It’ll be over.
She’ll go back to skating regularly and I’ll go back to playing. I know how she was before her performances when she avoided me, so I know the same thing will happen again but even worse when competition season comes around. Even if that happens and we’re over, the least I can have are some memories to come back to. Something to hold on to.
By the time we check into the five-star hotel, we’re both exhausted. We throw our bags down and settle in. This room is a lot bigger than the one that we stayed in at the gala. Instead of a massive bedroom, the room is smaller sized, but it has two huge bathrooms as each side of it. The kitchen and living room are connected in another room, with the refrigerator filled with drinks and snacks that Ms Hackerly probably asked for before it was cancelled for her and Mike.
We spend the first few days in a haze, going through all the things that I booked for us to do. We go for massages, mostly for Wren. Hearing her moan with pleasure didn’t help when I had mine right next to her.
We spend our days out in Palm Springs, visiting the most touristy places we can, and we spend our nights binging bad movies and eating room service, talking about everything and nothing.
I could get used it though.
Both of us sat in robes, eating ice cream, slouching on the couch, watching movies. Sometimes, she talks about whatever book she’s reading and I’m only half listening. I just like watching the way her mouth moves. If she’s picked up on it, she hasn’t made it obvious.
This morning, we decided to go down to the beach to read. Although, I’m doing more staring than I am reading. I'm lying on my back, slightly angled towards Wren who’s lying on her stomach, her head propped up on her bag while she reads. The sun has blessed her with small dark freckles along her back and arms and I'm fucking obsessed with every single one of them.
She’s wearing a lilac bikini with a white knitted cover up. She looks ethereal. Effortlessly so. I don’t think I could tear my eyes away even if I wanted to. She looks heavenly. Peaceful. Being with her is like watching the ocean crash against the shore. It's like looking straight into the fucking sun.
Looking at her now, you wouldn’t guess the number of snarky comments she said to me in the past four months.
“Can you stop ogling?” she asks without looking up from her book. I pick up mine and pretend to read it. I’m still figuring out how she does that. I can’t, for the life of me, decide how she’s always able to catch me watching without looking at me.
“I’m not ogling, I’m reading.”
“Really?” She turns to me, squinting her eyes, her head resting on her hands. “What are you reading?”
“The McDavid Effect.” She snorts, smothering her laugh in her arms. “What’s so funny?”
“It’s not funny. It’s… typical, that’s all.”
“What’s typical about a hockey player reading about hockey?”
“Everything.” I roll my eyes and grab the book out of her hands, and she tries to reach for it.
“And what are you reading?Romance? Isn’t this the book that Kennedy got for Christmas?”
“Yeah, she’s letting me borrow it. Give it back.” She tries to reach for it again and looking adorable while trying to. I push my hand up higher so she can’t see it. I skim the page she was reading, and I gasp loudly.
“Amelia Wren Hackerly, this is straight up porn.” Her face turns even redder than it was earlier from the sun.
Every day, I learn something new about her. Like how she insists on wearing panties and a tank top to bed, knowing I can’t touch her. And how she loves to read romance novels with very explicit sex scenes.
“It’snot. Jasmine is a great author. She writes about her own real experiences with love. It’s entertaining. You could learn a thing or two,” she retorts as she snatches the book out of my hand, putting it into her bag.
“It’s filthy is what is,” I say, and she shakes her head with a soft laugh. “How about this? Whatever you read now, I’ll do to you later.”
“Not going to happen, Davis,” she murmurs before turning her sun kissed face away from me and resting back on her arms.
Well, it was worth a try.
*
“Why don’t we go out tonight?” I suggest one night after we’re both tired from hiking on the Araby trail. I stand over her from the back of the couch while she lies down, her eyes closed but she’s still awake.
“I’m exhausted, Miles. We’ve done, like, everything on everyone’s bucket listeverin the last few days,” she says sighing deeply. She opens her eyes, and pushes herself up on her elbows, looking at me.
“Don’t you want to go out for some real food? We’ve been living off room service for four days,” I whine, as I walk over to her side of the couch, and her eyes follow me.
“Aren’t we going out on New Year’s Eve? We can wait until then.”
