Beyond the Black Curtain

Chapter 30 - Hey Jealousy

Oh bless his heart. I shook my head and smiled shyly at him. "You were all sorts of amazing last night. I'm a little..well, not a little. I'm actually so freaking sore right now BUT, I don't mind at all. Not one single bit."

***

"Baaaaabbbbyyyyy...we kind of have to get up," I found myself saying a few hours later. I checked my phone for the time, it read half an hour past 2 in the afternoon. Sebastian and I have managed to have sex at least 2 more times before we both fell asleep again, despite him running out of condoms. I just reminded myself I'd take the morning after pill once I could get his heavy arms off of me.

"Nooooo..." Sebastian grumbled behind me. I can feel a slow grin forming in his face as I wiggled to get loose from his grasp. "You feel too damn good baby," he mumbles then kisses my bare shoulder. I was so tempted to stay but I really needed to take that pill. That, and I'm hungry as hell for actual food.

"Much as I would love to stay in bed all day with you, I'm hungry and I want waffles and bacon and eggs and big strawberry milkshake," I say as I finally wriggled his arm away, taking the sheets with me as I got out of bed. Sebastian moans in annoyance and I just giggle at him, suggestively dropping the blanket before stepping inside the shower with nothing but my birthday suit on.

I shield my eyes away from the harsh California afternoon sun as Sebastian and I made our way to his favorite joint that serves breakfast all day. People were too busy with their own thing to notice us, plus, we managed to dress down discreetly. I know Sebastian still hasn't fully let go of his issues with me being abused by paps so this was actually a relief for him.

We were seated at his usual booth and our orders were taken already when we arrived. I gaze at the people passing by, enjoying the hustle and bustle of Los Angeles.

"Penny for your thoughts?" Sebastian breaks my reverie.

I smile earnestly and take his hand, my thumb gently stroking his fingers.

I let out a contented sigh and give him a silly grin. "Last night was wonderful, wasn't it? And I'm not just referring to the sex because that was in a totally different league," I say. He cocks an eyebrow but gives me the same childish grin after.

"I'll say," Sebastian responds. "I can't believe you just had your very first public engagement. You killed it, babe."

"Thank you for letting me do that on my own, even if I didn't seem to want to at first. It was really important to me that you were firm on refusing to walk with me, even though I know you were dying to do so."

"Oh god, I was thisclose to begging on the floor for Ann to let me, but as always, Leslie knew how to talk sense into me," Sebastian responded as the server brought our food. I look up at him with a grateful smile and he turned beet red just before he left. This did not go unnoticed by my Romanian potato.

"Careful, Sebastian, your Bucky Barnes is showing..." I tell him before he could even say something else. "The poor kid couldn't even nod at me!"

When he didn't say anything and just took a huge bite of his food, I raised one quizzical eyebrow at him.

"Sebastian Stan," I say in mock horror. "Are you actually jealous?!"

"I am not!" Sebastian replied quickly, looking like a petulant child.

"Are too!"

"I can't help it when I have the most beautiful girl with me, can you blame me?"

I eyed him carefully. I've never seen a jealous Sebastian before. I must admit that a tiny part of me is flattered as hell, but the majority is a little scared of how he'd react if someone actually made a pass at me. His eyes darkened a little at the server's reaction when I smiled at him and his jaws clenched ever so slightly as he left. If anything, it was those subtle reactions that scared me most. I mentally shuddered at the thought.

I nearly dropped my fork when a voice chimed in with my mental pondering.

"...thinking about? Rae? Sweetheart?" came Sebastian's worried question. He was looking at me with careful concern. "You just started pushing your food and spaced out."

I took a sip of water and forced out a confident smile. "Did I? I'm sorry. I'm right here." I attempted to take a piece of waffle in my mouth and I missed it by a fraction of an inch and fell back on the plate. I then hear Sebastian's silverware clank against his plate.

"Okay, Rae, you're scaring me. What is going on with you? Please talk to me, baby."

"I'm fine, Seb, I promise. Can we please finish eating?"

"But you--"

"I said I'm fine, Sebastian!" I say a little louder than I intended to. Good thing there weren't anyone else in the place than us. Sebastian seemed to wilt at the sound of my voice just then.

I needed to calm the fuck down, that much was obvious because I was freaking out over something that may be pointless in the long run. I know in my heart of hearts that cheating on Sebastian was something I wouldn't even think of doing. He's my 'end game', as what Scarlett had mentioned and there is no one else I'd wanted to spend my days with than him. When I signed up for this relationship I knew it wasn't going to be easy, and now that I'm a little bit more out there because of last night's events, the road will be a little more laden with bumps and roadblocks. I know he's in it for everything with me, but sometimes I feel like I need to know him better for me to feel secure with a lot of things.

We managed to finish our super late breakfast slash super early dinner without much incident after my tiny flare-up and spent the rest of the day taking a stroll around Los Angeles relatively unbothered and unnoticed. There's probably gonna be photos tomorrow, but at this point, if Sebastian seemed nonchalant when I checked and double checked with him before we decided to walk around, I figured I should be okay too.

I just was stepping out of the shower when I found Sebastian on our bed, looking at me tentatively as I made my way to change into comfortable sleep clothes which consisted of boyleg shorts and a red, nearly tattered Rutgers shirt that ran well below my thighs and was about two sizes too large for me. He smiled as I climbed into bed with him, his arms immediately encircling my waist as we both sat there.

"Rae?"

"Yeah?" I responded absentmindedly as I picked up my phone to set the alarm for the following morning.

"I need to ask you something. Promise me you won't get mad, ok?"

"Um, yeah, sure. What is it?" I tried to keep my tone light but my mind was racing towards a million different directions for reasons I don't know.

"What happened earlier at the restaurant? I uh, I know you said it was nothing, but I can't shake the feeling that there was something," Sebastian asked. I could tell he was fighting off his own nerves as he spoke.

I set my phone down and turned to face him. "What do you mean?"

"You know what I'm referring to Rae."

I take a deep breath and attempt to choose my words carefully. I had to be honest but still make sure to get my message clearly across if I wanted to get this right.

"You..um...sort of surprised me with your reaction to the waiter. I noticed these little things that you unconsciously did and it kind of unnerved me. I've never seen that side of you before and it caught me off guard and I froze. I don't know whether to reassure you or not because if I did, you'd probably think I'd cheat on you and if I didn't, I don't know how you'd react if someone would actually hit on me."

Sebastian's eyes grew a hue darker and I couldn't quite decipher the expression he held in them. The anticipation to his response was gnawing at my insides. He looked away for a bit and when he returned his gaze on me, his eyes looked sad, disappointed even.

"Did I...did I scare you, Rae?" came his weak reply.

"No, no!" was my quick response. "I thought I was, but no, you didn't scare me, like I said, you just caught me off guard. I just want to understand why you reacted that way when he didn't even say a thing to me. Seb, I need to know if...if..."

"If what?"

"If you trust me 100%. That I would never EVER do that to you. Last night probably had raised my  more and I need to know that even if I get more attention now moving forward, that you are confident in me. That you're secure in what we have together."