" don't act like it's a bad thing to fall in love ... with me. "
-- Not Such A Bad Thing // Justin Timberlake
-----
The icy December wind whipped almost painfully at my already chilled face and other exposed bits of skin, making me shiver sporadically; but that was okay. I didn't have to move just yet.
"Hey, Mommy," I said quietly, kneeling next to her. "How you been?"
She didn't answer.
Smiling bravely, I forged on. "I -- I know I haven't been by in a few weeks to see you. Um ... work's been kinda tough on me, you know, and college classes aren't helping at all, not even considering Daddy's bills. Cheers to the classic American stress load, huh?" I chuckled somberly. Mommy had always liked my sense of humor.
I swallowed hard, feeling the familiar lump of tears swell in my throat. "Mommy?" I asked softly, wishing she would answer me.
But she didn't.
"Mommy, I'm so, so sorry," I whispered, choking up now. "I should have seen the signs. They were all right there, and I was so blind ... Mommy, please come back!" I dropped my head as I pounded my clenched, nearly-blue-from-cold fist onto the dusty-snow covered grave. "Please," I gasped, my body beginning to shake with my sobs and the cold. "Please, Mommy, I miss you so much ... I need to tell you how sorry I am ... please, please say something!"
But she said nothing.
She never did.
The three stemmed roses I'd brought for the grave snapped in my trembling fist, the stems brittle enough now with the cold to be blown away in the wind.
Finally, when my freezing tears had too been swept off my face by my old maroon coat, I placed what was left of the flowers on the grave. "Merry Christmas, Mommy," I said softly, tears still brimming in my eyes. "I love you. And I am so, so sorry." I reached out and touched the gravestone softly, ignoring the bite of the icy slab as I traced her name on it as reverently as I could: Diana Ruth King.
"I'm so sorry," I whispered again, and touched my forehead to the stone, resting my weight on it and simply remaining still.
I don't know how long I was there, but one minute I was wallowing in nostalgia and regret, the next I was being shaken ... awake? Had I fallen asleep?
"...ello? Hello! Lady? Lady, are you okay? Are you taking a nap in the scary graveyard?"
I blinked my eyes open, which turned out to be harder than I'd originally thought -- my eyes had felt frozen shut. I supposed I really was more tired than I had originally expected. But who was calling me?
"Lady? Are you dead?" Definitely a little girl's voice. I looked up into the face of the cutest little girl I had ever seen: long blonde pigtails running down to about mid-chest length, a big light green furry coat with matching muffler, boots, mittens, and scarf; cheerful blue eyes, light dusting of freckles, and the cutest little gap-toothed smile I'd ever seen. She stood maybe two and a half feet tall, making her just about as tall as I was as I knelt on the cold ground.
"Oh, good! You're not dead!" The little girl stepped a little closer to me. "Are you okay, lady? It's very cold out here ... I don't think you should be sleeping here. A ghost could get you, you know," she told me somberly, and I had to fight a little smile. "In graveyards there are tons of scary things."
I nodded silently, looking down at the ground. Like I didn't know that. The scariest things in a graveyard weren't the notion of ghosts, or the graves themselves. No, it was the memories trapped forever six feet underground, the memories you couldn't ever dig up again without hurting yourself so badly it could even wake you up at night --
"Hey." The little girl's voice was softer now as she reached out to rest her small green mitten on my shoulder. "Don't cry, lady. My big brother says that even though people go into the ground in boxes you can't open, the people inside them will always be with you."
I smiled a little, wiping away the two or three tears I hadn't realized I was shedding. "Thank -- " I cleared my throat heavily, feeling the stiffness in my chest. "Thank you, doll. What's your name?"
"My name's Samantha," the little girl declared proudly. "That has eight letters in it and is the second longest name in Mrs. Prawn's class -- only because Elizabeth Lowell's name is nine letters."
I had to smile. How could you not? I hadn't had this much sunshine in weeks, maybe even years. "It's very nice to meet you, Samantha with eight letters," I said, shaking her hand as she giggled. "My name's Jasmine, and I've only got seven letters, so you've got me beat there."
