Taken

Chapter 2

     "I'll always be here," I reply, and we smile to each other. "You promised me some pizza," I say with a grin, and he chuckles.
We make our way back to the car, after dusting ourselves.
"Your place or mine?" He asks, then answers himself, "Yours." I stay quiet, knowing he doesn't want to be back in his house.
We silently get in the car, then drive back to my house.
     "I'll bring you your clothes", I tell James as I leave him in the doorway of the bathroom. I go to my bedroom and rummage around, looking for the spare pants and sweatshirt he always leaves here.
     After I hand them to him, James holds my elbow and tugs me into his warm embrace. I inhale his cologne deeply, and lean into him.
     He pulls back and enters the bathroom, and I head back to my room. I remove my accessories and shoes, and grab my cat printed pjs and head to the other bathroom to take a quick shower. When I'm done, surprisingly, yet not so much, before James, I head to the kitchen to start the pizza dough after pulling my hair into a bun.
     After adding the flower, yeast, oil, water and the other constituents, I leave the dough to rest and go sit on the couch. James comes out looking smolderingly hot with his wet, glistening hair, and pops himself next to me. He throws his arm over my shoulders and pulls me close.
     "Do you need a towel for that?" I ask, running my fingers through his hair. They come out wet. James shakes his head and buried his head in the crook of my neck, breathing deeply. I start to comb through the hair on the back of his head, and he moans. I smile a little at that, and continue my actions.
     After a while of this, James perks up suddenly and roughly grabs my face, staring deeply into my eyes with his raging ones.
     Slowly, painstakingly slowly, he puts his lips against mine, and slides his tongue inside. I respond, and soon we're both breathless.
     "I'm sorry I'm like this today..." he mutters, and I run a finger down his cheeks to his chin.
     "It's understandable", I whisper back, and he frowns.
     "I really thought Alyssa will stay..." He trails off, and I look down at our entwined hands. 
     I keep quiet, not knowing what to say to alleviate his sadness. Well, except for one thing...
     "The dough is ready, I think", I say in a small voice, and James chuckles.
     "If only you can love me as much as you love pizza," he replies, and I gasp.
     "No way in Hell", I say as I stand up. James follows me to the kitchen where I start to knead the dough.
As I'm rolling out the dough, James starts on dicing the tomatoes, green bell peppers, sausages and grating the mozzarella. We crack jokes and have fun, and I'm happy he isn't in that sad mood he was in before. While the pizza is in the over baking, James and I lounge on my bed, with my head on his lap, and his fingers twirling strands if my black hair.
Just before the oven's timer goes off, James' phone starts to ring. I stand up to go get the pizza while he answers the phone. Putting the oven mitts on, I slowly and carefully remove the pizza from the oven, and starts to cut it into squares. When I start to put the table, James noiselessly ghosts inside the kitchen and I jump.
"James! You scared me!" I exclaim, my initial shock at seeing him wearing off. I study his stiff composure and his hanging head. "James? What's wrong?" I ask, bewildered, and step towards him. "James?"
He looks up into my eyes with his tearful ones. I immediately throw my arms around him, and starts to whisper comforting coos in his ear. He remains unmoving, his hands still hanging limply by his sides, and that scares me.
"James? Tell me what's wrong. Who was that on the phone? James!" He remains unresponsive, staring dejectedly at the floor. I place my hand under his chin and pull his head up. His eyes look dead, unseeing. I frown and place my hands on his shoulders. "James, tell me what happened." When he doesn't say anything yet, I take his cold hands in mine and propel him towards the couch and sit him down, taking a seat next to him. I hold his hands tightly, wondering what could have thrown him into this zombie state.
After a while of restless waiting, James decides to finally pry open his mouth and talk to me.
"K-Kyle..." he trails off, tears now streaming freely from his eyes, creating a trail down his cheeks. They form dark spots on his light grey sweatshirt.
"What? Kyle what? James, Kyle what?" I ask when he doesn't continue. His dead grey eyes stare into mine.
"He's gone."