stevie | outer banks | JJxOC

33- In awe

"Your breath smells," Stevie giggled at the boy after their faces pulled apart from their kiss.

"You're so annoying," JJ rolled his eyes as he moved to sit back normally on the sofa.

"Woah, woah," Stevie complained, "I thought you said you loved me," Her smile was cheeky almost like JJ's smirk.

"I guess I do," He smiled back at her almost admitting defeat as she stood up, taking the empty plates back to the kitchen so they could be washed.

"Ok, then why?" Stevie asked as she came back into the room with JJ. The one thing she couldn't understand was, why argue with her? She would have liked him a lot sooner. Why sabotage himself? "Why argue with me?"

"Evie it was really hard to be around you and not be with you." JJ admitted, "It was easier to make you hate me and create a real reason for why I would never tell you how I felt. If you hated me then I could convince myself there was no chance because we all know just a rule alone isn't going to stop me. It killed me to see you with Tobie."

Stevie let out a dry chuckle and bit her lip before muttering, "It hurt me more."

"What?" JJ heard more than she thought he did. He had always been told they ended things on good terms.

"It doesn't matter." Stevie tried to cover up her accidental slip. She sat down next to JJ again hoping he would just move on.

"I thought you broke up after long distance," JJ asked softly, realising it was a sensitive issue.

"Yeah funny story," Stevie laughed sarcastically at herself, she tried not to think about what had happened with Tobie as much as possible, "We planned the long-distance thing but I caught him with someone else just before he left."

"He what?" JJ was slightly outraged but tried not to flip out because he didn't want to hurt Stevie. The worst part was he didn't know. He couldn't help her. He probably just went back to annoying her the next day.

"He told me he wasn't ready to have sex, which is fine because I wasn't either, but he just didn't want me," it was a while ago and Stevie was for the most part over it, but whenever she spoke about how he left her it stung. It broke her confidence down. Her voice slightly wavered.

"Why didn't you say?" JJ asked, feeling sorry for all the bottled-up pain she would have experienced.

"Cos I didn't want pity," Stevie had always ignored her problems, she just pushed everything down or away and pretended she was fine, "or you making fun of me. Why didn't you say anything about your dad?"

"I didn't want pity," JJ looked down into her eyes and realised just how similar they were.

"Don't leave me," Stevie asked, sounding vulnerable.

"Don't hurt me," JJ said at the same time. "You're eyes are sparkly,"

"I'm crying JJ," although she was happy, being with JJ made her happy, the underlying pain of what both teens had lost or had gone through permeated through her eyes. JJ leant down and let her cry into his chest whilst they hugged, both feeling soothed by each other's presence. Tracing his thumb across her face, JJ wiped her tears gently, "You know you don't deserve it. JJ it's not your fault," She tried to convince him. He nodded once but he clearly didn't want to talk about it, instead, he lent back down to kiss her.

JJ picked her up so her legs wrapped around his waist and guided them back into Stevie's room whilst they continued to kiss. JJ, who was still shirtless, waited for a nod from Stevie then started to remove her top leaving her in a bralette which made JJ smile. "So you've never..." JJ felt almost too awkward to finish the sentence.