"Seven is a cool number too!" Samantha assured me. "I can't spell my name too good yet, so I just write Sam on my activity time papers. I thought it was a boy name, but Justin said it wasn't if it was my name, because I'm a girl!"
I smiled at her. "Well, this Justin is very smart to tell you so. Is he your friend?"
"Oh!" Sam started like she'd forgotten something. "Justin! I lost him!"
"Huh?"
"He's my big brother," Sam explained, standing on her tiptoes as she scanned the bleak landscape around us. "We're cutting through the graveyard to go home, and I can't see him now!" She bit her lip, looking severely distressed.
I stood shakily. "I -- I -- " Curse my shivering! How long had I been in this godforsaken place? I had never been this cold. "I'll help you find him," I said, stepping back onto the gravel path that cut through the cemetery. "What does he look like?"
She happily fell into step beside me, her small feet having to take three steps to my one. "He's tall, taller than you," she started, kicking at a few small pebbles. "And he doesn't look like me at all -- he looks like you, really."
"Like -- like me?"
"Yeah." She pulled back her coat sleeve, exposing a small bit of her pale freckle-dusted wrist. "He's not the same color as me. He's the same color as you."
I blinked, looking down at my own darker skin. "He's black?"
Sam nodded, letting her arms swing by her sides. "Yep, like my mommy and daddy."
"Oh." I nodded. "You guys must be a great family, huh?"
"Yeah!" She grinned sunnily up at me, her smile seemingly bright enough to warm the air around us. "And, because it's almost Christmas, we're gonna get the best-est tree ever in the world! We actually went out to pick one out today: it's gonna be the best Christmas tree in Cincinatti!"
Her enthusiasm was contagious. "That's great," I told her. "I'm sure you'll get to put the star on the top and everything."
"I do that every year!" she confirmed, skipping a little now. "Hey, I have an idea!" she said suddenly. "Do you want to come see my Christmas tree?"
I hesitated. "Um, Sam, I'm a stranger. Remember? You just met me five minutes ago."
"But you gotta come!" Sam insisted, stopping to look up at me. "You were so sad by the grave over there, and you can't be sad when it's almost Christmas, you know!"
She genuinely looked like she believed this with all her heart. And, the more I hesitated, the bigger and shinier her eyes became. Please, for the love of God, don't cry.
"I'll -- see what I can do," I finally said, to placate her. "I've still got to go home myself, you know."
"Oh, yeah," she said, deflating a little. "Right. You probably have your own Christmas tree at home to decorate."
I smiled half-heartedly. "No, no tree for this stranger."
"No tree!" She looked at me like I had just crucified Santa. "How can you have Christmas without a tree?"
I chuckled a little. "Christmas isn't just about the tree and presents and pretty lights, you know."
Sam stared at me, wide-eyed. "What? But -- Christmas can't be about anything else! It never has been!"
Sighing, I looked back to the path ahead of us as we continued along. "You'd be surprised, kid," I said softly, my words carried away by the chilled breeze. "You'd be surprised."
We walked on together for about another three or so minutes, during which Sam tried to guess what Christmas was really about -- "New toys? Yummy food? Oh! Mistletoe!" -- and I replied with only "No, not quite." Seriously, had this kid never seen A Christmas Carol or something? Dickens would have a fit.
As we walked on, I began to shiver more violently. My accidental -- how long had it been? -- stay in the cemetery had not done me any good, especially in my thinner-than-was-probably-recommended-for-me-maroon coat in below freezing weather. And it was threatening to snow, too: I would be in pretty bad shape if I didn't get home soon.
"Look!" Sam suddenly exclaimed, startling me out of my cold thoughts. "Look! Look! It's Justin! Justin!" she called, running forward to meet a tall figure just down the path with his back to us. I watched, a smile gracing my cold lips as the little girl ran to meet her brother.
And then he turned around. And then I forgot quite how to breathe.
