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CHAPTER FORTY FOUR juliet is the sun
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"ARE YOU AWAKE yet?"
I felt Rafe's chest vibrate with each spoken word, bouncing through the skin of his shirtless chest and reflecting onto my cheek. For the past week, I'd been awoken in the exact same position, and in the same way each time.
My eyes adjusted to the sunlight-filled room, "Why do you wake up so Goddamn early?"
"It's nearly midday, wouldn't call that early." he retaliated, laughing to himself as his fingers ran through the mess of hair on my head.
"Keyword 'nearly'." I yawned, "By your books it's probably 8am."
"Speaking of books..." he trailed on, keeping his focus further down his chest which led me to the sight of a novel just inches away from my face. "I read on from where you left off last time, don't hate me."
"I was never gonna pick that book up again, don't even worry about it."
"Shame, you'd never get to see the notes I made for you." his hand moved down to my upper arm, tracing small hearts on the surface of my skin.
I shot up from where I'd been laying down, "You made notes for me?" my tone of voice was childlike in excitement, unfamiliar to such lengths of care someone had taken for me.
"It was hard to fit them in amongst everything my mom had already written, but it's the effort that counts." he pressed me back against his chest, this time letting his free arm snake around my waist.
The effort counted more to me than he could ever imagine. I'd never had anyone care for me a fraction of how much he did, even the 2 people who were supposed to care for me since they brought me onto this Earth. Life felt new around Rafe; everything I'd been used to hating was now everything I loved in him.
I paused to dawn on my previous thought, taking a longer moment to process the 4 letter word that crossed my mind. For a feeling that I was nothing but a stranger to, I was far too comfortable with subconsciously throwing it around.
It wasn't like I was lying; there was so much that I loved about him. But, it was only selfish to think of taking that further, as loving someone always came at the cost of yourself.
Blinking my impending mental cycle away, I stared back at the book nursed in the pair of caring hands in front of me, admiring each turn of the page and each strip of yellow marker that highlighted a series of quotes.
"What've you highlighted?" I inquired out of curiosity, the angle I was in proving to be a challenge when it came to the attempt of reading.
He paused on the section he was on, "Quotes that remind me of us." he smiled feebly. "We're a lot like them, if you think about it."
