"Put me down!" I hammer my fists into Yann's back as he walks back with me to the front of the house.
"Jesus," I hear him mutter.
As the blood rushes to my head, I suddenly feel dizzy. "I'm going to..." I hiccup. "I'm going to..." Another hiccup escapes, more violent than the previous one. "... puke."
"Shit!" Yann curses and he abruptly stops walking.
Hastily, he puts me down and before my feet can touch the ground, I am already flying towards the bushes before me. I barely make it there when I start retching, the beer coming up and burning my throat. I feel Yann's hand on my back as he rubs soothing circles and his other hand is holding my hair up.
My stomach hurts from puking so violently and I suddenly feel weak. My knees buckle under me and I start falling. However, before I can hit the ground Yann's hands come around me and he lifts me up effortlessly into his arms.
Looping my arms around his neck not to fall, I hold on tightly to him and rest my head on his shoulder. He carries me away from the party, away from the noise, away from the beer.
"Beer," I croak out feebly.
It's not a plea to have more beer, I most definitely do not want any. It's more of an accusation as I'm saying that the beer caused me to be that wasted. I've barely had five, I think. So much for tolerance.
Yann seems to misunderstand what I say and thinks I am telling him to get me back to the beer we left back there. "Oh shush, Graham," he says but his voice holds neither impatience nor annoyance, "no more beer for you."
I don't bother telling him that's not what I meant and just let him carry me. As my head rests there, in the crook of his neck, I smell it. The shampoo scent I'd hoped for earlier. I can't tell what it smells like – it's not the usual mango or strawberry or anything – but it smells heavenly good.
"You hair smells good," I whisper.
He only hums noncommittally and keeps carrying me. His beard tickles the side of my face and for once I don't mind it. I am too comfortable right now in his arms to really care. His hair brushes the side of my face as well, and it feels like a paintbrush on a canvas, kind of. I love the feeling. Again, my heart starts beating fast, like it's about to race out of my chest. What is happening to me?
"My heart is beating fast," I tell Yann. "I think it's the adrenaline."
His hair falls further into my face as he dips his head at me, confusion across his features. "What adrenaline?"
"The adrenaline," I say, as if it's obvious. But of course I don't make any sense. I'm drunk.
I hear him sigh and his hair slowly retreats from my face as only the end of his strands still caresses my skin. I smile despite myself and close my eyes.
A few seconds later, I hear a car door opening and I sense as Yann leans in and hear him mutter, "damn this truck." I feel myself sliding out of his grip and land onto a seat. I open my eyes to find Yann hovering above me as he straps me in. Leaning back, he stands by my side at the door for a moment, simply looking at me. Then he reaches for me and brushes my hair out of my face.
"Be right back. I'm gonna get the keys," he says and starts to walk away.
"You don't even have a license," I protest, my voice coming out in a yawn.
"You didn't seem to mind earlier," he says then he's gone.
I don't know how long I stay alone in the semi-darkness until Yann returns. Behind him, I see Ellie and Will with worried looks on their faces.
"Oh, Tracy," Ellie says as she looks at me. She doesn't look too steady on her feet and I know she's had some drinks too. Just not as much as I have.
"I'm fine," I hiccup. "Fine," I repeat.
Behind her, Will appears, his white t-shirt bright under the moonlight. He looks like an angel and I tell him so. "She's wasted," he says, eyes down on me.
He jumps into the driver's seat, keys jingling from his hands. When the car rumbles to life, I recognize Will's truck. Of course, what other truck on this Earth sounds like that? Like a dying whale that swallowed a motor.
"Drive safely," Will recommends before pulling away.
During the car ride, I don't talk much. I make incoherent sounds with my throat I guess but no words actually come out. It sounds like moans and grunts, but I'm not sure. At some point, Yann even asks me if I'm in pain. I am in pain but I don't tell him that. I feel like someone is using a hammer in my brain and it feels awful.
After what feels like an eternity, Yann pulls up in front of Ellie's house. I start to unbuckle my seat belt and open the door at the same time. I lose my grip on the handle and without the seatbelt to hold me back, start dropping towards the ground. I don't have the energy to try and pull back and just let myself fall. And fall I do.
Before I can kiss the gravel however, I feel arms catching me just before I hit the ground. Yann curses as he pulls me back up to my feet. I sway a little before he wraps his arms around me, steadying me. Sliding his arms under my knees, he picks me up again and carries me inside the house. I hear the door kick shut behind us as he starts to make his way upstairs.
All the while, my head and arms are dangling off. My eyes find the ceiling above me and I smile. "Do you see the stars, Yann?"
He doesn't answer. I think he's realized that all I am going to say tonight is incoherent so he just doesn't bother. I won't have it. "Do you see them?" I ask more urgently.
