We immediately sprung apart from each other. I couldn’t stop staring at her while Ethan started scratching at the wall with his finger as if examining and finding some fault in the layout of the wall or the paint.
“God, I’ll be late. I need to have breakfast.” He said and briskly climbed down the stairs.
Samara shook her head and she closed her mouth. She looked down and gasped.
“I’m so sorry.” She said, bending down to hastily pick up the broken pieces.
I walked towards her and crouched next to her. “It’s okay.” I said although I wasn’t sure if it was. I didn’t know how much this antique piece must have cost.
We awkwardly began piling pieces together even though she said that I shouldn’t.
“Samara, about what you saw, can you not tell anyone about it?”
“I saw nothing. Don’t worry.”
“Thanks.”
“It’s just that I was so shocked. I thought you two hated each other.”
“Not anymore.”
“Go have breakfast. I’ll clean this up.”
“Alright, thanks.”
I descended down towards the kitchen and saw that Ethan was laying down plates for the two of us. As we had woken up pretty late, the others already had their breakfast.
“Well that was embarrassing.” I said, making my presence known to him.
He looked up with a faint trace of blush on his cheeks. “Sorry for leaving you there alone.”
“It’s alright I got it. I told her not to tell anyone and she’s not going to.”
He sighed in relief. “I thought I was going to get kicked out by your father.”
I smirked. “Why? Are you afraid of him?”
“No, it’s because I don’t know how he’ll react to me dating his precious little daughter.”
“Don’t worry. I told you that he said he doesn’t mind if something was going on between us as long as it wasn’t a fling. His exact words.”
“Then he really has nothing to worry about.”
I blushed. “That’s good to hear. So what are your plans for today?”
“Go to work, come for lunch, kiss you a lot, go to work, come for dinner, kiss you a lot and talk to you until I fall asleep next to you.”
I chuckled. I was busy piling pancakes on our plates when I felt his chin rest on my shoulder and he started helping me out with the pancakes while placing a quick kiss on my cheek or neck every now and then.
I turned in his arms. “Let’s save this for the bedroom. We don’t want my mom or my dad catching us like how Samara did.”
He immediately seemed aware of our surroundings and looked around to see if there were any prying eyes watching us. There were none thankfully.
Only us two were at the breakfast table. We fed each other from our plates and it felt like we had been together for days and not just from last night.
After breakfast it was time for him to go to work. He went to his room to collect his phone and watch and I followed to give him a goodbye kiss.
“Come early, will you?” I asked, pouting as I rested my back on his door.
He turned towards me. “I will.”
“I’ll be back before you realize that I was gone.” He said, putting his things on a table. He wrapped me in a hug, swaying us slightly.
“I’ll wait for you.” I pulled back and pecked his lips.
He kissed my forehead and my cheeks.
“I really need to go.” He said but pulled me into a deep kiss instead.
“No one’s stopping you.” I chuckled.
“Okay, okay. I’ll go now.” He fumbled to unlock the door, all the while kissing me and once we were in the hallway we maintained a few feet of distance between us.
I bid him goodbye and immediately after started missing him.
***
“Since when did Ethan start caring about you?”
I was in the kitchen looking for an evening snack when I was startled by the voice from behind. I turned to face Olivia. She looked better than the last time I had talked to her.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean why did Ethan see me after lunch to talk to me about why we were not on good terms. It doesn’t even concern him?”
“He talked to you about it? What did he say?”
“He said that he noticed we weren’t friendly like we used to and gave me this long lecture about how important friends are and that we shouldn’t let trivial things come in between friendships.” She sounded annoyed.
Inside I was bursting with joy over the fact that he thought of talking to Olivia for me but I didn’t let it show. I wasn’t sure if it was a good idea to tell her that Ethan and I had just started dating.
“Only he doesn’t know that this isn’t a trivial matter I’m mad at you over.” She added.
I slammed the water jug I had in my hands. “If you have no intention of telling me what that matter is, then you can leave. I was having a good time until you came along.”
“As if I wanted to talk to you.” She scoffed. “I was only here to tell you to not ask other people to interfere in our matters when they know nothing about it.”
“In case you didn’t notice, I’m also one of those people who know nothing about what this ‘matter’ is between us.”
She didn’t answer me, instead choosing to let out a long sigh before leaving.
Olivia was really starting to irritate me with her childishness.
***
It was after dinner and Ethan and I were lying in my bed next to each other. I had my head in his shoulder with my hand on his chest and he had one arm wrapped around my shoulder. We were flipping through channels on the TV searching something worthy to watch.
“Did you talk to Olivia after lunch?”
He looked at me. “I told her to not tell you. Your friend isn’t really trustworthy.”
I sighed.
“Did it not go well?”
“Yeah, it didn’t. I’m starting to think we’ll never go back to being friends.” I said ruefully.
“Don’t think that. I’m sure she’ll come around.”
I shook my head. “I don’t think so. I’ve been friends with her for two years.” In reality, I had being friends with her for more than two years but this had to fit with my story. “And we’ve had a fair share of fights but this feels different. Whatever she’s mad at me for is big this time. It’s very serious and it’s starting to scare me because I don’t want to lose her.”
“I’ll be here if you ever need my help.”
“Thanks.”
“I was wondering at what point things started to go wrong. Surely you must have detected her early signs of withdrawal.”
I racked my brain to search for the answer but it was clear each time. This all started when I told her that she couldn’t be with Tristan.
But I couldn’t tell him that because that would lead to a whole round of him questioning me.
“I don’t know. It was slow so I didn’t really notice and then one day she just felt distant.”
I felt terrible lying to his face.
“Do you have something else you want to tell me?”
His question puzzled me.
But I has an answer. Yes, I had something to tell him. My secret.
“Not really.”
His features contorted in what I thought to be disappointment but it was ridiculous, he had nothing to be disappointed about.
Maybe he was just disappointed that I couldn’t remember when exactly Olivia started to be different towards me.
I shook my head to get rid of thoughts about Olivia.
“Let’s not talk about Olivia. It makes me sad.”
“Right, sorry.” He paused to think. “Then can I ask you something else?”
“What is it?”
He looked at me, forcing me to look back at him. “When did you realize that you like me?”
I chuckled. “Well, I think it was soon after you hinted that you liked me, when you cornered me in the hallway when I was running after you demanding what I did wrong because you had been avoiding me for a? month.”
He smiled faintly.
“And when did you realize?”
“It was at Brooke and Brian’s wedding.”
“What happened there?”
“We were talking to Brian after the ceremony and one of his friends asked how he realized that he was in love with Brooke and that she was the one. And his answer… his answer scared me because I saw myself in that position and at that time I couldn’t imagine liking you, my childhood enemy who I thought only knew how to throw money every where and was bratty and a snob.”
I hit his shoulder. “What was his answer?”
“It was cheesy. He said that he started wanting to spend time with her and when he wasn’t with her, he was constantly thinking about her. He enjoyed the time they spent together and missed her when he couldn’t see her. He’d always look forward to when he’ll see her again and it got to a point where he couldn’t imagine going through a day without her. That was when he knew he loved her. And I knew I was doing everything and feeling everything he had.”
“And yet you avoided me like I was a disease.”
“I didn’t want to like you.”
“Yeah, yeah. I was a snobby little brat to you whom you didn’t want to like at all.”
“Not anymore,” He murmured and kissed me deeply to prove his point.