There was no other way to say it. The boy before me was, quite frankly, handsome as hell. How else do I put such a simple truth? He was black, albeit a tad darker than me, and his cheekbones were high and prominent. He had a soft mouth that broke into a weary, relieved smile, tightening his angular jaw and revealing straight white teeth that shone a little in the waning sun. When he caught the running Samantha in his arms, I could practically see the muscles flex under his jacket. Be still, my beating heart.
"Sam, oh my God," the boy said, burying his face in the little girl's blonde hair. "I thought I'd lost you -- where were you all this time? You can't do that to me! I was going out of my mind looking for you -- oh, God, Sam, never do that again!" he finished his worry rant by squeezing the little girl tighter.
I stood there, trying not to stare at the scene. But it was hard not to. In a blink, I saw me in Sam and my father in the boy, Justin. My daddy always used to hold me like that. And now, thanks to that horrible tumor between the right and left lobes of his brain, he probably never would again.
"Sam, who's this?" Justin finally asked, watching me a tad warily as he set the little girl down.
Sam grinned up at her brother. "This is my new friend, Jasmine. I found her in here and she was very nice to me. She walked with me when I was trying to find you."
"Oh, I see," said Justin, looking at me now gratefully. "Thank you very much, Ms. Jasmine. Sam likes to wander -- I'm going to have to keep a closer eye on this monkey." He mock-glared at Sam, and she giggled cutely. Looking back at me, he nodded deferentially. "Thanks, again, Miss."
I smiled shyly, tucking one ragged boot behind another. "Call me Jasmine. I'm no Miss. And it -- it was the least I could do. She's very cute. And she seems to love her big brother very much, almost as much as he loves her."
He smiled too, looking down at Sam as he did. "Yeah, I guess," he said, gently. His soft smile made the butterflies in my stomach erupt, and I had to look away. At this rate, he would have me hot in this weather.
Heat... I shivered again. I had stuffed my hands in my painfully thin coat in an attempt to warm them, but it was doing nothing. My shivering was intense to the point where it was nearly painful. I had to get out of this weather -- fast.
"Well," I said finally, cursing how shaky my voice was. "It was nice to meet you, but I'm going to go home now. I'm a bit cold. I've been out here a bit longer than I -- I --" I sneezed heavily, and the force of the sneeze sent me staggering backwards a little, alerting me to how dizzy I actually was.
"Are you okay, Jasmine?" Justin asked, his warm brown eyes now filled with concern. "You don't seem too steady."
I tried to wave it off. The last thing I wanted to do was look weak in front of this really attractive boy. "No, no, I'm fine. I just need to get home."
Sam tugged on Justin's pant leg. "J, she's been out here for a long time. I think she was sleeping out here. I saw her from a long way away and it took me a while to even walk over to her."
Justin looked back at me, as I tried not to shiver. "Jasmine, can I see your hands?"
"What?" I asked dumbly.
"Your hands." Justin extended his own larger glove-clad palm. "If you aren't wearing gloves, I'd like to see your hands."
Hesitantly, I pulled one hand out of my thinly lined pocket and placed it in his own palm. "I really don't think that -- "
Sam gasped. "Jasmine, how are your hands that color?"
I looked down at my palms. They were their normal color, but though my skin was dark I could still make out what Sam had gasped at: my hands and sections of my wrist were tinged in blue.
I felt my head swimming. I knew I needed to get home, but I was not expecting it to be this bad. "I -- should be going," I said, trying to pull my hand away. "I need to go pull on a blanket at home and --"
"A blanket?" Justin repeated, incredulously. "If you don't warm up properly soon you will either catch frostbite or hypothermia. Or both!" he insisted as I again tried to pull away. "Please, Jasmine, come with us," he pleaded, stepping closer to me. "You helped me find my sister. Let me do this one thing for you."
