CHAPTER 7 – THE MORNING AFTER
999 Words
LAYLA’S POV
The morning after is exactly as awkward as I expected.
I come downstairs try to act normal, then Rafe comes into the common room with his sleeve pulled down to his knuckles and ruins my entire act.
Our eyes meet for exactly one second. One loaded, complicated, I-know-what-you-sound-like-when-you-lose-control second. Then we both look away.
It's not avoidance. It's two people who did something seismic twelve hours ago and haven't figured out where to put it yet.
Colt figures it out for us.
"What's with you two?"
Nobody answers. I pour my coffee. Rafe drinks his. Colt looks between us with an expression that says he's filing this under "things I will bring up at the worst possible moment later."
Eli is sitting at the far end of the room with his sketchbook open, and he doesn't say anything, but I can feel him watching. Not me. Not Rafe. The space between us. Like he can see something in the air that the rest of us are pretending isn't there.
The morning moves on and nobody mentions last night and every interaction between me and Rafe has a second layer underneath it that I can feel on my skin.
I notice the way his wrist flexes when he grips his mug – the same wrist that was pinning my hands above my head eight hours ago. I notice the space he takes up when he sits, and the way his voice rumbles low when he's talking to Colt but drops to something different when he says my name. I notice all of it - and I hate myself for every item on the list.
Then later in the day, I walk out of the shared bathroom with wet hair and a towel around my body because I forgot my clothes in my room like an i***t, and he's leaning against the opposite wall like he's been waiting there for hours – which he hasn't, but the timing is so catastrophic it feels engineered by someone who hates me.
We both freeze.
His eyes travel down my body in one slow, deliberate pass from my face to my bare shoulders to the towel to my legs and back up, and I watch him do it and my skin – which is still sensitive in very specific places from his hands – lights up like he's touching me all over again.
He locks his gaze on the wall above my head, and his jaw does the tightening thing, but neither of us speaks. The hallway is screaming with the memory of last night and I'm standing here in a towel with water dripping down my back and I can still feel exactly where his mouth was, and I need to move.
I walk past him – too close. Close enough that I feel the heat coming off his body. Close enough to know that if either of us breathed wrong we'd be touching.
My door clicks shut and I press my back against it and my heart is pounding so hard I can hear it. And through the wall, I hear him exhale long and slow, like he'd been holding his breath the entire time.
Stop it. Stop it. Stop it.
Colt finds me in the kitchen an hour later while I'm trying to make tea. He's in the doorframe with his forearms crossed and his shoulder against the frame, watching me.
"You're a terrible cook."
"I'm making tea, Colt."
"I know. And you're doing it terribly." He grins. "Just an observation, Rowan."
"You can take your observation and shove it–"
"Careful." He pushes off the doorframe and walks toward me and he's too close again – he's always too close – and his green eyes are doing that thing where they hold mine longer than necessary. "I'm starting to think you like me."
"I don't like you."
"Your face is red."
"It's the steam from the kettle."
"The kettle isn't on."
I look down. He's right. I forgot to turn it on.
He reaches past me and flicks the switch and his arm brushes mine and the contact is so brief and so stupid, but it still sends heat up my entire side.
"You're welcome," he says, already walking away.
"I still didn't say thank you."
"You were thinking it Rowan."
He disappears down the hall and I'm standing in the kitchen with my undone tea and a warm feeling in my chest that I refuse to name.
That evening, I open my door to get some air and Eli is there.
Crouching. Setting the glass of water down on the floor outside my room with the same careful precision he gives everything.
He stands, nods once, and starts to walk away.
"Eli."
He turns around and his dark eyes find mine. I hold up the glass with the lemon slice floating in it.
"How did you know I like lemon in my water?"
He looks almost embarrassed. "You mentioned it once. At Brandon's barbecue. A few years ago."
I was right. I knew I was right, but I still wanted to ask to be sure.
"Thank you," I say, and my voice comes out quieter than I mean it to.
He nods again and walks away silently.
I’m standing in my doorway holding a glass of lemon water at 10 PM and something cracks open in my chest that I shove back down with both hands.
Don't. Don't make this into something. He's being nice. It doesn't mean anything Layla.
I close the door, drink the water, and decide to move on from all of this because I hate it all.
I need to do better.
I'm getting ready for bed when I hear footsteps stop outside my door. Not Rafe's – these are lighter, quicker. Then a knock.
"Layla?" I hear Thea, the doctor, whispering from outside my room. "Can you come to the clinic? I urgently need to talk to you about your bloodwork."
- Writer
