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My voice startled her, causing her to jump slightly, her hand clutching harder onto mine. The electricity pricked my skin, and the hairs on my head stood up. This woman was going to be the death of me.
“Oh yeah…umm…what am I thankful for? I guess, leaving home. I had grown up in Braven Bay and felt safe and secure all my life. For a long time, I thought it was all I wanted out of life: a white picket fence house, a husband who adored me and my children. Any outside dream seemed…impossible. I didn’t allow myself to dream too big. But now, I guess, that’s all changed. I’m free to follow my passions and what my heart desires most, even if it is one of the scariest things I have ever endured.”
This piqued my interest. I knew next to nothing of her life in Braven Bay after I left, but from what it sounded like, my brother had been a class-A asshole.
“Okay, let’s eat,” Xander announced.
Dinner moved quite quickly, surprisingly. The conversations were kept light. By the discussion, I mean between Xander, Selena, and Amelia. I ate in silence and observed everyone.
It was a skill I had picked up when I was in the Marines. You needed to speak less and watch more. You learn more about the people around you and your surroundings.
When we were done, Selena and Xander ran to the store while Amelia and I stayed behind to clean up. I knew that Xander only made that arrangement so he could get Selena alone, and I was not a man who wanted to stand in the way of the mission of my best friend. But I didn’t want to be alone with Amelia, especially after the bathroom incident.
I dried the plates while she washed and hung them on the rack. Leave it to Xander to break the dishwasher and make me do his manual labor.
“I can feel you are staring,” I said as I turned to look at Amelia, who stood at the sink with her hands in the water. “Say what you want to say, Amelia.”
Heat covered her cheeks before she turned away.
“Sorry.” She replied shyly.
I placed the plate I had been drying onto its shelf before leaning against the hard granite of the tabletop and looking at her directly.
“Don’t do that,” I continued. “Say what you want to say. You have been staring at me for the last half an hour. So out with it.”
“Umm…” She was hesitant to say anything at first, but then she found the courage she needed somewhere in her head and turned to face me.
“I don’t know how to act around you. I am trying to figure out whether you hate me or not. And how we should interact. One night we kiss, and then the next, you tell me to get out of your face. You are also my ex’s older brother, which is…against some rule somewhere?”
“Are you asking me or telling me?” I arched an eyebrow.
“Telling.” She shook her head, completely flustered. “Look, all I’m saying is this,” she gestured between us, “is messing with my head. You’re in my head. Everywhere I turn, you’re there. It’s like you’re freaking Casper, a ghost sent to haunt me.”
I couldn’t help the slight tug on the ends of my lips. Seeing her all frazzled and flustered was cute. Her eyes darted everywhere, but she refused to meet me.
I placed the dish towel down, crossing my arms over my chest.
“I’m haunting you?”
This time her eyes flitted to me, and her blush deepened when she saw the amusement on my face. “You know what I mean.”
“I don’t. Enlighten me.”
“Enlighten you?”
“Yes,” I shrugged. “I’m a little slow, so you may need to help me.”
“Nathaniel.”
“Amelia.”
“You’re infuriating.”
“And you’re confusing.”
“How am I confusing? I said what I said, and I meant what I said.”
“I don’t understand what you said, so you’re confusing.”