I wanted to pull away, to go home to my chilly, empty apartment and curl up under the three blankets I still owned. Yet something in me told me that that was not the healthiest option for me right now. I think that something in me was common sense. Naturally, I elected to ignore it. Pride was on autopilot right now -- I couldn't appear needy I front of such an attractive young man, now, could I?
Unfortunately, pride got demoted to copilot as suddenly my legs buckled beneath me. I tried to stop the fall, but there was no avoiding my abrupt trip south. I braced myself for impact with the cold stone of the path and --
Nothing.
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"...mine? Jasmine! Look, she's okay! Jasmine!"
For the second time that day, I woke to someone calling me from sleep. The only difference between the first and second times is that I could actually feel my hands. And they hurt.
"Ah, my hands..." I breathed, and immediately tried to sit up. Bad idea. My head immediately protested, and I hissed in pain. "My head!"
"I'll get Justin," someone said to my right, and I blearily focused on the earnest face of little Sam as she scrambled to her feet and took off into -- the next room? Where was I?
I looked around as best I could, trying to take in my surroundings. I was in a home: well furnished, lowly lit by only the crackling fireplace I realized I'd been placed next to, propped up on comfy pillows and practically buried in plush blankets. Pictures hung from almost every wall -- pictures featuring Sam; Justin; Sam and Justin; Sam and Justin and an older black male; Sam and Justin and an older black woman; Sam and Justin and the woman and the man; the woman and the man in a wedding dress and tuxedo, respectively.
But what really drew my eyes to these pictures was how happy this family looked. Sam was always being held in every picture, by her brother or her mother or her father. Justin was always grinning toothily, whether seven or seventeen in the picture. The mother was always caught mid-laugh, probably at something either her husband or someone else had said pre-snapshot. The father was either gazing at his family adoringly or winking mischievously at the camera.
My heart caught in my throat, and I had to look away. Seeing a family so happy like this while mine lay in ruins, unable to be salvaged -- it just wasn't fair --
"Jasmine?" It was Justin, calling out to me as he came back into what I had deduced was the living room of his house. Because the house was so warm, there was no need for sweaters and heavy clothes. Sam and Justin both had shed their winter attire in favor of lighter clothing: Sam wore a sparkly yellow T-shirt, khaki cutoffs, and neon yellow fuzzy socks on her feet, with yellow frizzy scrunchies in her hair separating the blonde tresses into two long ponytails. Justin wore forest-green basketball shorts coupled with a black basketball jersey with the number fourteen on it and long black basketball socks.
"I take it you're a basketball fan," I croaked, hearing how dry my voice sounded and realizing how thirsty I was.
Justin smiled, more relieved than anything else, it seemed. "Yeah. Played a lot when I was in high-school. How're you feeling right now? Better?"
"Much," I admitted, enjoying the heat surrounding me. "Although, if you could show me me where the kitchen is, I could get myself some water. I'm parched."
"Oh! Oh! I can get it!" Without waiting to hear my protest of no really it's fine I can do it Sam wait a second!, Sam disappeared into what I assumed was the kitchen.
I sighed, a fond smile working its way onto my face in spite of myself. "She's an angel."
"Isn't she?" Justin sat down on the rug next to me. "I wanted to thank you again, for, um, what you did for me and Sam back in the graveyard."
I shrugged nonchalantly. "It's no big deal. If anything, I should be thanking you. I don't know how long I was in that godforsaken place. It's a good thing Sam found me and decided to talk to strangers for once -- I probably wouldn't even be alive right now if it weren't for you people." Noticing how he was shifting uncomfortably on the hard ground, I pulled one of the large, plushy pillows from under my back and handed it to him. "Here. The ground probably isn't comfy."
He shook his head. "No, you need that. I'm not going to take it."
"I insist," I said, pressing it into his lap. "Pull up that futon over there and you can prop yourself up on it so you don't hurt your back."
Justin was going to protest again, but one more earnest shove of the pillow into his lap had him moving to set himself up the way I'd advised him too. "Isn't that better?" I asked smugly.
"...meh," he said at last, looking away from me as he tucked his hands behind his head.
