Five Years of Fame [COMPLETE]

20. Movie Night

Spring, Year 3, Month 4

After the chime came a yell from upstairs.

"OLI! CAN YOU GET THAT?"

Reeve made a mental note to give Anton his own set of keys as she maneuvered her way through the maze of boxes still yet to be unpacked to answer the door.

Reeve let in gallons of brisk night air standing frozen in her doorway, surprised by who was waiting on the other side. Noah gave a half-smile and lifted his hand a centimeter, the two pizza boxes perched on top of his palm raising with it.

"I brought pizza."

"Hi. Noah. Um. What are you-"

"Noah! Hey, man! Come on it!"

Reeve hadn't heard Dani come bounding the stairs behind her and jumped when her sister appeared beside her. Reeve didn't have time to have a silent exchange of pointed looks with her sister as Dani gently pushed Reeve out of the way and welcomed Noah in. To Reeve's house.

"I'm glad you could make it!"

"Thanks for inviting me. Am I the first one here?"

Reeve had shut the door behind him to keep the cold night out and joined Dani and Noah in the small free open floor area there was available. Reeve was masking her confusion with cool indifference. She wasn't a perfect host but she knew yelling at her younger sister in front of a guest was bad etiquette.

Noah glanced around, the rest of the party he was expecting absent from view. Dani grabbed the two pizzas from his hand and took them into the kitchen.

"Actually, Anton and Kelly couldn't make it. Kelly agreed to go on that second date and Anton wanted to make that happen before she could change her mind again."

"So Anton and Kelly aren't coming for dinner?"

This was news to Reeve. Dani shook her head, her lips pressed tight to keep her smile too broad. But Reeve knew the glint in her eyes and her stomach plummeted.

"No. And turns out I have a class tonight that I totally forgot so it'll just be you two for movie night. Okay. You kids have fun! Oli, don't wait up, I'll be home later. Bye!"

Dani's farewells floated up into the air as she deftly avoided Reeve's outstretched hand, grabbed her waiting backpack from the bottom of the stairs, and slammed the front door shut behind her, all within a quick ten seconds.

Her disappear echoed through the stillness that she had left behind, Reeve and Noah finding themselves suddenly all alone. It wasn't the first time. On second thought, when Reeve analyzed that times she had been alone with Noah in the past few weeks, it had been because someone had invited him somewhere and then promptly left. It spoke volumes of her current obsession with her work that it took her this long to notice the pattern as Dani and Anton were the least subtle people in the world.

"I'm guessing you weren't let in on the whole 'movie night' thing."

Reeve shook her head, grateful that one of them had spoken at last.

"No. No, I was not."

"I could just-"

Noah pointed over his shoulder in the direction Dani had just disappear, his voice polite and understanding.

"No!"

The word came out before Reeve's brain had a chance to catch it.

"Um. I mean, I guess-" Reeve's throat tighten around her words.

The thought of the house empty, just her and her all her possessions, with nowhere to go and no one to talk to, felt suffocating. An evening spent in awkward company with Noah was a better night than having to spend it alone.