BLACK ROSES

Chapter 13; Ask

"'Fucking boiled cabbage'. I swear to god, you're insults get weirder as the days go by," she laughs.

We were interrupted by a knocking on the door.

It slowly creaked open, revealing a sliver of CC's face, who called in, "Girls? You ok in there? Everybody sent me over to check on you guys."

"Shit," Taylor gasped. "What do I do?"

"Yeah, we're fine. Before you go, I think Taylor wants to talk with you in private for a little," I shout back, completely ignoring Taylor as the sliver got smaller.

"What?!" she whisper-screamed. "No! Ellie, stop that!"

"In private? Taylor, are you pregnant or something?" CC responds, quietly opening the door to fit his head in.

"Oh, my god, why does everybody think I'm pregnant!?" she cries, throwing her hands up in exasperation.

"I think I'll just leave you guys to it, then," I state, clapping my hands and opening the bathroom door, ushering in CC as he protests. "Don't worry, nobody else is even in this restaurant, you won't get any surprise visitors."

As I walked back to the table, I noticed everybody had finished their meals and was starting to stand. Andy looks up and smiles slightly, making his way towards me.

"Is Taylor ok? She's not, like, pr-"

"No, she's not pregnant," I laugh, which makes Andy's forehead crease with confusion.

"Then what's going on?" he asks.

"CC and her are just confessing their undying love for each other in the girls' bathroom, no biggie," I say. Andy just nods his head.

Jake calls over to us, "Hey, guys, we're gonna head back to the buses."

We both shout our approval over to them. I hear the bathroom door open from behind us. I turn and see Taylor and CC leaving, slightly red and out of breath. I make eye contact with Taylor, and cock my eyebrow. She widens her eyes and shakes her head as subtle as she can. I put my hands up in mock surrender as they walk past.

"Well, anyways, we should probably get back-" I start, but is soon interrupted by andy grabbing my hand from my side. "-soon. Andy, w-what are you doing there?"

He just smiles as he looks down at our entwined fingers.

"I changed my mind," he whispers. It was so quiet, I had to step just a tad closer to hear him.

"You...changed your mind? About what?" I whisper back. His hand makes it's way to my hip, slowly encouraging me to collapse into him.

"About this. About us. I changed my mind," he states. His seaglass blue eyes meet mine, and I almost caved in on myself; how the fUCK does a man like this even exist.

I kept hearing my own voice giving me the same speech I gave Taylor;

'You're real fucking cute, ok?'

'I'm almost 98% certain he can see that.'

'You've already hit it off.'

'Go for it.'

'Trust me.'

"Is-Is this changing of mind a good thing, or...?" I trail off, becoming completely entranced in his eyes. We were dangerously close. I could feel his breath on my ear and his hair tickle my neck.

"I don't know," he mutters cockily. "You tell me."

Our lips meet, igniting those little fireworks behind my eyes again. Every book I've ever read has described kisses like this, and I honestly couldn't see it and found it extremely cliche. But, as our lips worked against each other, I completely understood. I felt like my entire body was engulfed in flames, but in a good way, I guess. I felt his mouth curve upwards into a smile, and I couldn't help but to grin with him. Somehow, I could feel my heart beat faster and faster, but the entire room just slowed down. I raised my hand to his cheek, my thumb absentmindedly stroking his defined his cheekbone. His stupid, fucking cheekbone. His lips were chapped and smooth at the same time, and the cool sting of his lip ring kept surprising me every time it made an appearance.

We broke apart, slightly gasping for breath, the grins still planted on our faces.

"You know, I can't help but feel as if a certain question should be being asked right about now," I say, biting my slightly swollen lip.

"What, you're think about marriage already, Ell?" Andy asks with a cocky smirk replacing the genuine smile.

I rolled my eyes and slapped his arm, saying with a scoff, "You wish, asshole."

"Alright, fine," he says with a sarcastic sigh.

"Be my fucking girlfriend, you twat."