I giggled. "Knew it."
We sat in companionable silence for a minute or so, me enjoying the warmth of the blankets and fire and Justin staring deep into the depths of the fireplace as though searching for answers to questions I could not guess.
"I got it!" Sam was back, carefully cupping a plastic light blue cup full of ice water in her small hands. "It's cold!"
I smiled and accepted the drink when she neared. "Thanks, doll." I took a sip, the blessed coolness soothing my parched throat.
She grinned, sitting down now in Justin's lap, the movement looking familiar and natural. "Are you going to be okay now, Jasmine?"
I pretended to think about it. "I don't know. I could die in ten minutes, you know. Or five."
"What?" Sam looked utterly distressed.
How she had turned on a dime from happy to worried was beyond me, but I chuckled and smiled at her. "But it's very likely I won't do any of those things. Your brother took very good care of me," I said, shooting him a grateful wink. "I should be just fine."
Sam pointed a finger at her brother. "She better be!" she said threateningly, wagging the appendage sternly. "Or else!"
Justin laughed, putting his hands up in surrender. "Yes, ma'am."
We all spent the next hour or so laughing and chatting in front of the fire together. I learned many new things about the two, like how Justin, who was a year and a half older than me, making him twenty-two, was a year above me in college and how he planned to major in engineering while I went for the medical field. He and I were able to bond quite well over the late nights of studying and long hours of work. He worked retail in a popular clothes department in the city, living with his parents to save money, while I had an internship in the local hospital, living in the house my family owned. Sam, of course, was in kindergarten.
"I got nine stickers this week for being good!" she boasted proudly, and I smiled at her. Justin side-hugged her, and she positively glowed.
After a moment's pause, I shakily got to my feet. "Well, I am indebted to you and your adorable family, but I think I must be going. I'd rather not impose, and --"
"Wait!" Sam leapt to her feet. "You can't go yet, Jasmine! Don't you wanna see our Christmas tree? You said you did!"
"I --" I knew what I had told the little girl back in the cemetery. But I had to be honest with myself -- if I saw or heard another way this family was everything I had lost in my own, I would probably break down and cry. The two had told me about the puddle splashing in the spring, the picnics and beaches in the summer, the long forest walks in the fall, the movie nights in the winter --
"Jasmine?" It was Justin now, getting to his feet to stand next to me. "Jasmine, you okay?" He was studying my face intently, making my heart flutter.
I quickly averted my eyes. "Yeah. Yeah, sure. C'mon, Sam, let's go see your tree."
Sam squealed excitedly and took off, tugging me behind her eagerly. I laughed, almost tripping over the little girl in front of me as she hastily pulled me to the room where the tree was. When we got there, Sam pointed happily. "Isn't it so pretty? I helped decorate it!"
"It's very pretty, doll," I said reverently, because it was. Ornaments clung to every overstuffed branch, yet looking neater than one would have expected. There were glittery glass snowflakes, gold and silver tinsel, and everywhere, everywhere, red and green and white Christmas ball ornaments. The only thing missing was the star atop the tree.
"I bet you guys only put the star up on Christmas Eve, right?" I asked quietly.
Sam looked up at me. "Yeah, how did you know that?"
"Because --" I took a deep breath, feeling the tears start. "Because -- my family used to do it that way too."
It was quiet for a moment, then Sam asked softly, "Used to?"
I turned away. "I'm sorry, I should go." Ignoring Sam's protesting, I quickly turned and ran from the room as fast as I could, brushing by Justin in my haste to get away. I should not have stayed for the tree. Memories were threatening to devour me, consume me, destroy me. Happy, warm flashes of my smiling mother or my laughing father swirled in my head, coupled with the comforting smell of her perfume and cinnamon cookies and his cologne and the rough scent of the pine needles of the Christmas tree. The memories ripped at my heart, reminding me of what I once had and what I would never have again.
Tears were blinding me as I stumbled for the door, thankfully not getting myself lost in this house as I ran to get away from the demons that would not leave me alone --
"Jasmine!"