I feel his chest go up and down as he sighs. "Yes, I do."
I smile wider. "They're beautiful, aren't they?" No answer. "Yann," I whine, "they're beautiful, right?"
Another sigh. "Yes, they're gorgeous," he says.
I frown. "I didn't say gorgeous, I said beautiful."
"Beautiful, yes." I am about to say something else, I'm not sure what it is but Yann speaks before I can. "Graham," he says, "can we play a little game?"
I nod eagerly as I try to lift my head but it falls back. "Yes, yes, yes! What game?"
"Who's gonna stay quiet longer."
All my excitement dies. "That's not a fun game," I pout.
Yann enters my bedroom just then and he looks down at me for a moment. "It's fun, I promise you."
He starts moving again and as he carefully lays me down on the bed, I say. "OK, let's do it."
"Great."
As I'm lying down on the bed, I feel as Yann pulls off my sneakers first. Once he's done that, he grabs my feet and turn my body so I am fully on the bed. Then, he comes over me and starts removing my jacket. I gaze up at him as his hair falls around his face. He uses his hands to tuck them back behind his ears but still a few strands dangle temptingly over my face.
He's removing my left arm from the jacket when I do it. I grab his hair. I wanted to just touch it, feel it in my hands again, but in my drunken state, I end up grabbing more than just a few strands and yanking him down.
"Shit!" Yann grits out and grabs my hand, trying to get me to let go of his hair. But I have his hair in a baby-grip. And babies don't let go. "Let go, Graham."
I grin up at him, victorious. "You just lost."
For a moment, he seems lost at my words. Then as he seems to finally remember the game he instated himself, he says, "You pulling on my hair wasn't part of the game. Now let it go."
His hand is gripping mine as he tries to pry my fingers open but as I said, my grip is tight. I have his head down, his face right over mine. More hair falls and I reach my second hand to grasp more locks but he anticipates my move and catches my hand in his other one.
"Not happening," he says. "Graham, I'm serious. Let it go now."
Something in his tone registers through my brain and I let go. Even though I do, he stays above me for a moment. Thinking he's mad at me, I whisper, "Sorry."
Finally, he sighs and pulls away. Wordlessly, he pulls the covers over me. I avoid looking into his eyes and stare up at the ceiling, at the stars. Beautiful stars in my wooden sky. I keep looking and start counting. One, two, three...
I realize the room is quiet for a moment, and thinking Yann is gone, I quickly look around the room. But he's right there, standing by my bed like earlier. He's staring down at me in a way I cannot quite decipher but whatever it is, it makes my heart go into overdrive again.
"Go to sleep."
Ducking slightly under the covers, I watch him go towards the door. I watch as he steps out and reaches for the doorknob. My mouth gets a mind of its own in this instant and one word comes out. "Yann."
He lifts his head at his name and he simply looks, waiting for me to continue. But I don't. Even in my drunken state, even though the alcohol has stripped me off of a few inhibitions, I still cannot bring myself to say the words.
I don't need to say the words however. Yann walks back into the room and, leaving the door open, grabs the only chair in the room. He picks it up and plants it before my bed. I don't take my eyes off him as he takes a seat on the chair and glues his gaze on me.
I don't know how long we look at each other like that, me with half a smile on my face and him with a face void of any emotions. But it's okay. That's closer than I've ever had him before.
My eyelids start closing but I refuse to let them stay closed for too long, afraid that sleep will rob me of this moment. I want to keep looking at him all night, looking into those eyes I've come to love.
My body needs rest and no matter how hard I try to fight off the sleep, it eventually pulls me in. It's okay though, because the last thing I see is the electric blue of his eyes. And the last thing I hear is the sound of his gravelly voice as he says, "Goodnight, Graham."
***
The next morning, when I open my eyes for the very first time, it's 11:27am. I just want a few more minutes until the headache goes away and I'll get out of bed. I put my phone back down on the bedside table and close my eyes again. When I slowly crack one eye open, I expect it to be several minutes later or at most 12pm. But it's later than that. The time on my phone has me sitting up too fast and all the blood rushes from my head and makes me dizzy for a moment. 14:49pm.
Pressing a hand to my forehead, I will the headache to go away but it doesn't. It's much less of a pounding than earlier but it still hurts a little. As the events of yesterday come back to me, I look frantically around the room. Of course, he's not there.
Dragging my feet through the house, I go to the kitchen. A thought then occurs to me: maybe he's swimming in the pool. Even though I know that he usually swims in the morning, I cannot help but hope he is out there. Ignoring the headache that increases with the heavy footsteps I am taking, I push through the backdoor and stumble onto the lawn. Even from where I am, I can see he's not there but I nonetheless take closer steps to the pool and look deep into it, as if Yann is hiding at the very bottom.
