Prank Me Love

Will You Join Me In My Worst Nightmare?

"Even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise."

-lines from the novel "Les Miserables" by Victor Hugo

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CHAPTER TWELVE:

The rest of the week has been a difficulty, leaving me to adjust to the absence of James after what happened the last time we talked. After that night, I'd never seen him on breakfast the next morning, neither did on my ride to school. I drove Belle by myself to school for the first time since she had been fixed, feeling suddenly a bit incomplete. Something was missing... Or rather, someone.

James still didn't show up the next following days leading me to finally get that he doesn't want to see me anymore after what happened. I understand if he felt that way... But something inside me falls apart thinking that I'm not going to see him again.

I look out of the window of the bedroom. The sun is on it's way to set down. Orange hazes surround the whole sky with swirls of purple and yellow. It is a breathtaking view but I feel like wallowing in sadness. The truth is, I feel somehow, guilty and confused. Telling those cruel words to James was so hard it had eaten me inside. I recall the look on his face and it made me crumble back to tears. He looked so torn, broken, destroyed... The hope in his eyes vanished and that picture stayed permanently captured inside my head. 

Crazy denial really kills on one shot. 

I was stuck in this spiral of feelings that imprisoned me from being free to feel the things I wanted to feel. No matter how much I get through the most of my present moments, I still have that eye on the back of my head, bringing me back to those days with Peter. And it is t*****e.

To be wanting to love and be loved, costs a price... A very expensive one. And now, I'm paying it. Maybe, at some point, the guilt that I've felt after Miranda said those words to me that day at the comfort room, diminished yet what I did to James just doubled it after. It made me more brittle and vulnerable.

I sat on my bed, mulling over what happened lately and sulk alone. Dad is out for duty hours at the hospital and so is mom--she's busy doing work at the town's bank. Dad was pretty much silent and just observant with the sudden disappearance of James. He still hasn't asked me about it yet. Though, I have to admit, I feel kind of relieved somehow that I don't have to try to explain everything... I just feel like facing these problems on my own for now...

"A piece of my heart, that belongs to you,

A piece of a string, lost from one shoe,

We tied it together, like a puzzle with no clue,

Our hands touch one moment, and it all came true."

I remembered those words from James' notebook. The four lines that he wrote on the last stanza of that poem he made for me that day. He'd left a hole in my chest when he left, now there's no one who could possibly fill it back again.

He loves writing, that's what he told me on one of those nights we just stared up on my ceiling, just lying on our backs, talking. He used to brush his fingers through my hair, his touch tingles sparks down my body. I lied down, and tried to reminisce that feeling, that feeling I'm missing so badly. I skim my hand through the surface of my bed, picturing him when he used to lie beside me there. His warmth, the smell of his cologne, but all I feel was nothing. I smell nothing but fabric and detergent. The loss became much more painful. Unbearable.

I sat up, rubbing the marks of tears from my eyes. I have been an i***t. I must be an i***t for doing that to him, for thinking I had no right to love someone else aside from Peter. Peter had been the love of my life, once upon a time... But now, I need to turn the pages to the next chapter of my story...

The one where James is the leading man.

"Honey, you fine?" Dad looks at me from where he sat on the couch by the living room. I had just got down the stairs, deciding to have a glass of water because I have been staying in my room for too long this weekend. Dad gives me a worried look and I gave him a small smile.

"I'm okay, dad," I tell him, "I'll be fine." I will try.

I went to the kitchen, wearing my lazy pajamas and opened the fridge. As soon as the water meets my throat, I sigh in relief. It felt like I've ran a marathon. It feels like I've been running for so long I don't know where I even had begun from the start.

I hear the front door opens and shuts as I put the pitch of cold water back to the fridge. Footsteps appeared by the kitchen doorway and I turn around only to be surprised to see James standing there.

The eyes that I've missed, the face I've longed to see again, the presence I've been blindly looking for... He is here.

I remained frozen from where I stood.

"I know you still aren't ready for anything," James speaks up, his eyes gazing deeply into mine. And I shivered.

"James..."

"I still love you." My heart skipped a beat after hearing him say that again. I do, I love you too.

"And I'm willing to wait," James moves forward, taking determined steps towards me. "No matter how many times you say you can't love me back, I'll wait."

He is now standing in front of me, too close that I got to crane my neck up just to look back at him. 

"Your dad might even hear me say these things now," James tells me.

"I do hear you," Dad calls out from the living room, making me chuckle.

"Yeah, he does," James grins down at me, his dimples showing. Those dimples that I've missed. "I'll wait for you, Shane."

My smile fades as I stare at him, captivated. "You will?"

"I don't care if you love Peter more than me... I don't care really. I just love you. I'll stay here with you. I won't go anywhere."

I feel speechless. He's giving me a straight confession and I don't know what to say.

"I'll stay here." he tells me and leans down right away.

