Ch. 18
POV: RYLAND
Kori rolls over in my bed to face the window, burying herself into the blankets even more. "You're not allowed to watch me sleep," comes her muffled voice, heavy with drowsiness, "just because you kissed me."
I step into the room. "You kissed me first, Kiwi. And I was just trying to figure out how to wake you up."
A groan comes from the bed as Kori completely sinks under the blankets, hair and all disappearing. "No, that's not allowed. Come back tomorrow. My head hurts."
"Ah well, if it isn't the consequences of your actions. That's to be expected."
"Shut up."
"You snore in your sleep."
"Do not."
"Do."
"Go. Away."
"You know, you never struck me as the lazy type." I'm at the foot of the bed now. It's impossible to stay away from her, and the urge to tease her sends tingles down my spine, setting my heart hammering. Though, pissing her off hadn't actually been my intention when I came in here. "Was it not you who barged in here squawking about a...oh, what was it called again? Some English project, right?"
The lump under the blankets shifts. "Don't. Do not do that. You don't care about that project."
"I care about not flunking English."
The blankets are thrown backwards as Kori sits up, and I'm reminded that she's wearing my clothes. And, oh God...
Kori Merrick in general is the bane of my existence.
Kori Merrick first thing in the morning is...fuck.
"Is this a trick?" she asks, and she sounds genuinely suspicious, which snaps me out of my daze. "What was all this, some Romeo and Juliet character play?"
I stare at her. "Roleplay outside the classroom seems a bit much, don't you think?"
Kori scowls at me. She hasn't done that in over a week, though I could never forget what she looks like when she's mad at me. (One of these days, she's going to have a permanent wrinkle on her forehead from all of those years of scowling, and I'm going to laugh about it.)
She pushes her palms into her eyes and lets out an annoyed breath, the kind those mean girls do in movies. "So what, did you lure me here and play nice last night to, like, shave off all my hair in the middle of the night?"
"Lure you here?" I take a step back from the bed.
Kori drops her hands to lock eyes with me, and I feel myself sinking in her grass-green irises and thick lashes. She stares at me, but she doesn't say anything else. The floor starts to tilt as I realize she's not going to speak again.
"You know what?" My heart pounds hard enough to hurt as I shake my head. "Fine. You caught me. I'm a villain, and yes, you're bald now."
I turn away from her then. Away from the sweep of her lashes as she narrows her eyes at me, the slight stretch of tawny skin across her neck and clavicles as she leans forward, my shirt collar slipping. Away from the flush spreading across her face, splotching her neck and her cheeks, bringing those brilliant green eyes to life.
I'm not sure what I was expecting. For her to wrap her arms around my neck and kiss me soundly? For her to pull me tight and surround me with the scent of apples, murmuring, "Good morning," softly in my ear?
I pause in the doorway. "If you want to shower," I say over my shoulder, "it's down the hall on your right. Breakfast is in an hour."
I shut the door on my way out.
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POV: KORI
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I’ve got the sudden urge to draw a stick figure Ryland and throw darts at it. That's not a new feeling.
But then that feeling is quickly followed by an overwhelming need to run after him, pull him into a searing kiss, and drag him back to bed. Now that's new.
Or is it?
Has anything changed?
The kissing, for one. The wanting to kiss him, to be near him, to make sure he's alright. The solid feel of him against me, the press of his lips. He kissed me last night with a type of desperation I've never seen from him before. I wanted to spend the rest of the night wrapped up in his embrace.
You’re losing it, girl.
I let out a frustrated groan and bring a pillow up, smacking it against my face. I wish I could take back what just happened. I'd only been awake five minutes and we were already at each other's throats.
Though, in my defense, he tried to cut off a chunk of my hair in the sixth grade once.
Ryland and I pretty much spent all of elementary and middle school yelling in the halls and kicking the shit out of each other at least one or two times a year. One time in elementary, someone glued my school laptop shut and I know it was him. He was practically cackling in class.
Ryland and I fueled each other like oxygen for fire. He always knew just what to say to piss me off. Then, I'd lash out right back at him until Grace or Archer showed up. Teachers didn't care much about any of us, so they all conveniently turned a blind eye whenever something happened. (Kansas and I used to say they were all being paid to keep their mouth shuts and just let the rich kids act how they wanted, and I still believe that to this day.)
One day, Ryland and I got really into it at the top of the staircase. I don't even remember what started the argument, but I remember being madder in that moment than I'd ever been before in my life. I ended up getting a lucky hit in that sent Ryland reeling backwards enough that I was terrified for a split second that he'd fall all the way down the stairs.
He ended up catching himself on the railing at the last second.
