Lena's pov
After dancing and playing around with Kouvr, for hours, since I ended up coming way earlier, I feel very comfortable and free to talk with anyone at this party. I tried to not bring up Gigi into our conversation, but I kind of thought that Mia would invite Gigi, which I am sure she did, but Gigi didn't show up. I haven't seen her. Not even Larray or Nai or Mario or Ravon. So she must be with them. Except she has friends I don't know of.
But right now, I feel kind of good. And happy. Even though the voice in the back of my head is judging me for even being able to smile.
I go to get a drink from the kitchen, leaving Kouvr with Alex. On my way, I recognize a few people from the first party I attended. Also new faces, which seems surreal because I've known these people online for the longest time and now I am like 10 feet away from them.
When I get there, I look for a bottle of water but there are only alcoholic drinks. I'm not sure I feel like drinking though.
"Looking for something?" Someone says behind me, placing their jaw on my shoulder. I turn around, making them lift their head. It's Quinton. We've never talked before.
"Hey, um yeah. Water, please?" I ask politely. And for some reason, I don't feel as comfortable around him. Maybe because of his crooked smile and his bloodshot eyes.
"Yes, sure! Come!" He says very convinced, pulling me by my wrist to the garden outside. I follow him without saying anything, trying to keep up with his pace, even though his grip on my wrist is starting to hurt. When we get outside, the fresh air hits me, but it's not too cold. I was getting kind of hot inside anyways. He is walking up to a group of people whose faces I can't identify from here.
"Look who I found!" He yells, waving his hand. We get closer and he pulls me to sit on the couch. I see Jack's face, which makes me feel slightly more ok, even though for some reasons unknown to me, he dislikes me. Also Micheal. And Thomas. Ok, I'm good.
"Hey, I brought us some-"
I turn my head to see who is talking. It's Vinnie. He's looking at me, probably not expecting to see me here. I think that's why he stopped. But he quickly recollects himself.
"Drinks." He finishes his sentence and sits next to Jack on the grass, handing him on of the drinks in his hands. I look away to look at the other people sitting with us. I recognize some of them but not all. I also spot Amira far away. For once talking with someone else other than Vinnie.
That's when I remember why I'm here in the first place. I turn to Quinton.
"So where's the water?" I chuckle uncomfortably.
"Ohh right!" He scans the small table in front of us. "There's no water." He says, lifting his shoulders.
"Then I'm going to go look for water." I say starting to stand up.
"No stay! I'll go look for water." He leaves before I can even stop him.
I'm not liking this. I play with my nails as I try to look at Vinnie without him noticing. Jack's talking to Vinnie, turned towards him. Vinnie's turned towards his front though. And if I'm not wrong, he's looking at me. I turn to fully look at him, but in that moment he looks away. Then I turn around, just to find Amira still talking to some guy. I think he was looking at her. I'm loosing braincells from staying here. I want to leave and go back inside.
"Here you go." Quinton hands me a cup from nowhere before I can successfully leave.
"Thank you." I say and sip my water. Except it's not water. "Mm, what is this?" I scrunch my face.
"It's Tequila." He laughs. I spit what was in my mouth back into the cup.
"I wanted water." I'm starting to get irritated.
"Oh come on! Have a drink instead."
"No, thank you!" I raise my voice.
"Calm down, babe. Or are you already drunk?" He laughs. I roll my eyes and try to stand up.
"Don't leave." He lightly pushes me back down.
"Dude, let her go." Vinnie chimes in.
"Mind your business, man." Quinton dismisses him.
"No I want to go!" I speak for myself. A few people's attention has been dragged and I don't like being at the centre of attention in this way. But I'm not going to stay silent and like a puppy around him.
Quinton looks at me shocked. I roll my eyes and stand up again, dropping the cup of tequila on the table. I see Jack looking at me carefully. I raise my brow at him to ask him 'what?'. He just takes his eyes off me and sips his drink. I glance at Vinnie, who's glaring at Quinton, before finally leaving.