The kiss. The kiss I've always thought about of getting again. And here it comes. The new chapter begins.

"We should really stop showing our PDA to dad," I tell James when we got up to my bedroom after our shared make-up kiss at our kitchen. Dad was smiling at us as he watches us took the stairs, me blushing and James grinning wider as usual.

"It makes me uncomfortable," I add, "It's weird."

"Okay. If you say so, princess." That nickname. That nickname I've missed.

"I've missed you so much," I whispered to him, my mouth against his ear, as I snuggle closer to him, our backs leaning on the headboard. Our legs entwined over the sheets, and his arms around me.

"I've missed you more," he told me. "It has been real t*****e not seeing you for days."

"Where did you sleep?" I asked him the question that has been bothering him for the past few days.

"Well, your dad offered me the garage to stay at. There's this bunk bed there and it got me past through sleep," he replies, "certainly better than driveways."

I smiled, recalling the first time we've met. "So, that must be the reason why dad wasn't too worried to ask me where you have been when you disappeared. You've been partners in crime."

He smiled down at me, and I chuckled.

"Dad used to love Peter like that too, you know?" I suddenly blurt out. Not knowing why I even felt the urge to say it.

James just looks at me, silently understanding. And he waits for me to go on.

"He really loved Peter, like I did," I added.

"He really must be a nice guy," James comments. And I nodded, holding back my tears.

"He was," I say, remembering those times I used to meet Peter on the front yard every weekends. "But dad wasn't really nice to him at first, unlike you."

"Then after a while, he sees how Peter had been for me, so caring and loving," I added, my heart getting lighter and lighter as I continued.

"He just loved him eventually. He even lets him stay for dinner." I recalled that first day dad invited Peter for dinner. Peter was really nervous but dad was very comfortable, he even managed to bring up nice conversations over the food.

"Peter had been a huge part of my life," I tell James, looking at him, "But I knew our moment had already ended long before... And I want to move on now."

"I know how much you love him," James says, his hand touching my cheek, "I know he'll stay here," he touches my head lightly and looks into my eyes.

"But I'll stay with you now," he adds.

"I'm scared," I say weakly.

"It's okay to be scared, Shane," James tells me, cupping my cheek. "It's a normal reaction. But remember what I told you about doing something you want?"

I nodded silently.

"You should do what you want, even if it scares you... And I'll stay here. I won't leave. We'll face your fears together."

"I'd love that," I say, kissing him gently on the lips. "The bed seemed colder without you while you'd been gone."

"Yeah," James nods, smiling down at me, "Here's the only warmest place I've ever been. Even the couch on your living room got nothing to compare to this."

"Don't leave me," I tell him, my eyes silently asking.

"I won't," he says back right away. We moved down, laying our backs on the mattress, facing one another. "Besides, this is the only place where I could really sleep soundly."

"And dream of good dreams too," I added.

"Yeah," James agrees, chuckling, "That too. Dream of good dreams."

"It had been nightmares without you."

James looks at me with a smirk and brushes the hair out of my cheek.

"You're not the only one who had suffered nightmares lately, princess," He says. His hand resting on the side of my face as he studies me for a moment.

"We'll get through this," he finally whispers and I nod.

"I trust you," I replied and we smiled at each other.

Sleep right there, had never been comfortable again after those long days we've suffered being away from each other.

"Morning, love birds." Dad greets the two of us as we sat by the table in front of the breakfast. As usual, he's on his daily hobby of news reading and James silently sat with a grin on his face.

"Morning, dad," I say back, giving dad a peck on the cheek. We went on with the breakfast the way we used to since James had joined us. Even when it was just the three of us, without mom again, it already felt like a complete family. The two people I love, together with me on a morning meal, smiling and chatting for little talks. It is already satisfying and I instantly felt brighter and much more in the mood.

"You ready?" James asks from beside me, once we finished eating. I grin at him, nodding. I waved dad goodbye and kissed him again before both James and I went out of the house.

"I've missed driving Belle," James says as he swirls my keys on his finger while we towards Belle, hand in hand. As I feel his warmth against my soft palms, I smiled to myself. The poem that had been imprinted in my memory suddenly visited me once again...

"A piece of my heart, that belongs to you,

A piece of a string lost from one shoe,

We tied it together, like a puzzle with no clue,

Our hands touch one moment, and it all came true."

"What are you smiling at?" James asks me, as he opens the car door of the passenger side for me. 

"Nothing," I tell him, secretly hiding my little obsession with his poems. "I just feel happy."

"Me too," he says and kisses me before he closes the door and walks around towards the driver's side.

"Let's open the windows this time," I tell James, rolling the window down at my side of the truck.

James chuckles and does the same as he backs away from the driveway. The wind meets my skin as I savor the feeling of its chill.

I silently recite those lines from James' poem in my mind again... And as I say it over and over my lips hummed a strange yet familiar tune, whispering it back to the wind.

The new chapter is already turning to its next page.