Day four.
I woke up Saturday morning to find Raphael and Scarlet whispering not so quietly on the living room couch.
"Hey," I said, leaning against a wall somewhere between my new bedroom door and the living room, with my arms crossed over my chest. That's when I noticed the bottles of nail polish spilling out from an acrylic box between Scarlet's legs, a dazzling pink bottle in one of her hands. "What are you doing?"
"Raphael feels like painting his nails," she said, examining the color. "We're unsure of this particular shade of pink."
Then she held up another bottle, a color very similar to the other one she had in her hand. "Or this one?"
"Before breakfast?" I joked. Then, "they're the exact same shade."
Scarlet tsked and glanced at Raphael. "He's not an artist like the two of us."
Raphael looked at me properly for the first time since I walked in. "Clearly not. Why are you standing so far away?"
I eased off the wall to sit comfortably beside him. "Better?"
He rolled his eyes and sifted through Scarlet's other options. "How about something more subtle?"
Scarlet seemed to visibly deflate, and gave a long, elaborate sigh. "Aren't you supposed to like glitter and pink?"
"Do you smell the stereotype?" Raphael turned to me. "I don't think you smell the stereotype."
I bit back a smile. "But, Raphael, really. Why aren't you going for the glitter and pink? Look, this one is pink with purple glitter."
He shook his head and plucked out a pastel blue. "Here."
"I hate you both," Scarlet announced.
But she painted Raphael nails, the smell of the varnish tingled my nose and I left them to their half sarcastic conversations to grab something to eat.
I returned with mugs of coffee in hand, to find that Scarlet had already moved on to painting her own nails.
"I figured I'd make up for his loss of flamboyancy," she waved her pink nails in the air. "What do you think?"
"Perfect."
"Can I paint your nails too?" she asked, then blew air over her nails. "Please?"
My eyes shot to Raphael helplessly. He grinned.
"Maybe some other time," I said hurriedly, and handed her the coffee before she could say anything else.
"What's the plan for today?" she asked after taking a slow sip.
"Not sure," I glanced at Raphael but he seemed too interested in his coffee to reply. "We should stay in, I think."
"Order Chinese," he continued for me. He finally looked up, "Watch a movie."
Scarlet took another sip. "I think I'll meet up with a few of my friends."
"You can stay," I said. "We're not trying to kick you out of your own home."
"I know," she said. "But I didn't paint my nails pink for nothing. Besides, it looks like a good weather kind of day today."
We turned to the large windows, the sky looming heavily with the prospect of rain. "Yeah, definitely."
I learned soon after that Raphael was the kind of person who never sat sat still during movies.
Scarlet left a few hours before lunch, and we ordered Chinese as Raphael insisted, curling up on the couch with one of Scarlet's old classic DVDs playing.
He'd pulled out one of his markers as soon as I pressed play, and alternated between fixing his eyes on the screen and tracing unidentifiable shapes all over his forearm. When he ran out of space, tapping his pen against his thigh restlessly, I wordlessly pushed up the sleeves of my shirt and rested my arm over his legs.
The press of his pen against my skin was not as distracting as I thought it would be, and we watched the movies with little commentary in between.
It was when he ran out of space on my arm that I finally looked down to see what he'd drawn. I didn't come out with much, as most of the images had overlapped.
He lifted his head to look at me.
"I could sit on your other side," I said. "So you can draw on my other arm."
He smiled. "Or you could take your trousers off."
"You'd like that."
"Which is why I suggested it."
"But then my legs will freeze," I pointed out. "It's cold."
"Turn on the heaters."
"I don't know how."
He groaned, and started with the continuous tapping of his pen again. "I'll give you head."
I stared at him. "You will?"
"Sure," he shrugged, staring back.
"You will," it was no longer a question.
"That's what I said," he looked at me funny. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, totally."
"You look like a virgin with that look on your face."
"There's nothing wrong with virgins."
He raised his eyebrows. "But you're not one."
"That's very observant of you."
"I generally try to be. So trousers off or what?"
I lifted my hips to slide out of my sweat pants.
Raphael's calloused fingers traced over the skin on my thigh. I willed a certain body part to stay loyal as he uncapped his pen. "You're not actually giving me a blowjob, are you?"
"No."
"Good to know."
I saw the smile on his lips that he tried to hide as he started doodling on my skin, and then looked away towards the TV again.
Kinda early update cause I felt like it lol
Thanks for reading fam