Within The Stars | ✔️

21

~Elias' POV~

Samara and I began to hang out a little more often, sometimes at her house or mine, and sometimes in public. It was a Sunday when I showed up at her apartment again, planning knocking on her front door. Usually I gave warning that I'd be coming over, but I didn't see much of a point anymore. She was almost always home, anyways.

To my surprise, she opened the door up surprisingly quickly, opening it before I could even knock once. I lowered my hand down to my side and she blinked up at me through long lashes, looking stunned. "Uh.." She said, furrowing her brows. "What are you doing here?" She asked, slipping out of her apartment and closing the door behind her. I stepped away so we weren't so close. "Actually, I was just coming to hang out." I told her, watching as she paused and simply stared up at me like she was waiting for me to say that I was only joking.

"O-Oh." She stammered when she realized that I wasn't going to say anything more. "I usually go to the library on Sunday's." She told me, her tongue darting out to roll over the ring on the left side of her lip, the action catching my attention perhaps a little too quickly. I snapped my eyes back up to hers almost immediately. "Then I'll go with you. I'm already here." I muttered, to which she just snorted and crossed her arms over her chest. "Go with me?" She echoed, cocking up a brow. "For what? The sake of annoying me?" She asked. I glared at her, not surprised by her sass and the way she was giving me a hard time. That seemed to be a common thing with us. "Just take me to your car." I snapped at her, not bothering to respond to her sassy remark.

A little smile formed on her full lips, the amusement clear on her face as she brushed past me. I turned around and looked after her, shaking my head at her antics. Yet, for some reason, I almost..didn't mind it, either.

I shooed my stupid thoughts away before they could wander and followed her down into the parking lot, where I got in the passenger's seat while she was in the driver's. The car wasn't quite what I had expected her to own, perhaps Poppy but not Samara. It was too..simple to be something that looked like it belonged to a woman like Samara, if that made sense. It was too bright, too—the color, I mean. Even so, I could tell by that smile that formed on her lips when she turned the engine on that she really liked this car.

The drive to that seemingly always empty library that Samara loved so much was short, as it was a lot closer than I had realized. Samara practically leapt out of the car the second she had parked it and pulled the keys out of the ignition, turning the car off. My brows shot up as I got out of her car, glad that I didn't have to be cramped in that tiny fucking thing anymore. It wasn't made for people of my height, it seemed.

Samara headed inside and I sighed as I followed behind her, trying my best to remind myself that I was here for a reason. I sat down across from her once she found a table she wanted to sit at, narrowing my eyes in on her when she pulled a book out of her bag and opened it to whatever page she'd left on. For a while I had no problem just sitting here while she was reading, occupying myself with studying my surroundings until I eventually turned my head to look back at her again.

She had her head down, the long strands of her black and purple hair falling down over one shoulder to create a slight curtain on the left side of her face. The book she had was held open by two of her fingers at the top, her right elbow on top of the table. I couldn't help but to stare at her, examining the slight furrow of concentration between her brows or the way that she absentmindedly tongued her left piercing while she was reading, the action clearly subconscious. I clenched my hands into tight fists and I blew out a breath, wondering what the hell was wrong with me. How much more would it take until this feeling went away finally? This attraction, it wasn't new to me but I still couldn't figure out what to do with it. Even with my feelings for Poppy, there was this strange part of me that was attracted to Samara, to her sass and her attitude and the way that she looked. But Samara wasn't my type—I'd only ever had things for girls like Poppy.

Yet Samara came along and had been the exact opposite of Poppy, with that hair and piercings and the way she dressed. Even down to her attitude, she was just different from Poppy, which hadn't been a bad thing to me at first. Then the attraction to her began, and I hated her for it. I had never been interested in women like her, but something about her got my blood pumping and I didn't want to feel like that, not when I had my sights set on winning over Poppy. Samara was a distraction, a temptation, and I despised her for stealing even an ounce of my attention so easily.

I must've been staring at her so intently that it caught her attention because she glanced up at me, keeping her book open with two long fingers. "Why are you staring at me?" She asked, cocking up a brow. "Go get a book or something." She grumbled.

Rolling my eyes, I slouched back into my chair and stared at her dead on, knowing it would just irritate her more. She tried to go back to reading but I could see the way she was fidgeting nervously with the pages of her book, not liking the way I was staring, and that just made me smirk in amusement. "Stop it, Eli!" She hissed softly when she grew irritated, flicking her eyes up to look at me. I leaned into the table, bracing my forearms on top of it. "I'm bored." I said, causing her to scoff.

"Do I look like I'm supposed to be your personal entertainer?" She retorted sassily. I chuckled, scanning my eyes over her face as I watched her continue to fiddle with the pages of her book again. "Right now?" I teased, a sly smile growing on my lips. "Unfortunately, no."

She sent me a glare and slipped her bookmark back into her book, slamming it shut before she pushed her book off to the side. "Fine. If you want to be entertained so badly, then let's talk." She huffed, shifting in her seat as she sat up a little straighter. I watched her closely as she leaned towards me, her brown eyes piercing into mine. "How far are we taking this dating thing, first of all?" She asked, making me cock up a brow. "How far do you want to take it?" I asked, a little uncertain what she wanted to me say, or what she was trying to ask.

Though she paused for a second, she eventually ended up giving a feeble shrug of her shoulders. "I don't know.." She mumbled, averting her gaze from mine. I continued to stare at the side of her face, my gaze wandering down to her lips. "Are you trying to ask if we should act more intimate in front of them?" I asked, not surprised when she glanced up at me from beneath her lashes as her head was ducked down in embarrassment.

"No." She said, surprising me. "I just...It'd be weird if we're supposed to 'dating' and haven't even kissed before, if they ever considered that. Wouldn't it?"

I narrowed my eyes at her as I digested her words, clenching my hands into fists. "You want me to kiss you?" I asked, the thought of it causing a great amount of conflict within me. On one hand, I'd been the one who suggested this fake relationship, which meant having to do things like kiss her. However, there was a large part of me that considered Poppy in all of this. If I kissed Samara, would that make things more difficult for me to win over Poppy? Perhaps the biggest conflict of all was that I wasn't blind to that little nagging part of my brain that wanted to kiss her, even with the consideration of Poppy.

My tone was incredulous, almost a scoff, and it was that which made her hesitate before she quickly stood from her chair. "Um, never mind." She said, stuffing her book back into her bag. "We can just work around that stuff. Just forget I ever mentioned that." She told me, practically trying to flee.

It was instinct when I stood from my chair, grasping her by her arm before she could get far. I yanked her back, turning her towards me before I ducked my head down, sealing my lips over hers without hesitation.

Samara froze at first, taken aback by my sudden kiss, and I felt her large breasts push against my chest when I pulled her into me further. One hand slid around to her back, feeling the corset that she had over her short black dress beneath my fingertips, the warmth of her body and her sugary scent invading all of my senses. I couldn't help it when I kissed her rougher, her lip rings cool against my mouth. She began to kiss me back, hesitantly at first, but then I felt her small hands clutch at the front of my shirt. I slid my other hand into her pretty hair, the strands so soft as I gripped them in my fist and tilted her head back enough to kiss her more. A surprised whimper left her lips when I did this, the pounding of my heart and the fire licking at my skin making it hard for me to breathe.

"E-Eli," She gasped when I forced myself to break away from the kiss, her chest heaving against mine. I could see the stunned look written all over her face, and I imagined she could see the exact same expression written across mine, too.

And there was nothing to be said about how we were feeling after that. It was hanging in the air, written all over one another's faces that neither of us had expected it to feel so good.