Trapped

"Do I deserve this?"

I went my own way to go find Danny and see if he would be willing to practice with me some, and I hoped that things would feel different with him. He wasn't down stairs any where so I went searching for him upstairs. "He's probably in his room," I thought to myself as my feet carried me in that direction. I searched for which door was his based on the memory of Tara telling me which room belongs to who and knocked on it softly. I had expected a "come in" or at least a "yeah?" Of some kind, but instead, the door was suddenly pulled open. Noah was on the other side of this door, and he glared at me, waiting for me to say something. My heart palpatated from the feeling of anxiety crashing into me, along with the slightest bit of embarrassment, "Sorry, I-" I started to stutter out before he slammed the door in my face "Thank god," I thought to myself as I released the air from my lungs in a heavy breath out. A few rooms down, a door flung open to see what was going on, and thankfully, it was the person I was looking for. "Danny!" I called out happily. He smiled and waved me over. "What's up, smiles?" He asked. I laughed at the nickname he called me. It was beginning to be common that he refers to me as a random nickname of some kind, like Chef Alethia, and now smiles. I stopped just out in the hall and got a slight view of his room. A large navy blue blanket lay across his bed, clearly having been used and not made again, as it revealed a matching sheet and pillow case in that same navy blue color. His bed frame and nightstand matched each other's deep, rich brown color, and he had a couple of things scattered on the nightstand and some shoes placed by the wall on the other side of it. "I was training with Zane, but he got called into work early, so I was wondering if you would mind continuing the training with me?" I asked him in a 'can I convince you' kind of way. "Yeah, I can do that. Just give me a second to change into some sweat pants." He replied with a smile. "Okay, I will wait out here until you're done, and we will walk together." I said through another smile. What felt like only a few moments had passed by quickly when he opened the door back up, ready to go. "You're not wearing your glasses?" I asked when I noticed the lack of them in their usual spot just above his nose. He was quite good looking without them on, I had thought. He's attractive with them on as well, but without them on, his eyes become the centerpiece to his face instead of the glasses, and he had a very masculine and attractive look to him. "Yeah, I don't want to risk them falling off during our training, so I just decided to leave them here." He explained. "Have you ever thought about getting contacts?" I asked curiously. Glasses on or off, he looked cute either way. He let out a quick short laugh,"You're not the first person to ask me that. I've considered it, but I've been wearing glasses so long, I'm not really sure if I could pull off that look." He explained. I gave him a stunned look,"Danny, you look great without them on. You could absolutely pull off contacts." I said bluntly. "You think so?" He chuckled out. I nodded vigorously and smiled at him. He returned my smile before adding, "okay well you might have just convinced me to try contacts some time."

We practiced for about an hour as he showed me different ways to block and pull off a counterattack. At the end of our little training session, he wanted me to run threw a particular move with him again, with all my previous attempts failing and ending with his fist just barely stopping short of connecting with my face. Finally, he threw his fist towards my face, and I successfully blocked it with my left arm and threw the palm of my right hand to his chest to simulate a punch. "You did it!" He exclaimed excitedly with a huge ear to ear grin plastered on his face. My smile soon matched his, and my body filled with excitement from my new accomplishment. As the thrill of it ran through both of us, Danny reached out, and bear hugged me tightly in celebration. It caught me off guard, so my body jumped slightly as he latched his arms around me. His hug was warm and gentle, yet firm. I'm not used to giving or receiving hugs, but I'm quickly realizing that I really enjoy them. He pulled away suddenly but slowly, "Uh, sorry. I should have asked if it was okay to give you a hug first." He stated nervously. "I hope that didn't make you feel uncomfortable or anything." He continued. "No, of course not. I can't say I was expecting it, but no, it's completely fine." I replied, trying to reassure him. I didn't want to explain to him that I actually enjoyed the hug and wouldn't mind it if he just randomly hugged me like that, for fear of it coming off as weird. After all that time with Michael, maybe I'm just touch deprived. He never showed me any affection, and physical touch used to be one of my love languages. Then again, I'm glad he didn't because the times he would touch me in our moments of being intimate were bad enough. His touch left me feeling empty inside and for lack of better words, gross. I had actually wondered for a while if I was wrong about physical touch being my love language since it had such a strong opposite affect with him, but I'm now realizing that it might have just been him that had that affect on me.