Shit. I immediately sped up, wishing these people had not been so nice. I could not let myself cry in front of them! The front door gave way to a large front lawn, with a long cobble walkway leading to the cul-de-sac ahead. Suburbs. Figures.
Footsteps behind me. I poured on more speed, but if the truth be told I was still weak and my body was protesting at being shoved back into the cold it had just been rescued from. In my haste to get away from this house, I paid no attention to the cobblestones beneath my feet and inevitably my left heel got itself caught between two particularly large ones, sending me sprawling on the snowy stones.
"Jasmine!" Definitely Justin. I coughed, snow having found its way into my open mouth. "Jasmine, oh my God, are you okay?" He knelt next to me, and that is when I began to cry. "Jasmine, what's wrong?" he asked again as he pulled me to my knees. "Jasmine, please, tell me what's wrong!"
"I miss them," I sobbed like a child, burying my wet face in my now cold hands. "They're gone -- my family is gone and I'm never going to have picnics in the summer or long walks in the fall and I especially won't have Christmas again with them -- I'm going to have Christmas all alone again this year and I -- I want my family back!" And then I dissolved, the stress on my still recovering body coupled with the strain of the cemetery and the emotional turmoil swirling in my head too much for me to bear a moment longer. It was loud, gross, and so very embarrassing, but I had not cried like this in years and God knew I needed to.
As I poured my heart out, I sensed, as if from far away, a pair of strong arms around me, stroking my frizzy hair and back, holding me close and rocking me gently. "Hey, hey, it's okay," I heard Justin say softly. "It's okay. You're gonna be okay, I promise."
"It's not fair," I said in a small voice, hating how helpless I sounded as my tears subsided. "It's not, it's not, it's not."
"Shh, I know, I know," Justin consoled. "It's never fair. I know."
We knelt there in the cold together, our arms around each other as I collected myself. Though I was extremely embarrassed by such a display of emotion, I could not help but feel grateful that at least I was not alone during it.
"Hey, are you okay now?" Justin pulled back a little and looked at me, putting his chilled hands on my shoulders.
I nodded gratefully. "Thank you, Justin. I'm sorry I --"
"Don't apologize," Justin admonished, helping me to my feet. "Something tells me you've been dealing with that for a long time, haven't you?"
I looked down. "Just, like, a few years."
"A few years?" Justin repeated, incredulous. "Jasmine, you have to cry sometimes."
"But why?" I asked, looking back up at him. "I always feel horrible when I cry, and crying never brought anyone back, you know? Why cry?"
"You may not feel great crying," Justin told me. "But you'll feel a lot better after crying. Don't you?"
He was right. It felt as though something had been stuck in my throat for the last three years and had finally dislodged itself in the waterfall of tears. "I guess," I admitted. "But it makes me feel so...weak. I can't afford that! Mommy and Daddy aren't here, so I gotta suck it up." I looked down. "That's all I've ever known, Justin. I have to take care of me...because no one's left to."
Silence. If I hadn't been embarrassed before, what with my blubbering and general self-pity, then I definitely did now, in this awkward quietness that seemed to develop between me and this boy.
"I --" My throat was clogged with tears, and I cleared it heavily. "I should go. I'm sorry for intruding and for -- causing a scene." I offered him my hand apologetically. "You've saved my life. That is a debt I can never repay. I thank you again, Justin."
Justin crushed my smaller hand in his larger one, dwarfing my own. "You can't go yet. "
"Justin, please, I --"
"No!" he insisted, squeezing my hand gently. "No, you can't go yet! You just -- you can't! Not yet!"
I looked up at him then. "I can understand Sam wanting me to stay, but I don't see why you want me to? And, anyway," I continued, looking down at our hands clasped together. "I sort of just let loose a ton of emotion just now, and I really want to go home and handle this by --"
"--by yourself, right?" Justin finished. "And that's why you can't leave yet, Jasmine!"
