Between Love and Hate

Change of Plans

*Violet's POV*

As I walk up the stairs to my room with Kane, I feel this giant void opening up inside of me. 4 years. 4 years I was with Jace. I gave everything to him. And I thought he had done the same for me. I guess I was wrong.

I unlock the door to my room and find it empty. I’m not surprised. Stella went to a party so I didn’t expect her to come back tonight. 

Kane drops my bag and then turns on the lights. I turn around to look at him and his face looks way worse in the light. I walk up and examine the cut on his forehead along with the dried blood that sticks to his neck and continues underneath the collar of his shirt.

“Kane, this looks really bad. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine. Don’t worry about me. It’ll heal.” I’m glad to see that he at least has stitches in it. 

I sigh and go over to grab a towel and say, “Come on.” He doesn’t say anything as he follows me to the bathroom. When we get there I instruct him to sit on the counter and he says, “What are you doing?”

“I’m cleaning all the dried blood off of you.”

“Oh, no, you don’t-”

“Please. Let me do this. Please,” I ask him, begging him with my eyes. He nods once and I run the towel under the water and then move to stand in between his legs to clean off his cheek, being very gentle around his eye. I can see the purplish shade starting to form underneath it. I can feel his eyes watching me intently even though I’m not looking directly at them. I start to move lower, cleaning off his neck and then moving down to his chest. 

“This would be easier if you took your t-shirt off,” I say quietly.

He stiffens and says, “No.” Something in his tone tells me I would lose that argument so I just move his collar out of the way and wipe off as much as I can. 

“Here,” he says softly as he unzips his hoodie and then lifts up his t-shirt from the bottom to reveal the parts of his chest I couldn’t reach before. My mind flickers briefly to when I touched his back last time and he freaked out. This time he refuses to remove his shirt but lifts it up, giving me a full view of the muscles underneath. Clearly the issue is with his back. But why? 

I only have a few seconds to contemplate this before my brain starts to drift to the way his muscles form a V pointing into his pants. I snap myself out of that thought and drag my eyes back to the cloth which I lean over to rinse in the sink and then bring it back up to his chest and continue wiping up the blood. 

I’m trying very hard to ignore the feeling of his eyes on me and focus only on the task at hand. When I’m done, I release his shirt and go to step back so I can rinse the cloth in the sink but his hands snap to my hips, holding me in place. I look up at him and his eyes are even darker than usual as they hold my gaze.

I see indecision flicker through them and then he averts his gaze and drops his hands. I can’t help but feel hurt by this action but I take the hint and step away to rinse the cloth. He hops down from the counter and I follow him back to my room.

When we get there I walk over to my closet and grab a t-shirt and a pair of pajama shorts.

“Could you-” I start and he rolls his eyes but turns around for me. I change quickly and I say, “Okay, I’m done.” He turns back around and asks, “Is your roommate coming home tonight?”

“No, I don’t think so.” He moves towards her bed and I say, “Wait!” before I can stop myself. He stops walking and turns to me, raising an eyebrow. I look down and twist my fingers together anxiously. “Can you- um, can you stay with me? Here?” I ask, gesturing to the bed with my eyes. His eyes soften and he walks back towards me. 

He pulls the covers back and gets in, sliding close to the wall and holding the blankets up for me. I plug my phone in quickly and go to turn the lights off before making my way back over to the bed. I climb in facing him and he gently tucks the covers around me and leaves his arm around my waist.

I snuggle in close to him and then tilt my face up and say “Thank you.”

“Good night Violet.” I love how my name sounds coming out of his mouth. I fall asleep easier than I expected given the circumstances.

The next morning I wake up to the feeling of fingers brushing my hair out of my face. I stir a little and snuggle further into the chest underneath me. Suddenly, memories of last night come flooding back to me. My eyes snap open and I look up to find Kane looking down at me. My cheeks flush in embarrassment. 

I start to pull back but he has one arm around me and pins me into his side. 

“Hey, it’s okay. You’re safe,” He whispers to me.

“I’m sorry about-”

“Stop that. Don’t be sorry. I’m glad you called me.”

“But I thought you didn’t want anything to do with me anymore?”

“Nothing could be further from the truth,” he tells me. I’m so confused.

“I don’t understand. You said-”

“I know what I said. What I said has nothing to do with what I want, trust me.”

“Trust and I aren’t really friends at the moment,” I tell him.

“Understandable. And I can’t explain things, but just know that I will do everything in my power to stop you from getting hurt. Okay?”

I don’t understand what he’s getting at, but I hear the conviction in his words. I lean back and place my head on the pillow so that I can look in his eyes when I say, “I believe you.”

At that, his lips crash into mine and I feel his fingers digging into my hip as he pulls me closer. I drag my hand up his chest and rest it on the side of his neck. I lift one leg and wrap it around him as I feel his tongue skim my lower lip. I open my mouth and his tongue tangles with mine. My body is once again on fire everywhere he touches. The logical part of my brain has clearly been burned to ashes because not one single piece of me wants to stop this.

I feel something hard against my inner thigh and it makes me moan. At this, he pulls back and says, “Violet stop. I can’t.”

“Why?”

“Because I feel like I’m taking advantage of you. You’ve just had a very traumatic 12 hours.”

I groan and begin to untangle my legs, feeling embarrassed once again at my uncharacteristic advances. His hands find my leg and stop me. “Just let me be here with you, okay?” I relax my body into his and just lay there with my head snuggled into him and his arms wrapped around me.

And for some reason, on what should be the worst day of my life, as I’m lying with someone who could not be any more wrong for me, everything feels right. 

I don’t know how long we lie like that, but I figure Stella should come back at some point. I sigh and move my head so that my chin rests on Kane’s chest.

“My roommate is probably going to be back soon,” I tell him. He sighs and says, “Yeah,” before releasing me. I get up and sit on the edge of the bed. I can’t bring myself to stand up though.

“Do you feel this too?” I ask, so quietly I’m not sure he can even hear me.

“Yes,” he replies and sits up beside me. I get off the bed and grab my jeans shorts from yesterday and a random t-shirt from my closet. I look back to find Kane sitting on my bed looking at the door. I change quickly and say, “Okay, I’m done.” He looks back and I walk over to him, standing in between his legs, looking at the cut over his eye.

“Can you teach me?”

He looks up abruptly and says, “Excuse me?”

“How to fight. I wanna learn how to fight. How to be strong.”

He wraps his arms around my waist, holding me close and says, “How about we go get breakfast and discuss this another time.”

“I’m not hungry,” I tell him. 

“Don’t pull that with me Violet. We’re going to breakfast.” I just nod. I can’t bring myself to argue with him. I hear a key turn in the lock and I jump back from Kane as the door opens. 

Stella looks at me and then at Kane with a startled look on her face. “Vi? I thought you weren’t coming back until later?”

“There was a, um, change of plans.”

“I see that,” she says, eyeing Kane.