I never forgot how that fight made me feel. We'd thrown stuff at each other before, and even hit each other with our backpacks, but never with our hands. I don't know if it was because of the whole "boys don't hit girls" thing, but Ryland always either had his arms crossed or his hands in his pockets whenever we argued. Like he was straining against touching me.
For me, the thought just never truly crossed my mind, up until that day. I had just wanted him to shut up. That night I barely slept, tossing and turning over how easily he could rile me up.
After that, I was more determined than ever to be good. Ryland be damned. I started telling myself that even if it hurt, I'd eventually have to come to grips with the fact that Ryland was always going to hate me. That no matter how desperate I was to be liked, things would never change between us. That my presence alone was a plague for him.
That point was proven a week later, when I felt something tugging on the ends of my hair in the middle of math class.
Ryland always complained that my hair was so long that it covered his desk, so I'd try and wear my hair up whenever I could to be nice. (It's not like I was always trying to start arguments with him on purpose. They just happened. He's a hater.) But that week my mind was completely elsewhere, so I'd just roll out of bed and come to class.
Ryland will tell you that his scissors were just laying there, and my hair was touching his desk and got caught in them.
Even today, I think that's a fat load of bullshit. And I told him that after class. And on and on went this cycle of yelling and scowling and teasing and not-so-silently hating each other.
Until Hannah Brown suddenly couldn't walk without using a wheelchair, and Austin Montgomery fell from the roof of the middle school and never woke back up, and Ryland Park became the center of it all.
And suddenly, yelling at each other about hair length seemed ridiculous.
I tug at my hair now and release a breath, slipping my fingers from the brown roots down to the blue tips. Tilting my head to stare towards the window, I sit quietly for a moment.
That was the best night of sleep I've had...in a long time.
The thought makes me feel giddy, a dumb grin spreading across my face and a blush across my cheeks. I have no idea what's happening between Ryland and me, but whatever it is, I'm anxiously excited about it.
I glance down at the bed, sliding my hand over the silken sheets. My other hand drifts to my chest, squeezing the soft material of his shirt in my fist. Last night is coming back in small fragments, including arriving at Ryland and Archer's house.
How Ryland had carried me upstairs into his bedroom.
How he'd wrapped his arms around me and tugged me close against him, covering us in the sheets and blankets.
How, if I stayed still enough, I could hear him softly humming as he fell asleep.
I stand up on shaky legs, peering around the room. My eyes land on Ryland's desk first, which is surprisingly clean. It's pushed up against the wall facing the window with just his laptop, a lamp, and a clock on it. I do a slow spin around the room and realize that the entire place is clean. I hadn't gotten a good look at his room when I'd come over for the project, but now I can see that everything's got a place. An empty hamper on the other side of the bed. Two brown dressers side by side on the far wall directly underneath a small flat screen TV. A small bookshelf next to the dressers filled with different video games, which is just about the only sign that someone's living in this room. No posters, no pictures, no clothes in sight.
I wonder if his room always looked like this, or if it was simply cleaned out after he left.
I stare at those video games for a few seconds. Then, I suck in a breath and stride towards the door.
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20 minutes later, I'm freshly showered and standing in Ryland's room again, his closet door flung open as I stare in disbelief at the contents inside.
Ryland's closet is separated in a million different sections. Long sleeve dress shirts, short sleeve dress shirts, ties, pants, sweatshirts, coats, and a few suit jackets. Everything is arranged by color, then shades within each color. I move over towards one of the dressers and open the top drawer. Neatly folded T shirts there, more in the middle drawer, with jeans and cargo pants in the bottom drawer. The other dresser has sweatpants, shorts, and socks in it.
I'm beyond words as I pull out a pair of sweatpants and another T-shirt, tugging them on. There's a full-length mirror hanging from the closet door, and I scrub at the roots of my hair, still slightly wet from the shower. I figured using the blow dryer might be me getting a little too comfortable, so I opted for letting it air dry.
I poke my head outside of the room, but the house is quiet. I step out and head over to the spiral stairs, trying to stay quiet as I walk down them. I can hear music as I approach the first floor, and I follow the sound of it further into the house. The kitchen is as big as a restaurant's, and I stutter to a stop at the sight.
Archer's standing at one of the multi-colored granite countertops, his back to me. There's a small speaker on his far right, changing colors in tune with the music playing. Archer's in a white tank top and dark blue pajama pants, and I can see the muscles in his back shift as he reaches across the counter for things, humming along to the music. He's slim, smaller than Ryland is, but still with serious muscle definition. I remember when the two of them used to be the same size, but Ryland put on a shit ton of muscle while he was gone. My thoughts drift to the party last night, how I slid my hands underneath his shirt and felt the abs there as he pressed soft kisses to the base of my throat...
