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Description
      Their Denny's sits in a clean, quiet part of the city, with a Popeyes, Perkins, and Seven-eleven for neighbors. Trimmed palm trees yawn above their heads in the cast of fresh Florida sunlight. Kaylin yawns too, on Abel's right arm, leaning into the subtle hills of his muscles.
He laughs, rests his left hand on her head.
     "You're tired?"
     "A bit... I don't know why."
     She watches his lips fold into each other, hidden in the groomed, dark blonde hairs of his beard. His chest rises, then falls in a heavy sigh, and he ruffles her hair before letting his hand fall back at his slacks. Even though the sun is already warm, she wears a light jacket to cover the bandage. Abel says that people will panic if they see, because they're too damn paranoid about getting infected. But as they walk into the clinking of plates and the smell of meats, eggs, maple syrup, his muscles rise like hackles, stiff against her clutching arms and the side of her face.
     The wound, the bandages-they feel like a brand, an evil mark baking beneath her sweater. She clenches tighter to Abel, tries to convince herself; the eyes are glancing, not staring. They don't know. They can't know. And nothing's wrong with her. She's not one of the paranoid idiots.
In the far corner, a woman leans over to her companion and mutters something into her ear. Kaylin's face warms. She prays they are talking about the usual, how she's "young enough to be his daughter" or trying to figure out if she is his daughter.
     She glances at Abel. He's reading the menu even though he'll get pancakes, and he'll share with her because she'll only want one. But he always reads the menu, and always with that serious, creased expression, so she can't tell what he's thinking. She closes her eyes and presses back against his cotton shirt, which, like always, has no smell. His deodorant is unscented, cologne nonexistent, his professor's role only casting his breath with the occasional whiff of hot chocolate, coffee, tea, some quick hot drink never consistent enough to label him.
Abel orders the usual, and when the waitress sets the plate of pancakes onto the table, he slides the top cake onto her empty plate. She stares down at the butter running yellow and watery against the deep amber syrup, and watches them both soak into her pancake like stagnant water on old wood. The butter smells sharp, the syrup rotting sweet, and soon, her mouth waters not from hunger, but from nausea.
     "Kaylin?" Abel pauses with knife and fork poised. The crease between his eyebrows darkens. "You all right?"
     She nods. "Yeah. I just... I don't know. I'm not really hungry."
     He just stares with his brows furrowed until she turns her eyes down to the soggy pancake, then he returns to his food. It isn't hard to convince him she's not hungry. It's true anyway; she's not.

Description
      Their Denny's sits in a clean, quiet part of the city, with a Popeyes, Perkins, and Seven-eleven for neighbors. Trimmed palm trees yawn above their heads in the cast of fresh Florida sunlight. Kaylin yawns too, on Abel's right arm, leaning into the subtle hills of his muscles.
He laughs, rests his left hand on her head.
     "You're tired?"
     "A bit... I don't know why."
     She watches his lips fold into each other, hidden in the groomed, dark blonde hairs of his beard. His chest rises, then falls in a heavy sigh, and he ruffles her hair before letting his hand fall back at his slacks. Even though the sun is already warm, she wears a light jacket to cover the bandage. Abel says that people will panic if they see, because they're too damn paranoid about getting infected. But as they walk into the clinking of plates and the smell of meats, eggs, maple syrup, his muscles rise like hackles, stiff against her clutching arms and the side of her face.
     The wound, the bandages-they feel like a brand, an evil mark baking beneath her sweater. She clenches tighter to Abel, tries to convince herself; the eyes are glancing, not staring. They don't know. They can't know. And nothing's wrong with her. She's not one of the paranoid idiots.
In the far corner, a woman leans over to her companion and mutters something into her ear. Kaylin's face warms. She prays they are talking about the usual, how she's "young enough to be his daughter" or trying to figure out if she is his daughter.
     She glances at Abel. He's reading the menu even though he'll get pancakes, and he'll share with her because she'll only want one. But he always reads the menu, and always with that serious, creased expression, so she can't tell what he's thinking. She closes her eyes and presses back against his cotton shirt, which, like always, has no smell. His deodorant is unscented, cologne nonexistent, his professor's role only casting his breath with the occasional whiff of hot chocolate, coffee, tea, some quick hot drink never consistent enough to label him.
Abel orders the usual, and when the waitress sets the plate of pancakes onto the table, he slides the top cake onto her empty plate. She stares down at the butter running yellow and watery against the deep amber syrup, and watches them both soak into her pancake like stagnant water on old wood. The butter smells sharp, the syrup rotting sweet, and soon, her mouth waters not from hunger, but from nausea.
     "Kaylin?" Abel pauses with knife and fork poised. The crease between his eyebrows darkens. "You all right?"
     She nods. "Yeah. I just... I don't know. I'm not really hungry."
     He just stares with his brows furrowed until she turns her eyes down to the soggy pancake, then he returns to his food. It isn't hard to convince him she's not hungry. It's true anyway; she's not.