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Sleep is still heavy on my eyelids, by the speed of my thoughts, it's still weighing down the rest of me too. All thoughts but one get bogged down.
“James?” The bed is small enough I don’t need to turn to know I am on it alone. “James?” I’m trying to keep my voice calm.
I’m up before my head is ready for it, the accompanying head rush confirms it. My brain is holding on to logic, my heart is firmly in the opposite camp.
“Archer?” I find myself yelling down the hall. If he is downstairs, he will hear me.
No answer. The chill that makes its way up my spine has nothing to do with my nakedness.
“He wouldn’t just leave. He wouldn’t just leave,” I mutter to myself in an effort to keep oxygen flowing. I run back into his room and peek out the window.
My brain jumps ship — his car is gone.
I hold on to the windowsill, my ragged breaths fogging up the panes. I grab the first thing I find on his desk, suddenly feeling the need to cover myself, to put a layer between me and the outside world as shame takes hold of me. It takes me a while before I can move, before I can untangle the web of emotions I’m trapped in.
I feel so ridiculous. So stupid. The way I came in here last night and laid myself on a fucking silver platter for him, and now he’s gone?
My first thought is to take it out on one of his model cars. However, I will be the bigger person. He will not get to pin this on me like he has done since he entered my life.
I storm out of his room, without realizing it, I am making my way to the kitchen. I need tea and chocolate. Not necessarily in that order.
I stand on the bottom step, taking note of several things. The damn foyer table is none the wiser. It is exactly where it always is, mocking me. There is a fire going in the living room, the distinct aroma of coffee permeates the air.
“James?” I try my luck one more time, cursing my idiotic need to give him the fucking benefit of the doubt. Nothing. Only silence and the crackling of the fire.
My dad has the coffee machine on a timer, that’s all it is. The reach of my gullibility never ceases to amaze me. I let my body sink into the stairs, falling unceremoniously on Elizabeth’s pristine beige runner, thankful that my sore muscles landed on something softer than wood.
With my head hung low, I grab on to one of the spindles for support. I don’t mope. “Valentines get up, and get going.”
“Fuck. Don’t go far, though, Valentine. You in my school sweatshirt is the fucking hottest thing I’ve seen in my pitiful life.” Whatever headway I made in resuming a vertical position, is lost. I slump on the step once more.
“I love it when you talk to yourself like a crazy person.” James’ smirk is self-satisfaction at its finest. “Are you planning on keeping that ass of yours on that step, or are you coming to join me for breakfast?”
All the words I know are fighting for pole position, not one of them making it out my lips. I watch him disappear into the kitchen, coat still on, a light dusting of snow on his dark, always-perfectly-groomed hair.
“Come on, buttercup,” he calls. “I know breakfast is your least favorite meal of the day, but you must be hungry after—” He doesn’t finish his sentence, trying to disguise it by digging in one of the bags he set on the counter. “Look, I even brought you tea.”
“We have tea in the house.” Not my smoothest comeback.
“This is a special chocolate tea with some berry. And the appropriate answer, brat, is ‘thank you’.”
I still don’t trust this. I decide to push my luck. “I have nothing against breakfast.” I move closer, choosing to stay on the opposite side of the kitchen island.
Without looking up, James hands me the take-out cup. “Then you can’t have anything against joining me.” His commanding eyes make an appearance, there is a dare and a threat gleaming in them. I hate it’s all it takes to get me more than a little bothered. Again, I say nothing, moving in the direction of the breakfast nook.
“Cat got your tongue?” He sits on the bench on the opposite side of the little table while he empties the brown paper bags containing our food.
“It’s been a strange morning,” is all I venture to say.
“You thought I bailed.” There is no question, it’s a casual remark he makes as he takes out several food containers.
I feel shame for the second time today.
“Here, I got you this. Don’t make a big deal of it, the card came with the breakfast.” He hands me a dark pink envelope. I try to keep him from noticing the slight tremble in my hands as I take it from him and pull out the contents. Shit. It’s a card with a cute little drawing of an owl, the phrase ‘Owl be your Valentine’ in glittery red letters. There is an addition in blue pen. A small arrow between ‘yours’ and ‘valentine’ points to the words ‘step-in.’ “Owl be your step-in Valentine?” I find myself reading out loud.
“I have never been in a relationship for Valentine’s Day, but I figured you must’ve had some plans today, and since I refuse to put up with your whining and moping—”
“I don—” I start to protest. James reaches across the table and sucks my bottom lip into his mouth. Fuck. My whole body ignites.
