COMPLETED // i don't want to hurt anymore - enoch o'connor x reader

Chapter 33 - Separated

(Y/N)'s P.O.V

I traipsed up to my room, walking five steps ahead of my boyfriend at all times. I couldn't believe our punishment. How was it fair?! I'd always know that Miss Peregrine never loved us being together, but physically keeping us apart is, in my humble opinion, far too drastic.
At the top of the stairs, I whispered a sad goodbye to Enoch (at a 'safe' distance) and pushed the door to my shared room open gently.
As I'd expected, Emma was already there, reading... Was that Jane Austen? on the window seat. She hardly looked up when I walked in, but raised her head and frowned as she saw me fall onto my bed glumly.
"What's up with you?" she questioned, putting down her book and coming over to my bed.
"Nothing..." I said, my words muffled slightly by the fact that my head was buried in my pillow. Emma plonked herself down on the bed and crossed her arms disbelievingly.
"I don't buy that for one second. I won't tell anyone, promise."
"I know for a fact that as soon as you walk out of this room you'll head straight to Jacob and tell him everything." I mumbled.
"Well... That would only matter if it's about Jacob. Is it? Has Enoch's surliness finally driven you away, and now you want Jacob?" She only said this teasingly, but, due to our current situation, it made me snap.
"No, it isn't actually, I'd rather have Enoch over Jacob any day, and Enoch isn't surly around me, it's probably just because he doesn't like you."
Emma chose to ignore the last comment and instead picked up on the former, grinning. "Of course he isn't surly with you... I bet he's lovely and soft..."
I pretended to make retching noises, although it made me smile slightly.
"Or is he a bad boy?" she continued, "Who makes you beg - "
"Ooookay this has gone far enough. If you're not going to take my problems seriously, then you may as well go back to 'Pride and Prejudice'."
"I would happily take your problems seriously if you actually told me what they are!"
I sighed heavily and pulled myself up to sitting position next to Emma. "Fine. In a nutshell, it was kind of Enoch and I's fault that the fire started because we were the ones smoking... Well actually I choked too much to get any smoke out, but that's not the point... And, yeah, Miss P found out because Enoch, the klutz, left a few of them, visible, in is trouser pocket. Now we're both grounded for a week and we're not allowed to be within 1 metre of each other for a month." I watched Emma's reaction as I caught my breath from speaking so quickly.
When she finally spoke, I couldn't tell whether she was trying not to laugh or trying not to cry. "Wow... That's pretty tough. So, no physical contact whatsoever?"
"Nope." It's stupid, I guess, how much this scared me. I'd come to rely on Enoch for happiness, and he'd come to rely on me too. And now we weren't even allowed to hold each others' hand? How could the Headmistress do this? I groaned heavily and collapsed back onto my pillow.
"What am I supposed to do now?"
"Well, you could get a hobby. Like... Sewing! You could ask Horace to teach you. Or, maybe gardening is more up your street - "
"No, Emma dear, I don't mean it like that. I meant... How are Enoch and I supposed to stay together if we can't even be close to each other?"
Emma furrowed her eyebrows and thought for a moment. "I don't know... I suppose you're just going to have to trust - WAIT. I've got it!" She looked up at me, excitedly, and I nodded at her to carry on. "Well, because you can't show how much you love each other... You're going to have to say it."
"Right."
"Right. But that's not going to change Miss Peregrine's mind, because saying 'I love you' is fairly innocent. But what if you weren't to keep it innocent?"
I really had no idea where my roommate was going with this. "Um... Continue."
"Enoch could say things to you, in public, that are perhaps inappropriate, things that will make Miss P uncomfortable."
"Yeah, but... We could get into a lot of trouble..."
Emma scowled at me. "Think about it. In your opinion, there is nothing worse than being separated from Enoch. What's the worst she can do now that you've been split up?"
"True... Anyway, even if we did do this, how would I tell Enoch the plan? I can't get near enough without alerting everybody else at the same time..."
"Leave that to me." And Emma, the insane person that she is, winked.