday and helped Kai shop for some clothes and other essentials. He was too afraid to go to his mother’s house to pick up any of his stuff, and truthfully, I didn’t want him around that insufferable bitch, either.
    While we were out, we passed by an art supply store, and I asked my brother if we could go. I insisted that Kai let us buy him a new easel and some paint and brushes and other supplies. He tried to refuse. He didn’t like feeling like a charity case. But I wanted him to have something to do when I wasn’t around. So while I was at school, Kai painted.
    I still hadn’t told Kai I had plans for Sunday afternoon. I was hoping he would come with me, but something told me he wasn’t going to be receptive to spending time around a bunch of people he didn’t know after everything he’d been through lately. It was Saturday night before I managed to tell him.
    “You’re going out tomorrow?” he asked.
    “Yeah,” I answered. “Just bowling with some people from school. It’s no big deal. I’d love it if you would come with me.”
    “No,” he refused. “I don’t think I could deal with being around people right now.”
    “I figured you’d feel that way,” I admitted.
    “But you’re still going?” he asked quietly.
    “Yes,” I replied. “I told them I would.”
    He bowed his head and looked hurt.
    “I won’t be gone long,” I said gently. “Maybe three or four hours, tops.”
    “That long?” he whined.
    I felt horrible. Part of me wanted to just cancel bowling, but I’d told Jamie and Max I would go. I didn’t want to go breaking promises this early in the year. I was trying to fit in as much as possible. I certainly didn’t want to call attention to myself. But I also knew Kai really needed me.
    “Are you sure you won’t come with me?” I pleaded.
    He refused. He just wasn’t ready to deal with people. It was hard enough being around my mother and my brother every day, and he spent most of his time hiding in his room and painting.
    When Sunday rolled around, Kai was a wreck. He kept saying he had a bad feeling about the day, and he was trying everything he could think of to get me to stay home short of actually outright asking me not to go.
    He was making me so anxious. He paced back and forth in the hallway outside my room the entire time I was getting ready, and every time he saw me, he threw his arms around me and squeezed tightly. It was as if he thought he would never see me again.
    Will dropped me off a Bowl-a-Rama at two o’clock, and Jamie was waiting outside. She was chewing her