"What the fuck was that about?" I hear Vinnie say as I leave.
"Bro chill. I was just having fun. Why do you even care?" Quinton replies. I can't understand what Vinnie says back though.
Why does he care? Maybe because anyone who knows me would. Except Jack obviously. I wouldn't even count him among people that know me.
I put my hand in my pocket to take out my keys. There aren't here. Shit. How did this evening go down hill so fast? So now I can't even go back to my own house. I must have lost it when I pulled my jacket to dance with Kouvr. Oh God.
I try to look around for Kouvr, but I can't find her. This house is too big. It's 10:30 already. Fuck. I haven't seen Gigi all day. And my head is starting to spin. I don't know why.
I don't feel like talking to anyone new right now, so I don't want to stay in the living room because I don't want anyone to approach me. Most especially duchebags like Quinton. I hope for all the girls around him, that he acted like that because he was just drunk.
The only place I can comfortably stay is Kouvr's room. So I head upstairs quickly and go to her room. When I open the door though, I find two people inside. Making out.
"Oh shit. Sorry." I apologize. Wait. Isn't that Amira? I quickly close the door back. And the guy looks like the one she was talking to earlier. I thought she was like into Vinnie or some shit. Does he know about this?
Well, it is none of my problem.
And yet you're happy that you just saw what you saw... My subconscious sings. Oh please. I couldn't care less. If he doesn't like me, Amira being with someone else wouldn't change that. Anyways, What do I do now?
Vinnie's room.
No, no. What if he enters? I'm not sure I'm ready to talk about what happened yesterday.
I try and call Gigi again. Still no reply.
Ugh, I hate going anywhere without Gigi.
"Hey." I lift my head from my phone, already knowing who it is.
"Hello." I reply.
"Have you lost your way again?" He jokes.
"No. I would like to go home though." I roll my eyes.
"Not having fun?" He leans on the wall.
"I assume you neither if you are here right now." I put my phone in the pocket of my jacket and cross my arms.
"Hmm... You're not completely wrong. I was actually going to bed. So goodnight." He says, lifting himself back up.
"Lucky you." I murmur about to walk away.
"Where are you going?" He asks.
"I don't know." I raise my shoulders. "I wanted to go home, but I lost my keys."
"Stay in Kouvr's room." He nods at Kouvr's room.
"It's... occupied." I hide my embarrassment looking at my feet with my feet.
"Oh ok." He laughs. "You can stay in my room."
I lift my head back up, to understand how he meant it by his face expression.
"If you want." He adds. He doesn't seem to mean it in a weird or creepy way.
"If I'm not a burden..."
"No, don't worry. You can pay me tomorrow." He shrugs. I roll my eyes, laughing.
I follow behind him as he leads us to his room. I've been there countless times, but I've never spent the night there. As a matter of fact, I've never spent the night at anyone's house except Gigi's and Esme's before I moved here.
We get there and he closes us inside. I awkwardly sit on the bed as he takes off his white shirt.
"Do you usually go to bed this early?" I ask.
"No. But I don't want to be downstairs right now. And I just want to call it a night already." He says pulling his trousers down. I lay my back down, still sitting down and look at the ceiling.
I wonder what happened after I left. He looks like it didn't go very well.
"Seems like we had a similar night."
"Then I'm sorry for you." He chuckles.
"Thank you." I laugh. "It started of really well though."
"Mine too." I see him walk to the side of the bed, now wearing some navy blue sweats, and lie down. I stand up and walk to the other side of the bed.
"What ruined it then?" I sit down next to him.
"People who can't keep their negative opinion to themselves." He rolls his eyes, staring at the ceiling with his hands under his head.
Looking at his tattoos reminds me of that midnight, when I acted as if knowing someone else's tattoo order is normal.
"What are you thinking about?" He smirks.