"Oh, Kori!" Archer chirps, turning to face me with a big smile. He's wearing an apron with a dancing hamburger on it. "You're up!"
I blink rapidly. "Yes, hey, hi. I'm...I'm up."
He gestures towards the box of Bisquick pancake mix on the counter, and I'm instantly snapped out of my daze. "I know you've got a thing for pancakes," Archer says, "and I found this in our pantry, and by some miracle it's not expired yet, so I thought-"
"Archer," I say, "you made me pancakes?"
He flushes bright red. "Well, I made us pancakes. But I know you like them, so there's that. I remember when you, Zack, Grace, and Eddie would come over in elementary school and my mom would make them. You'd always be so excited." His nervous smile fades then, and his eyes flick over to the front door. "Ryland's not here right now. He went for a run, but he told me you were here."
"Right." I bite my lip for a second, scared to push the subject. "How has...Ryland been lately?"
Wariness flashes across Archer's face. "He's fine. Still adjusting. It's been...rough for him."
"Right." It's pretty clear he doesn't want to talk about that. I stand there awkwardly for a moment, wondering if he'll question my presence anymore, but when he doesn't, I say, "Here, let me help you finish up."
Archer and I work around each other easily, moving from one end of the kitchen to the next. I pull the bacon out of the oven and then start scrambling eggs as he finishes up the pancakes. Kansas did most of the cooking over the years, but I picked up on a few things.
"So," I say, picking an egg from the carton, trying not to glance over at the clock on the wall. It's been about 45 minutes since Ryland and I fought. He's going to come back soon, won't he? "Last night was fun."
Archer gives me a look over his shoulder. "Exactly how much do you remember?"
"I think altogether, maybe an hour and a half in total."
He laughs. "Yeah, same. Things are pretty fuzzy, but I remember having fun."
My phone vibrates, and I pull my phone out. The text is from Grace, to our little group chat with her, me, and Nevaeh.
GRACE: BESTIES IS EVERYONE STILL ALIVE???
GRACE: I'M ALIVE :D
I grin. "Grace is alive," I say to Archer.
He's got his back to me, but when I look up at him, I can see his ears have gone bright red.
KORI: Alive and well
NEVAEH: I'm breathing
GRACE: YAY
Archer's fidgeting over by the gridle, flipping the last of the pancakes over, and I squint at him. "Grace...she, ah, she's alright?" he asks, reaching into the dishwasher to grab plates. "She drank a lot more than we did."
I crack the eggs into the pan. "I'm sure she's fine."
"Oh. Yeah, okay."
I bite my lip to keep from smiling. Grace doesn't make it a secret that she likes Archer, but last night was the first time she's ever actually made a move on him. She's all bark and no bite, so I was seriously shocked to see them kissing.
Now the only issue is whether or not either of them remember it.
Archer's a tough one. Half the school is crushing on him, and the whole time I've known him, he's never had a girlfriend. At least, not one that I'm aware of. I honestly didn't think he had romantic feelings for anyone, so it feels like I'll explode if I don't ask him about their kiss. Archer's easy to fluster, so I've never known if he actually liked a girl romantically or if the attention just made him nervous.
"How much of last night do you remember?" I ask him, turning the stove off as the eggs finish.
At that, he goes completely still, and a bright laugh bursts out of me. He whips around to face me, running a hand through his cropped hair. "Kori," he pleads, his big brown eyes filled with worry, "stop talking."
"Okay, okay." I hold up my hands in a surrender motion, laughing. "I'm sorry."
He shuffles past me towards the fridge, groaning, "Seriously. I'm freaking out enough as it is."
I pour the scrambled eggs in a bowl. "Don't freak," I tell him. "She's only been dreaming about that kiss since, like, forever."
Archer stutters to a halt. "What?"
Shit. "Yeahhhh," I say, stretching out the syllable as I walk to the kitchen table and place the bowl of eggs down. "But you didn't hear that from me."
Archer's staring at me like I've got four heads, but in three strides he's standing in front of me. He reaches for both of my hands, gripping them tight and exclaiming, "I'm sorry, what?"
I laugh again, and his mouth drops even wider.
He drops my hands, rubbing his face with his hands. "I...I don't know how to deal with this," he says in a muffled voice.
"Does anyone ever know?" I lean back against the table. It's cute seeing Archer all flustered over Grace. "Just ask her out. Easy peasy."
Archer lifts his head and gives me a flat look before heading back towards the gridle. He flicks the dial on the side, turning it off, and scoops the remaining pancakes onto a plate. "Right, Kori. And tell me, have you asked your crush out yet?"
My mouth drops open at that.
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TO BE CONTINUED...
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Archer + Grace = Grarcher??? Arace??? Ace???
Maybe I should've picked better names for them...
-Zuffy <3
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