A little disappointed, I make my way back to the kitchen. I find a note from Ellie that I don't take the time to read. A glass of water and a painkiller wait for me on the counter and I greedily take the pill. I type a quick text to let her know I am awake and well, expecting her text to come right back but it doesn't.
As I am about to put my phone down, it rings and I see Will on the caller ID. "Morning," I say automatically since I just woke up.
I hear Will chuckle on the phone before he answers with, "Good afternoon, Tracy. How're you feeling?"
"Not as terrible as I should," I say and take a seat by the counter. "Tell me I wasn't that drunk."
"Well, I don't know. You told me I looked like an angel. Does that sound like drunk talking to you?" He chuckles even more on the phone.
"Oh whatever, it was just a metaphor." I roll my eyes. "You're with Ellie?" I ask.
"No, she's with James."
I laugh at that. "Jeez, she couldn't even stay till I woke up this morning and had to go out see her boyfriend? At least she left me painkillers." Will is silent for a moment on the other side of the phone, "Will?"
Finally, he talks. "Ellie spent the night at James's."
I laugh at how ridiculous that sounds. "No, she left me a note this morning. What are you talking about?"
Silence for two seconds. "She wrote me like ten minutes ago to say they were leaving his house."
At those words, I jump off the stool and go over to the fridge where the note written on a yellow post-it sticks to the door. Surely enough, it's not Ellie's handwriting. It says, "Take the painkiller. Breakfast is in the microwave."
"Yann," I whisper more to myself than Will. Then suddenly, "I have to go, Will. I'll call you later."
Disconnecting the call, I quickly rush to the bathroom and brush my teeth. I take a quick shower to get rid of the scent of alcohol from last night and racing back to my room, I put on whatever my hands fall upon first which end up being a pair of dark blue jeans and a tank top. I'm out in less than ten minutes and start walking.
It takes me ten minutes before I reach his front door. I am about to knock when I hear it. A soft melody played on a piano. Für Elise by Beethoven. And God, does whoever is playing plays well. As I listen there, my ears pressed tightly against the door, I can imagine deft fingers flying over the keyboard, barely touching the keys and delivering such a heavenly masterpiece. I smile in spite of myself and my own fingers ache to touch a piano right now.
When the melody stops, it takes me a few minutes to come down from cloud nine and chase away my elation. Composing myself, I reach a hand up to knock on the door at the same time another melody from inside is starting. However, at the sound of knocking, it stops abruptly. I curse myself and take a few steps back.
When the door opens, I find Yann standing before me, naked chest and sweatpants hanging low on his hips. His hair is up in a ponytail and as he stands in the doorway looking down at me, I suddenly feel shy and embarrassed that he saw me drunk and probably blabbering last night.
"Hi," I finally say when the silence gets too awkward and he's obviously not going to make this easier for me.
He only raises an eyebrow at me and says, "You know how to knock now?" Jesus, he's still not over it.
"Well," I begin, "technically, last time I came through the backdoor."
He says nothing at that and just keeps looking at me. Awkward, awkward. "I just wanted to thank you for last night and breakfast and the pill." Then something occurs to me, "Did you stay all night?"
He gives me a look that says do you honestly believe I would stay all night? but he answers nonetheless, "No, I came back this morning to check up on you but you were sleeping."
To check up on me, I think. That's... nice. Different from the Yann I know.
"Did I say anything weird last night?" I know that Will told me I was drunk but as I spent most of the night with Yann, maybe he will reassure me and tell me it wasn't that bad. I only remember bits of the night.
"There was nothing you said last night that wasn't weird," he says, bored.
Silence comes between us and I am not sure what to say. He keeps looking at me and I keep avoiding his eyes. "Was that you playing inside?" I blurt out.
He keeps looking at me with no interest whatsoever and I wonder what happened to the Yann I was graced with last night. "Yes."
"You play beautifully." He doesn't acknowledge my words, doesn't say thank you. "Can I play?"
Now that gets his attention. He snorts and rolls his eyes. "No, you can't."
"I'm a good player," I say and hope that maybe the competitive side of him – if he has one – will want to find out which of the two of us is the better player.
He nods. "I heard you that time when you broke into my house. I've got an idea."
At least I tried. Again, I blurt something random out as I cannot stand the silence between us. "Do you ever think about shaving your beard?"
He shakes his head at me and I see his ponytail flip left and right. I can tell his head shake wasn't a no to my answer. "We're not suddenly friends because of last night, Graham. Don't even dream of it."
"Well, I did prefer the Yann of last night." He says nothing but something flicks in his eyes. "Maybe I should get drunk more often."
"Don't expect me to be there the next time you do." He starts backing away inside the house, "Goodbye, Graham."
The door closes.
•••
Sorry for the late update, finally done with my finals. At last.
Chapter 17! Did you guys like it? :)