Chapter 26
The books and the movie’s lie.
You know when you’re reading a book and the main character can’t sleep so she gets into bed with someone she loves and finally sleeps? Rubbish. It doesn’t even work.
Regardless of the fact Zach was in bed with me that night, lying together didn’t help me sleep at all. I think I got around two to three hours of overall sleep that night. However, Zach seemed to sleep perfectly fine.
No matter how many times I tried counting sheep or counting into the hundreds, nothing helped. All I could think of was the cottage and being kept in there. I probably sounded like a baby with the way I was going on about it but when nothing like that has ever happened to you before then it kind of hits you.
By the time it hit eight am, I was wide awake and bored out of my mind. Zach was still fast asleep underneath me; he’d hardly stirred all night. I didn’t want to get out of bed though, since it was Zach’s house and not my own, I felt weird wandering around someone else’s house or bedroom, for that matter.
My head was still aching but only dully. It was better from how it was before and it wasn’t as prominent which made me feel slightly better.
After laying there in bed for a while longer, I decided to get up. I couldn’t lie there for anymore. I headed towards the door which I knew led to the en-suite bathroom and headed inside, closing the door behind me.
A groan escaped my mouth as soon as I looked at myself in the mirror. I looked awful. My hair was a mess, my eyes were red with dark circles underneath and I literally just looked a mess.
I took the brush from the side before brushing through my hair and tying it up into a high ponytail. Then I searched the bathroom for a spare toothbrush. Most people had spare ones, right? I finally found one in the cupboard underneath the sink.
After washing my face and brushing my teeth, I felt a lot better and looked a bit more presentable. Tiredness was still washing over me though and all I wanted to do was curl back up in bed and go to sleep but I knew that wasn’t going to happen.
Unsurprisingly, Zach was still asleep when I re-entered the room. His chest was rising and falling as he slept and I found myself standing in the doorway of the bedroom watching him sleep. It sounded creepy but as I watched him, all I could think about was how lucky I was to have him.
He was willing to risk himself getting hurt and injured repeatedly just to keep me safe. Although, in doing so he did hurt me emotionally, he was doing it for a good reason. He was putting me first and I was thankful for that.
After being creepy and staring at him for a while longer, I moved from my space in the doorway and headed back towards the bed. I wasn’t planning on going back to sleep so I just sat up and pulled the covers back over me to keep me warm whilst I waited for Zach to wake up.
I wasn’t sure how long I sat there before Zach woke up. He let out a sleepy groan and rubbed his eyes before pushing himself up into a semi-sitting position.
“Morning.” He smiled, leaning over and placing a kiss on my cheek.
“Morning to you, too.” I giggled, my cheeks going red due to his previous action. It wasn’t anything big yet he still managed o make me blush.
He sat up fully, wrapping his arms around my waist and pulling me closer to him until we were hugging. “How did you sleep?”
I shrugged, leaning my head against his shoulder. “I’d say fine but then I be lying.”
Zach just sighed, holding me closer to him and resting his chin on top of my head. He slowly lowered the pair of us down until we were lying back in bed.
“Try and get some sleep, I’ll be here when you wake up.”He murmured, one hand stroking up and down on my back whilst his other hand stroked my hair.
It was comforting and it made me feel safe and I think that was the reason why I finally fell asleep for the first time that ‘night’.
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When I woke up again, it was just after two pm. I’d managed to sleep for an extra five hours. It wasn’t for that long but I felt much more relaxed and even more refreshed. Some of the previous exhaustion of having no sleep had worn off and I felt much better than I had before.
Zach was still there, like he’d promised except he’d turned the TV on. I could only hear the slight murmur of it which meant that he’d turned it right down... probably so it wouldn’t wake me up.
We were in the same position except I’d somehow managed to move myself further over so one of my legs were slung over his and my hand was resting on his chest. It was such a comfortable position; I didn’t want to move.
“Do you feel any better?” Zach asked once he noticed that I was now awake. He reached over to grab the remote ad turned the TV off.
“I do, thank you.” I smiled.
He moved closer to me to kiss me but I stopped him, putting my hand over his mouth. Zach frowned which only made me laugh.
“You have morning breath, you not kissing me.” I laughed, placing my other hand over my mouth like I’d done to him to prevent him from kissing me.