"Nothing involving you." I lie confidently.
"Oh really?"
"Yes." I say, laying down on my side because sooner or later I have to actually sleep. What I was trying to avoid is most likely going to happen at this point. Us talking about what happened yesterday.
He doesn't say anything. I don't say anything. After a few seconds he turns to me.
"I... Spoke with Gigi today."
I look at him shocked and confused. Very.
"How? I mean when? Where did you even find her?"
"She was at Larray's."
"I knew it! And what did you guys talk about?" I ask the dumb question. What else?
"You know... What happened yesterday..."
"Sure." I murmur, turning to lay on my back.
"She told me about your promise." I can tell he's threading gently. I smile awkwardly, nodding slowly. I'm not mad, I'm just embarrassed. Because now he'll think of me as betrayal.
Vinnie's pov
Lena doesn't a seem very happy about me knowing her promise with Gigi. Then she will probably leave if she finds out I know about her... Past.
"Are you... mad?" I ask trying to cautiously get to her.
"No," She sighs. "Sorry, I just- I'm disappointed in myself."
Oh. Ouch.
I hope she didn't mean it as in she regrets everything we did. Because I don't.
"No I didn't mean it like that." She reads my mind. "I mean like... You know, breaking a promise. I don't regret what we... did, but I regret breaking our promise. Which makes no sense because they are the same thing. And it's not like I regret making that promise, because we were just watching out for each other."
I get her. I don't want to suggest she keeps breaking their promise, but I also don't want us to stop. I kind of like her. And I don't care what any of those so called friends have to say about it. I think it is very selfish of Jack to have told me he doesn't want me to date anyone because we won't hang out as much as before. It is true, but I didn't think that he was that selfish.
"I understand." I limit myself to say. "So what do you want to do?" I ask her before she does because I don't know. And also it's not my place to say.
"I don't know. I like staying with you. She's ok with that." She replies.
"So she's ok with us being friends?"
"Yeah." She smiles, but I can tell she's hiding a frown. I guess I can work with that. Not like I have a choice.
I love staying with her too. She makes me happy. But I don't want to be the one to ruin Lena and Gigi's friendship. I know Gigi makes Lena happy, so they should be together.
"So just friends?"
She nods.
She looks down at me, like before. When she did that, it reminded me of that midnight, when she told me the order of my tattoos. I found it interesting. I smile at the memory. I remember thinking she was pretty. But I didn't think anything else. Then the next day, Jack bailed on me for our plans for the next day. I was bored and Lena's name just popped on my mind. The first time I actually thought of liking her was when we went to see the Hollywood sign.
"What's your favourite tattoo of yours?" She looks back at me.
"Hmm... This one." I point at my arm, indicating the writing 'Made of Heaven'.
"What's yours?" I tease her.
"This one." She says, placing her finger on my chest, on the 'Break my heart'.
But she doesn't remove her finger though. She keeps it there, tracing the writing. No one has done that before and I love how it feels. I try to control the rising and falling of my chest. She looks up at me.
"What? Friends do this, right?" She asks smiling. She knows what she's doing. She's doing it on purpose. She places her fingertips on my chest and traces down slowly. I should stop her but fuck. I can't. And I don't want to.
"Yeah." I breathe. I can feel the shivers down my spine.
"Oh ok, good." She smiles aware of the way my body responds. She moves closer. I put my palm on hers and trace through her arm till I get to her shoulder. I lift myself, putting my hand on the bed, behind her. I love the way our eyes never lose contact as I move on top of her. The way she looks up at me. The way her hair is a mess under her. The way her chest is rising and falling. The way her lips are screaming for me to kiss her. It's like she doesn't want to do it herself so she won't feel the guilt. So I lean in to kiss her. She immediately puts her hand on my neck pulling me closer, igniting the fire. She's kissing me like it is the last time. I can't help the moans that fall from my mouth. She's too hard to resist. With her other hand, she digs her nails in my back. Her soft lips taste like the tequila. I put my hand on her bare waist, squeezing lightly. I move my hand lower, till I reach the hem of her skirt and I slightly pull down. Her lips start moving slowly and her hands move away from my body. I sense she's uncomfortable.