"I -- I have to do this on my own, I have to --" Justin shook his head, cutting me off, and I bristled in return. Who was this arrogant and attractive young man, telling me what I could and couldn't do on my own? "Oh, yeah?" I asked, a little harsher than I'd intended to. "And why not?"
Justin took a deep breath and looked directly at me. "Because," he said softly. "Because I know exactly what you're going through. Because my parents died when I was very young. Because I, Jasmine --" He paused and leaned closer, his lips near my ear.
"Because I made the same mistake as you."
Silence.
Finally, I broke it. "Um, but your parents --"
"I'm adopted," said Justin somberly, pulling back from me slightly. "And, of course, so is Sam. Different times, different foster-care homes."
"Oh," I said softly. "I didn't know."
"How could you have?" Justin asked, cracking a small grin. We sat for a little while longer in silence until he said, "I just, you know -- I see so much of me in you and I know what road you're traveling down and I want to help you, Jasmine, please, let me help you because this loneliness will take over you and it will mess with your head and I just --" He stopped, realizing he had been rambling. "Sorry," he said sheepishly. "I get carried away a little bit when I get passionate about something. It's really irritating, I know, when I don't shut up."
"That's alright," I told him, a small smile tugging at my lips. "It's actually kind of...cute."
He stared at me. Lord kill me now I did not just call this kid -- this boy-- this man cute, did I?
And then he grinned. A full blown-out grin that had my cheeks heating and my own mouth smiling with his. Well, to be fair, I didn't call him cute without reason, simply because I was raised better than that, I reasoned.
"Thanks, Jasmine," he said softly, and the way he said my name had me tingling all over. God in heaven, have mercy on me. How had I gone from emotional train-wreck to infatuated schoolgirl in three and a half minutes flat? Hormones, man. Great shit.
"So..." he said finally, interrupting an awkward silence I hadn't even realized was there until he spoke. "Does that mean you'll -- let me help you?"
I looked down. "I don't know, Justin. I feel like I can do this on my own."
"Please," he begged, and I looked up at him to see the intensity of his gaze. "I can't let anyone end up the way I almost ended up. Not when I have a say in the matter."
We held gazes, a contest of wills, neither wanting to give in. Doing things alone was all I'd ever known -- I couldn't just let some stranger waltz in and tell me how and when and why to do things! No matter how sinfully attractive he may be.
But he was still attractive...
The only thing that was finally able to break up our little staring contest was my quick shiver of cold and small sneeze prompting me to turn away from him. Only then did I realize how cold I was actually becoming once more.
Justin seemed to notice it too, and sighed. "We'll work on this. For now, why don't you come back inside, out of the cold, huh? I think you scared Sam a little bit, see?" I looked towards the house and saw Sam's little face pressed up against a window, looking worriedly out. Her face brightened upon seeing me waving reassuringly at her, and she happily waved back before beckoning us back into the house.
"She wants us inside," I said, smiling a little at the small face in the window. "I suppose...I could stay a little longer. For -- for her."
Justin smiled at me, and suddenly I wasn't so cold. "Well, let's not keep her waiting. My lady," he told me, mock bowing and offering me his arm. I laughed and, playing along, curtsied quite horribly and took the proffered arm, tucking my arm through it. Together, we sauntered back into the house, giggling the whole way inside like a bunch of little children.
I hadn't had this much fun in years.
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hi
so this is the nEW AND IMPROVED KINGS AND QUEENS
yes Jasmine and Justin are the ship (hint: title + Jasmine's last name???????? OHOHOHO if u don't know her last name check her mom's tombstone it's there I swear)
(there I swear rockin' them rhymes man)
no I'm not going to kill Sam
I thought long and hard about it but it wouldn't do anything other than tear Justin up inside and because Justin is so very attractive I'd like to avoid that
because I'm black I thought I should incorporate my skin color in something I write right
write right
the picture is Jasmine omg idk who that is but she's so pretty fml
okay my chem teacher is watching me weird I should go
tell me if you like this more???? k bYYEEE