Three more weeks flew by between training, studying, watching movies with everyone and hanging out, and beginning to feel more comfortable in the house. Noah stayed as cold as ice towards me, and Eli kept his distance as much as possible, but I spent a lot more time with everyone else. We were all becoming closer through them helping me, and even simple things like cooking and cleaning together, and just laughing together in the livingroom as they told stories of their life or of what happened at work recently. I can't quite find the best words to explain how I've felt, but the word content comes close. I still believe this will all come to an earth-shattering halt one way or another, but for now, I'm enjoying being here. Being surrounded by a few really cool people, learning about this side of reality, feeling like I'm actually living for once and not just settling for only being alive, settling for just surviving. No one else knows about Michael still besides Zane and Danny, and I still don't even feel comfortable telling them everything. Every emotion hits me sometimes as I think back on everything. I struggle to hide it, especially from the two of them, but I can't bring myself to explain or talk about it either when they ask, and honestly, I haven't wanted to. Part of my brain insists that I should keep my emotions hidden and stay quiet about my thoughts and feelings or else something bad will happen. Maybe that's something I learned from being with Michael, or maybe it's my intuition. It's hard to tell the two apart sometimes. During the 3 weeks that have passed, Noah finished healing completely, and the whole group has gone out to hunt down and capture a couple creatures, leaving me at home alone, which felt like torture. I've improved a lot on my fighting and defense skills, and I've learned so much about the many different kinds of creatures and monsters out there, along with everything there is to know about them. The group decided as a whole, aside from 2 who you can probably guess of course, that I should definitely join in a hunt soon, but that they should wait a little longer before taking me along.

I lay in my bed after a shower that I desperately needed after today's training. Danny and Zane both helped me train today since they both have the day off. They're still both so much quicker, stronger, and more skilled than me, but I try not to let it get to me since they've had their whole lives to train and learn. I've only been training for about a month but I've improved so much already, thanks to their help. So I'm proud of how far I've progressed, and I've enjoyed it a lot as well and look forward to the days I get to train with one of them. Everyone was skilled in everything I'm learning as a whole but each of them has their own specialty that they know just a little better than the others, which is why I work with them individually on different days. A knock came from my door, breaking me free from my thoughts. "Come in," I say out loud. Tara opened the door and walked in, followed by Zane, Danny, Greyson, Blayke, and Ty. I gave them all a very confused look, and a nervous smile surfaced on my lips. "Uh, what's up, guys?" I asked anxiously as I looked back and forth at them all. "We have a surprise for you." Tara said with a smile so big you'd think it could actually touch each of her ears. "We all pitched in as a gift from all of us." Ty commented with a proud smile plastered on his face now as well. "Go ahead, Tara." Danny said, giving her the okay to give me whatever gift they were all so excited about. She pulled her arms out from behind her back to hold out a medium-sized gift bag. I gently took it from her and a look of pure joy, excitement, and surprise must have crossed my face in a mixture with each fighting to show as my main emotion, as I opened the bag to find a box with a phone inside. "What?" I asked, surprised and waiting impatiently for an explanation. "we've had to leave you here alone a few times, which made us all worry about you, and we know it can get boring here in general sometimes, so we decided to all pitch in on a phone and a phone plan for you." Danny explained. "Yeah, so now you can stay a little more entertained, and we can all keep in contact with you, or you can reach us in case of emergencies or anything." Zane added to Danny's explanation. "I-I can't accept this guy's. It was probably really expensive, and I have no way to pay you back, and -" I started to explain but was cut off. "None of us are asking you to pay us back." Blayke said with a slight laugh. "It's a gift." Greyson added with a smile. "You're keeping it, Alethia. we won't take no for an answer." Danny said sternly while still smiling. "What can I do to thank you all?" I asked in disbelief at the fact that they would go through so much trouble for me. "You just did," Ty said, laughing. I laughed back at what he said and then hesitated for a moment before deciding to get up and give each of them a hug. They all gladly accepted that as my thank you before everyone, aside from Zane, made their way out of my room. When I noticed Zane staying behind, I acknowledged his remaining presence by looking at him and tilting my head slightly to the side. Once everyone was out of my room and the door was shut behind them, Zane finally broke the silence. "Dont feel bad. It didn't cost much with us all pitching in, and think of it as just as much for us, and it is for you. We've all been really worried about you when we have to leave, especially when we've had to leave you here completely alone. Now we don't have to worry as much because you can call one of us if anything happens, and we can also text or call you to let you know when we're on our way back home, or we can just text to talk or just whatever we want. All of our phone numbers are put in the contacts already. It's your phone to do what you want with, but you deserve this Alethia." He explained, trying to make me not feel so bad for accepting the gift. "Do I deserve this?" I wondered. I stood back up from the bed, unsure of what to say next. Zane shrugged with a sly smile as he slowly held out his arms for another hug. I felt my face heat up as I walked back to him and wrapped my arms around him once again. He wrapped his heavy arms comfortably around my body, engulfing me in his embrace. My heart sped up slightly as he touched me, and I felt flutters in my stomach as he hugged me tightly for a few seconds longer than when we hugged when everyone else was around. "Thank you for everything." I whispered with my head leaning on his chest. "I would do it all over again in a heartbeat if I had to." He replied In a low deep voice, and with that said, he released me from the tight hug and walked out of my room, leaving me alone in my room with my heart still beating unbearable fast.