I immediately break our kiss to look at her. Her lips are red and slightly swollen. She's panting. I look at her eyes and, I could be wrong, but she looks a little bit... scared?
Did I go too far? Did I hurt her?
How about you fucking ask you idiot my subconscious suggests. Right.
"Are you okay?" My voice comes out rushed from how fast my heart is beating.
"I, uhm, I don't... want to go that far..." She squeaks, her voice getting lower towards the end. She is scared.
"Oh sorry." I say moving back to the bed.
"Sorry." she immediately says.
"Why are you apologizing? You don't have to apologize." I chuckle confused.
That's when I remember what Gigi told me. Shit.
"You can tell someone no if you don't want to." I reassure her. I want to put my hand on her shoulder but I don't know how she's feeling right now. She looks at me.
"You know something, don't you?" She furrows her eyebrows.
"Yeah. Gigi... told me about it." I admit.
"Oh." She looks away.
"Sorry if you didn't want me to know." I apologize.
"No, it's fine. I think I trust you enough to have told you myself." She looks back at me. "Don't worry, I won't rant about it." She laughs.
"No no, If you want to talk about it I'm here." I tell her. I feel like it's burning her inside, even as she laughs.
"I think that's the first time in a long time a guy let me turn him down, you know."
"Because it's the first time you want to turn a guy down?" I ask, already knowing the answer.
"No." She sighs. "Last time I did I got hit for it." She huffs and rolls her eyes and crosses her arms, turning to lay on her back. Sassy always.
"I..." I don't know if I should tell her sorry or if I should ask more questions. I don't know how she likes to deal with the memories.
"You don't have to make a poem about how it gets better, I'm fine." She laughs, looking at me. I give her a small smile. She looks back at the ceiling.
"But yesterday was also the first time in a long time that I genuinely wanted to...you know, be with a guy like that." She smiles.
"Really?" I chuckle. She laughs along nodding, smiling to ceiling like she's thinking about yesterday. I love that she doesn't regret that, because even when I got home, I couldn't stop thinking about it. I hate that it had to end. That way most especially.
I can't help but ask, "Did you think I was going to hit you?"
She looks at me. "Yesterday, when we were fighting?"
I nod like a kid. I'm scared of her answer.
"I won't lie, it did cross my mind. For a second." She glances at me. She's acting so chill about everything.
"When? during the fight I mean." I ask.
"When you raised your voice. Like when you said I can't believe what random people say about you. Oh, and when you said that if you don't tell me something it's because you don't want me to know." She explains.
My heart melts in guilt. I am glad she's still able to voice her feelings though. That she can still speak her mind.
"Why did you keep replying?" I ask genuinely.
"That's my problem." She laughs. "I won't shut up. I always want to have the last word in a fight. And, once again, that's what got me scars."
"Leilena don't say that." I stop her. I don't want to hear it. No one should have to deal with that, no matter why, who, when.
"I know he wasn't supposed to, but it is what got me scars."
"Speaking up for yourself is always right. People need to know how you feel. He, whoever he was, was just a dick."
"Yeah I know." She sighs.
"I'm glad you're out of that now." I want to promise her I would never treat her that way. But I keep quiet. I don't want to put pressure on her.
"Me too. How much did she tell you?"
"Well her perspective. Not precisely what happened during the relationship. And also about 9th grade."
"Hmm... ok." She simply replies. She looks tired now. And in fact she yawns.
"You tired?" I laugh.
"Yes." She laughs along. I love her laugh.
"Well then..." I place my hand on her cheek. "Goodnight."
She smiles. "Goodnight."
And now I can peacefully drift of to sleep.
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