Behind Your Walls

27 | a date

It is often said that the company you keep ends up influencing you in some way or the other. That seems to be true for my company too because I want to do everything else but study now.

It is strange as I have always appreciated being regarded as studious. With the situation in my home and my lack of social interaction, knowledge was the only thing that gave me happiness. I used to get this exhilarated feeling whenever I had successfully solved a particular question. It was pride that made me happy and now that pride is gone.

Carter never sits to study. He has a moderately high IQ and reading before exams is the only thing he needs to score high. I am not blessed with that kind of IQ and therefore, I need to study but I cannot with him around me. He sucks in all the attention.

I read the same lines over and over again. I have been on the same page of my history textbook for the last fifteen minutes and I can't concentrate because my mind is with Carter who is shaving in the bathroom. He is humming a soft tune and every time his voice reaches me, I have to squeeze my legs shut because they keep tingling with a familiar sensation. Part of me wants to shout at him to stop humming but I don't want to miss the voice too.

"This isn't working," I mutter to myself.

Just then the humming stops and I hear footsteps coming closer to the room. I pretend to be focusing really hard with my pen between my teeth and my eyes on the page so that Carter doesn't know all the dirty thoughts about him inside my head right now.

Unfortunately, my book is pulled away and placed on the bed before I can act it all out. I find Carter opening his cupboard and skimming through his clothes. As I stare at his broad back, feeling a little confused and a little horny, he pulls out two shirts and turns to me.

"Which one?" he asks, holding one in each hand for me to view.

I raise an eyebrow. "Are you going somewhere?"

"Not me. We."

My heart flips. "We are going somewhere?"

He nods and then shakes the shirts to bring my attention back to them. "Which one?"

One is a plain white one with crisscross patterns over it. It is cute but I am more impressed by the black and grey one in his left hand. It has a beautiful pattern and looks more stylish.

"That one," I say, pointing towards it.

Carter looks at the shirt and then at me, approvingly.

"Good choice, snippy," he says. "Now get ready."

"Where are we going?" I ask, excitement flaring through me.

"Amusement park. I'm taking you on a date."

I lift my hips to stand on my knees on the bed while he finishes closing the cupboard. "I thought Carter Bell didn't date."

Carter turns, his smile descending to a smirk as he strides toward me. My heart thumps when he comes close and bends down a little until he is face-to-face with me. He twists a strand of my hair around his fingers and lets it go, watching as the hair bounces against my cheek.

"That's about to change, I guess," he says and it makes me grin.

"So, I'm the first?" I cross my arms over my chest, feeling greedy with the butterflies fluttering in my stomach.

"You're the only one," he says, catching my lips with his.

I wrap my arms around his neck to kiss him back.

***

The last time I went to the amusement park was when I turned fourteen. Fun has never been a relevant part of my life. The few outings I ever had was when the school took us on excursion trips. It was quite fun if I ignore the fact that I was alone all the time and called Mom a hundred times a day because I was scared among strangers.