A Crazy Little Thing Called Love

Chapter Fourteen

Hunter stopped me on my way to the fridge. “Oh no you don’t. You’ve done enough. I’ll cook breakfast. What kind of eggs do you want?”

“Uhhh...chicken?”

“Seriously,” his look said...well, it didn’t really say anything, but I got the impression that he wasn’t impressed with my joke.

“Surprise me,” I said finally, sticking my head out the window so that I wouldn’t suffocate on the noxious fumes still coming up out of the trash where my pile of charred pancakes sat.

The kitchen window just happened to face the Jones house, so while I was examining the wonderful view of the side of their house, I looked up and happened to see Alex through one of their upstairs windows. He was pacing back and forth in him bedroom. I could tell because every time I was in his room, I got to see the lovely view of my bathroom window from his window. Supposing he wasn’t up to anything too important since he was just pacing and looked as though he were deep in thought, I leaned as far out of the kitchen window as I could, grabbed a pine cone that just happened to be on the ground there, and chucked it at him. When it struck the pane of glass, he turned toward me, startled. I waved. He opened the window.

“Yes, Drea?” Asked Alex, appearing slightly annoyed at my interrupting of his unimportant thinking.

“Hunter’s cooking breakfast.” And that was all I had to say.

A minute later, he was knocking on the front door. 

As my mother said once, “The way to a man’s heart, is through his stomach.” I’m pretty sure she was quoting someone else, and the statement doesn’t have much to do with what I’m telling you... Just thought you should know. But, really, a lot of guys I know are driven by their stomachs. Like dogs are. Can you imagine that? Little animated stomaches driving around in dog and boy shaped vehicles?

I left the kitchen and opened the door to my best friend. He hugged me and then pushed his way inside, headed toward the new, much better smell drifting from the kitchen. Following Alex back, I stood in the doorway and watched Hunter for a bit.

“Here,” he handed me a plate. 

Dang. I thought. He is a way better cook than I am.

Hunter hadn’t burned the eggs at all. Then I tasted the food. It was just short of heavenly.

“You know,” I said. “If you want to cook me breakfast every day from now on, I wouldn’t mind.”

Alex, standing there with a plate in his hand and his mouth full, muttered something along the lines of: “Me either.”

Rolling my eyes, I turned to him. “You wouldn’t mind if I decided to cook breakfast for you everyday from now on.”

“Yeah I would,” he returned. “Your cooking sucks.”

“Someday, I just might kill you for your offensive words.”

“You’re going to kill the guy who saved your life? Good call.”

“I saved your house from burning down when that fire started in your kitchen.”

“A fire that you started.”

“It was not my fault that I just happened to put the dish towel near the gas stovetop.”

“Yes it was!”

“Was not!”

“Hey!” Hunter pushed Alex and I away from each other. Turns out, we had been progressively getting closer to each other in our heated battle, until we were nearly nose to nose. “We have bigger problems here than who caused a house fire!”

He pointed out the window. From the angle we were looking out it, we could clearly see the Jones’ driveway, and the car parked on the street near it, and Cole getting out of that car.

My first reaction was something along the lines of happiness. Can you see what’s coming next? We’ll see.

In a sudden frantic rush, Hunter, Alex and I flew out the back door of my house, across the yards, and into the Jones’ back door. The doorbell rang just as we got there. Alex yelled to his family that he’d get it while we raced toward the door.

Then I was stopped. Hunter had grabbed the back of my shirt. I turned to look at him. “You’re Drea, not Alex.”

Oh yeah...

Alex was turning the door handle. Hunter pushed his back against the wall and pulled me against him behind the opening door so we’d be hidden from sight.  I looked up at him, then flushed when I realized our proximity. The door touched the back of my head so that there was no room to back away.

Do you have any ideas how many awkward situations I’ve been in? Don’t answer that. It was rhetorical. But to answer my rhetorical question: there are way to many to count, and this particular situation just added to the total of awkward situations in my life.

Two inches. That’s how far apart our faces were. As to how far apart the rest of us were...I would say there was less than an inch between us. My chest was pressed against his. Up that close, I could just see his pupils in the dark brown of his irises as we locked eyes. I looked down in panic, only to find myself staring at his mouth.

Oh, way to go, Drea, now it looks like you want to kiss him, which you totally don’t. You don’t...right? Do I want to kiss him? It’s not like he wants to kiss me. Unless he does. If he does and he kisses me, and I don’t and don’t kiss him back will he hate me? But what if I want to kiss him too and I do kiss him back? What happens if it’s just an accident, like he fell forward and accidently hit his lips on mine and I kiss him and then he thinks I’m just really weird? And what would that do to my relationship with Cole? Ruin it, probably. So I have to risk him hating me if he kisses me and I don’t kiss him back. Obviously.

Moved my line of sight again and looked at his nose, then turned my head away, then turned back. Hunter seemed closer.

My brain whirred.  Is he getting closer or is that me just imagining things? Or am I getting closer? What? No. Turn your head! Look away! No ruining your relationship with Cole!

I turned my head away again, holding my head at an uncomfortable position 

“Yeah, just a sec, I’ll go get her,” Alex was saying. He closed the door. “Cole wants to talk to you.”

Blinking, I registered what he’d said and pushed away from Hunter, giving him one last awkward look before opening the door and covering his face again.

I put on a smile. “Hey, Cole!”

Butterflies fluttered in my stomach and nearly flew out of my mouth when Cole smiled back at me. He shook his dark hair like a movie star. 

“Hey, Drea. Do you want to go out tonight?”

Wow. Straight to the point.

I gave the door a look, wondering if Hunter was listening and what he would think. But what did it matter what he thunk?

“Yeah,” I told Cole, smiling brightly. “I’d love too.”