“I do not.” Zach protested, moving away from my hand and covering his mouth with his own. He pulled his hands away from his mouth and scrunched his nose up. “Ok, maybe I do. I’ll be back in a sec.”
With that, he jumped up from the bed and ran to the en-suite bathroom, closing the door behind him. I played with the end of my t-shirt whilst I waited for him to return.
The bathroom door opened shortly after and Zach returned. A grin erupted onto his face as he ran towards the bed and jumped on, only missing me slightly.
“Zach!” I laughed, moving away from him so I didn’t get any the impact of his jump.
“Maisie!” Zach grinned. He shuffled over and pushed me back onto the bed before straddling me.
Zach lifted his hand and pushed the bits of hair that’d fell from my ponytail to the side. His hand rested on the side of my face as he lowered his head closer towards mine. Our lips were almost touching when we were interrupted.
By my stomach.
My stomach grumbled just as Zach’s lips were about to touch mine. He burst out laughing, moving his head back before resting his head on mine.
“Are you hungry?” He asked in-between breaths from laughing so much.
“Just a tad.” I giggled. I grasped his cheeks in my hand and placed my lips over his, giving him a slight kiss before pushing him off me and getting of the bed. I held my hand out for him to grab. “Coming?”
He nodded, grasping my hand in his and leading me towards the door. “I’ll get my mum to make us some food.”
His mum made the best chocolate chip pancakes.
That was all that went through my mind as I sat on the stool in the kitchen. Zach had asked his mum to make us both pancakes, which she’d agreed to doing without any hesitation. She didn’t mind at all and that made me feel that bit better about just crashing at his house.
Apparently, the pancakes used to be Zach’s favourite when he was younger which only made me giggle as I ate mouthfuls of the fluffy, chocolate-y goodness.
I had to get the recipe to how you made these. They were the best pancakes I’d ever had. Zach gave me two painkillers for my headache which helped ease the dull pain that was still remaining.
Once it hit four pm, I knew I had to go home. I hadn’t seen my family since before the whole Max and Paul fiasco. The last time I’d even talked to my mum was last night so I could tell her where I was.
Zach had let me borrow his phone so I could call my mum and ask her to come pick me up from his house. I didn’t want to walk alone, which wasn’t surprisingly considering the last time I’d walked by myself..
I still hadn’t changed my mind; I wasn’t going to tell my mum anything about Max or Paul. Apart from a slightly aching arm and a headache, I wasn’t going to tell her anything. There wasn’t really a reason, the police had arrived once we’d ran and there was no physically obvious marks left on my body from what had happened.
After changing out of the clothes that I’d borrowed from Zach, I headed to the front door, Zach following behind me.
“Do you have to go?” He pouted. He was leant against the doorframe, his arms crossed across his chest.
“I haven’t seen my mum since yesterday and its Christmas, I have to go.” I smiled, moving closer to him. I wrapped my arms around his neck, pulling him into a hug. His arms wrapped themselves tightly around my waist as he buried his face into my hair.
“Have a nice Christmas.” He whispered, planting a kiss on the top of my head.
I squeezed my arms tightly and left a small kiss on his neck. “You too! Make your mum make you some chocolate chip pancakes.”
He chuckled, pulling away from the hug and holding my hands instead. We said our goodbyes before I turned and left.
My mum was waiting in the car for me when I finally got to the road. I jumped straight inside and slammed the door shut. The heat hit me automatically which made me let out a sigh of relief.
“How was your night?” Mum asked, a teasing smile on her face as she watched my cheeks burn bright red.
“It was fine.”
“Just fine?” She questioned, wriggling her eyebrows as she started the car again. She started driving home as she waited for my reply to her question.
“Just fine.” I repeated, hiding my face in my hands. We hadn’t even done anything except sleep and eat pancakes yet talking about my relationship with Zach made me so embarrassed.
Mum chuckled at my embarrassment before being silent for a while. “So are you two back together?”
I nodded unable to stop the smile that was slowly spreading on my face. “We’re taking it slow, though.”
“Understandable. Now we have to go home. You need to do your part of the decorating, we’re late this year” She smirked, turning the corner that led to our street.
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This is so so so short, I know but I wanted to post it's been ages. ((School ruins lifes)). I wrote this at school on tiny notebook computer things so if there's mistakes ((there's probably a lot)) then that's why.
One more part and then maybeee an epilogue.
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