The Art of Moving On | ✔

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE; part one

      I look back, because I'm a glutton for punishment.

     Sometimes, all the time, it amazes me that Dres is all mine, to do with what I please. I make a mental note to fit in Dres and Cas alone time into the weekend.

     Amelia drapes her coat over my arm, her gaze fixed mostly on the dessert table like she's plotting to try everything. I take their coats to the foyer and hang them up in the front closet.

    When I head back into the living room, Dres and Amelia have joined the mix. Dres is talking animatedly to my grandparents and I swear grandma is just about swooning. It's more words than I ever got from Dres when I first met him.

     Amelia moves beside me and whispers, "Why don't you give me a tour?"

     I freeze. "Well, there's not really much to see," I whisper back.

     She smiles coolly. "Give me one, anyway."

     "Okay..." I shoot a fleeting glance at Dres, wondering if he's going to save me from impending death (he doesn't notice) and then lead Amelia out of the living room into the foyer. "So this is the front hall. Hall closet. Staircase. And yeah, okay, let's just skip to the part where you give me the speech."

     Amelia raises an eyebrow, coyly. It's very 'I have no idea what you're talking about.'

     "Come on, you know the bit. 'If you hurt my brother, you'll suffer endless torment by my hand.' That sorta thing."

     "I don't think you're going to hurt my brother," she responds simply. I think right because if anyone's likely to get hurt here, it's me. I'm the one who's more invested.

     "So if this isn't the speech portion of the night, then what is this? An interrogation? What do you want to know?"

     She quirks her brow. "Oh, you know, the standard stuff. How did you guys meet? How long has this been going on? Is my brother a top or a bottom?"

      Every ounce of blood in my body shoots into my face, making me unsteady on me feet. I have absolutely no volume control when I blurt, "What!"

     Amelia laughs easily. "Right, he's totally a bottom. Why am I even asking?"

     "I — we — I mean — he's not — and we haven't—."

     "Relax," she places a hand on my arm, like this will calm me down, "I was kidding. I don't actually need or want to know what it is you two get up to in the bedroom."

     I swallow against the urge to tell her we don't get up to anything in the bedroom. Literally. We actually haven't done anything in his bedroom. His front foyer, yes, and his car, and the kitchen at Weston's. But not his actual bed. I don't tell her that, though. Instead, I nod, waiting for my heart rate to return to normal.

     "But how did you guys meet?" she asks, curiously. "Dres won't offer up any of the details and my mother seems to think its his story to tell. Though I suppose it is half your story, too."

     "I mean, there's not like a story. We didn't, like, run into each other at the grocery store or something. It's not like I lost my breath when I first laid eyes on him. You know, it wasn't like some crazy movie moment."

     "We didn't meet at a grocery store, but Cas certainly lost his breath." I turn and Dres is behind me, leaning against the door frame between the living room and where we are in the foyer.

     "Ha ha," I say with a roll of my eyes. "I had a momentary lapse in my vital functions."

     Amelia grins. "Oh, he's funny. I like that for you."