Deal With It

forty six

I sighed, "I love you, too. A lot. But please just be more careful." He nodded, leaning forward. He placed his hands on my cheeks and left a kiss on my forehead before moving back. "We have to report this," I said. "It wasn't an accident and you know that."

"What's the point? Those damn cops are useless and we can't prove anything."

"They aren't useless—" I started but Tyler cut me off.

"You're only saying that because Daniel is one, too," he frowned, his jaw locked tight.

"He has nothing to do with this!" I argued. Just the mention of his name had me agitated. I wanted to keep my distance from him at any cost. Tyler was still clueless about my kiss with Daniel and I didn't want to add it to our mix of problems, not when our lives were already overflowing with them.

He just sat there, not speaking. He stared directly ahead.

"So that's it?" I asked. "You're going to leave it at this?"

"No, I'll deal with it in my own way," he said and just as I was going to interject, he added, "don't worry. I won't get into any trouble."

"Fine, let's just leave. I'm so tired," I groaned. There was no point discussing the matter any further since it would probably result in a heated argument. I would, however, find out what his master plan to handle this was.

-

The next morning, I woke up feeling rather hot. Tyler's chest was pressed against my back and his arm slung over my body. I wanted to stay in this position but was anxious to wiggle my way out as well. "Tyler," I said. "I need to get up."

"No," he groaned into my hair, followed by a mix of mumbled words. I twisted my head around and could just about see his face.

"This is uncomfortable," I fidgeted in an overly exaggerated manner to get my point across. His head shot up and the blinding sunlight forced him to look at me with only one eye opened.

"You're uncomfortable? I'm the one with one dead arm, one burnt arm, a gunshot wound and a face full of hair— which smells great, by the way," he said. "Not to mention the awkward boner," he added with a smirk.

"Yeah, I noticed that one..."

"Maybe you could help me out with it, then."

Laughing, I shook my head. "Not a chance."

"Fine. I'm not letting you go," he announced, moving closer to me and wrapping his arms tightly around my body. He buried his face into my shoulder and pretended to snore loudly.

"I'll suffocate if you squeeze me any tighter."

"Then I guess I won't squeeze tighter," he chuckled. I continued to whine for him to release me but my efforts remained useless. He could be real stubborn when he wanted to be.

A loud, confident knock sounded on my bedroom door. "Arissa, it's twelve pm. I think you should get up now," Mum said.

Twelve?!

"It's so late! How did I stay asleep so long?"

"Guess you weren't as uncomfortable as you said, huh?"

"Seriously, let me go."

"Oh, come on. It's not like we had the most peaceful night," he reminded me. Fair enough. We did get home around 5am. Instead of going to Tyler's house, where his father would probably erupt on hearing the news, we came to my place. Our attempt to sneak in without waking my parents up didn't work and they caught us, anyway. They weren't exactly calm about it but allowed us sleep before the interrogation. The interrogation which would begin as soon as I left my room.