Lera
Our afternoon runs smoothly, with lot's of smiles and laughs. My mom seems to be relaxing a lot more, which is a good thing. She deserves a break.
We've spent all day on the beach, soaking up the sun and working on our tans. This is finally starting to feel like a real summer. A summer of laziness. A summer of hope, and beauty in the day-to-day life.
The sun's only slightly dipped when we begin to eat dinner. We've gone real summer stereotype tonight, beachside barbeque, big bowls of salad and ice-cream for dessert. I'm seated between Kat and Fern on our outdoor table, with Christian sitting opposite from me. He threw me another smirk when we sat down, as I internally groaned. Since then I've tried ignoring him, although he keeps trying to grab my attention, either by making stupid faces or kicking my shin from underneath the table.
He's always done this. I don't get it. Surely he could have found someone else to annoy in all the years I've known him for.
After we finish our dinner, we all just hangout again for the rest of the night. Apparently, some of our neighbors around the other side of the cliff always set off fireworks on the first night of summer (heavily cliché, I know), so we were staying up until it eventually happened. Even Fern, who was starting to tire at 8pm, was determined to stay up with the rest of us. We play cards, sing songs, and bask in each others company. For the first time in a few months, I finally feel like I'm apart of a real family, like I'm home. Even Christian can't dampen my mood.
By 10, everyone's getting a little restless. The fireworks don't starts until 10:45, and everyone's getting tired from the long day of excitement. Well, I'm not tired. I feel alive. I feel like I'm walking on a cloud, like everything in the world is going right.
The parents all stand from the kitchen table, and begin to stretch their muscles. My mom turns towards me, and with a sigh, says,
"Honey, there's a storage cupboard around the side of the house with some deck chairs in it, do you think you could grab some for the 3 of us? It's unlocked", she gestures to the adults at the table.
I flash her a smile and make my way towards the side of the house. I find the shed, and yank open the door, and turn on the small, dim overhead light. Where could they be? Towels, floaties, no chairs. Chairs, chairs, chairs... OH MY GOD IM GOING TO GET MURDERED SOMONE IS TOUCHING MY SHOULDER I AM GOING TO BE MURDERED IM TOO YOUNG TO DIE AHHHHHH!!!
I flip my head around quickly to meet my intruder only to be met with... a slightly scarier face than I anticipated. Oh wait, that's just Christian.
"CHRISTIAN! Don't sneak up on me! I thought I was going to be killed!" I yell at him, as he doubles over laughing.
"Look dreamy, I know we're moving fast, but screaming my name already? I didn't take you for the type." he retorts, raising an annoying eyebrow at me.
"Ew, you're disgusting! Anyway, what are you doing here, apart from scaring me to death?"
He makes an obvious motion with his arms, before stating with a dull tone
"Getting chairs?"
I roll my eyes, again. I seem to do that more often when he's around, coincidentally.
"Well, you can just go back, because I am perfectly capable of carrying these chairs back by myself."
He scoffs at my response.
"Sure, sparky, you can't even find them to start with."
"First of all, I am a very capable woman, and we women don't need the likes of you and your kind telling us how we should be doing things. Secondly, I was trying to find the chairs, before I was rudely interrupted, by YOU!"
"I know that, I'm just saying, in all the years I've known you, I've never seen you carry so much as a heavy schoolbag on your back." True, but that's only because I like to protect my spine from unnecessary weight.
I sigh at his growing smirk.
"Fine, whatever, just, help me find them and then we can get out of here." I reply, his grin only intensifying at the fact that he's won. For now.
We continue to rifle through the piles of junk in the store room, (someone really needs to clean this out) until we finally find the chairs. Christian hoists 2 chairs under his arm leaving me with only one, ignoring my protests.
We turn around, and begin walking to the door. The closed door. Huh, Christian must've closed it on his way in. I try and turn the handle, only to find it... locked. My eyes fill with fury, and I flip my head around to look up at him.
"Did you close this door?" I ask.
"Yeah, why. I thought I'd give us some much needed privacy." he replies, wiggling his eyebrows at me.
"Well that's just great, except did you lock it too?"
He knits his eyebrows together in confusion, as I purse me lips together.
"No, well, not intentionally anyway."
I groan, dropping the chair and sinking onto the floor.
"Hey, it's fine, we'll just, bang on the door and call for help or something," he says, dropping his chairs and looking down at me.
"Christian," I reply, raising an eyebrow, "I can hear the hottest hits of the 70's blasting from their speakers from here, they're not coming to find us until their asses get tired and they need these chairs to sit on."
He thinks for a minute, before lowering his body to sit on the floor opposite to me. We stay silent for a minute, looking anywhere but at each other. He breaks the silence first.
"So, whatcha thinking about?"
I sigh, considering which point I could start out with.
"Uh, so I'm stuck in a shed which is probably roaming with 100 year old bugs, I'm cold because I forgot to bring a singular sweatshirt, across the room from the person who hates me the most in the world while I'd much rather be dancing to the ABBA out there." I say, massaging the migraine I feel coming on.
He doesn't reply, and for some reason I find myself feeling worried. Did I hurt his feelings? Hold on, why do I care if I hurt his feelings. Good riddance.
I hear him sigh before I feel him tapping my shoulder. I open my eyes to see him standing above me, holding out the sweatshirt he was only just wearing.
"What's this for?" I ask, confusion etched across my face. He shrugs his shoulder slightly and replies.
"Well, first of all" he mimics, "You said you were cold, and that you wanted to dance. So put this on, and stand up," he thrusts the sweatshirt into my arms before extending his other hand. I begrudgingly take his hand, and he pulls me up towards his body. The force of his pull makes me accidentally fall into his chest, and I quickly step back, pulling the sweatshirt over my head. Unfortunately, my head gets stuck in the hole of the sweatshirt. As if this couldn't get any worse.
And now he's laughing at me. Great.
"Do you want to help instead of just laughing at me?" I yell at him.
He continues laughing as he pulls the sweatshirt through my head. Bad idea. We're close again. He's looking down at me, with his trademark grin spread across his face. Why is he looking at me like this? Why hasn't he moved his head. Why haven't I moved my head.
I quickly turn to walk towards the other side of the shed, but his hand catches mine.
"Come on, you said you wanted to dance, didn't you?" he says.
"In all the years I've known you, I've never seen you dance, so it's fine, we don't have to..." I'm cut off as he starts to dance. Badly. His hand, still connected to mine sways in a different rhythm to his hips, which are swinging from side to side. I burst out laughing and can't seem to stop myself.
"You want dance, so we'll dance! Come on, I look stupid here!" he says, his eyes glinting in the moonlight.
He looks desperate, so I join in, copying his unnatural looking moves.
In no time, we're both swaying around the shed, completely lost in our own world to the sound of 'Waterloo'.
Wait, why isn't he teasing me? Or, trying to put a bug down the back of my, no, his sweatshirt. Or, being a pain in the neck?
Almost as if he can read my thoughts, he bends slightly to whisper in my ear.
"Lera, who said I hate you?" a small smile dancing on his lips as I look at his eyes in alarm.
"I... I just..."
"Shhhh," he shushes me. "No need to answer". Hold on, I'm confused.
A banging on the door, startles me out of his grasp.
"Are you kids still in there!"
A/n:
Heyyyy besties!
Thanks again for reading!
If you're enjoying this series, don't forget to vote!
Happy reading!
lots of love, em xx