“I appreciate everything, but...I don’t want to be up here alone with your brothers. I’d rather be with you.” I said. His eyes seemed to brighten.
“Okay.” He said, pushing the trundle bed back in place. Then he stood up straight and looked at me, his eyes questioning me.
“With me?” he asked, just checking to make sure. I nodded. I knew that he wanted to agree, to let me be with him, to sleep with him in the sofa bed, instead of upstairs with his brothers, but it would have been going against his better judgement and the morals that his parents have taught him.
He finally shook his head. “It’s better if you stay here with Ike and Tay. I’ll only be downstairs if you want to talk or something.” He said. Tears built under my lids and only added to the huge headache that I already had. I quickly wiped them away before any would slip down my cheeks.
I nodded anyway. Even though I wanted to be with him, I agreed to stay up in his bed and in the room with his brothers. He smiled and leaned over to kiss my cheek. “Sleep tight. Morning will be here before you know it.” He said. I nodded again and then backed onto the bottom bunk, laying my head to the pillow and closing my eyes.
I didn’t fall asleep. I laid there for probably 3 hours. Night fell and I glanced over at the clock that lit the rest of the room. Isaac had already resided for the night and I heard Taylor climbing the stairs. It was just after midnight. I shut my eyes tightly, hoping that if I inflicted enough pain to them, I would wake up from the hellish nightmare that I was going through. But I didn’t wake up the way that I had been hoping too.
Taylor came into the room and sat down on the end of the bed. Actually, it was his bed. Zac had but his bed back under Taylor’s bed and I never really got it back out again. I moved under the covers and he jumped in fright.
“Oh geeze, Angie, I didn’t know that you were spending the night. You scared me. Hey, what’s wrong? Zac’s downstairs watching Saturday Night Live. Are you guys in a fight or something?” Taylor asked. I shook my head and got out of his bed.
“No, it’s just that he said that he was coming back up but I guess that he was distracted. I’ll go downstairs. Night Tay.” I said leaving the bedroom.
“Night.” I heard him call after me. I silently slipped down the stairs and found my way to the living room. Zac was leaning against the back of the couch, his legs outstretched on the sofa bed. He was wearing sweatpants and a plain gray t shirt. He didn’t see me watching him. He laughed at something on the television.
I entered the room and he looked up. “Hi Ang.” He said when he saw me. All the thoughts of that night flowed back in my head. This was all too much. I closed my eyes and my lips quivered. “Ang?” I collapsed to the bed and curled up beside him. I cried silently, tears streaking my face, and my hands clamped in fists resting on his chest. He wasn’t sure what to do. He hesitated a few seconds before enclosing his arm around my back, gently stroking my hair.
No words were said, he knew that I didn’t want to talk. I just needed to be in silence. He turned the television off and wrapped his other arm around the front of me, putting it on my shoulder so it was as if he was hugging me. I wouldn’t have been able to go on if he wasn’t there with me. I was so glad that we were so close, such good friends. But then I had to ask myself, “Is he just a friend?”
We never ‘officially’ announced our feelings for each other to his family. My mom knew about us, but well, my mom didn’t really matter any more. But I thought about it and I never really broke up with Bobby, either. I hated sneaking around with Zac in fear that someone would see us together and then tell Bobby, or even worse, Bobby seeing us himself. We weren’t really sneaking because we weren’t formally ‘together’ or anything like that. It wasn’t that I didn’t like Bobby, because I did like him, I liked him a lot, but there was something special about Zac.
I wasn’t sure what it was, but I knew, I just knew that the accident with my mom wasn’t nesseccarily an accident. It happened for a reason. And I was leaning towards the idea of it happening so that Zac and I would get to be closer to each other. Even though it sounded really greedy, it was what I believed. Perhaps so that we be together more than we were before. Maybe a sign that we were supposed to be with each other.
“I agree.” Zac mumbled. I looked up into his eyes. I thought that he was sleeping, but his eyes were open. “No, I wasn’t asleep. And I agree with everything.”
“You heard me?”
“Everything.” He said, moving into a more comfortable position, putting one of his arms under his pillow and the other he reached over and cupped my face. His thumb moved across my cheek.
“So, what are we going to do?” I asked, putting my hand over his.
“Well, I think that’s the very least of your concerns right now.” He said.
“Yeah, but--”
“Shh, don’t worry about me right now.”
“I want too, though. I want to figure everything out while I am in the right mood.” I insisted. His eyes didn’t argue with mine. “First, I need to break up with Bobby.”
“Don’t you think that you should…wait a while?”
“Wait for what? The sooner the better! Or do you actually like sneaking around half scared out of your mind about getting caught?”
“Well…now that I think about it…” he joked. I backhanded him in the shoulder. We both laughed. It felt really good to smile and laugh. “But seriously? It’s a bit of a thrill of getting caught, ya know?” I had to smile at that answer. “I mean, what fun would I get out of this if I didn’t have to think about, oh, let’s just say, my dad walking in?” He leaned over and kissed me.
I only think that he intended for it to be a short kiss on the lips, but I brought my hand to the back of his neck and kept him there, not letting it be only a little kiss on the lips. He smiled. “Or that, too.”
He was so cute. I lifted his arm that wasn’t under the pillow and draped it over my stomach, me sorta lying with him.
“I love you.” I said.
“Love you, too.” He replied.
“Goodnight.”
“Sleep peacefully, Ang.” Was the last thing that I heard before I did fall asleep.