All This and $10 on 2

In Another's Eyes

I'm not entirely sure what woke me up first: The morning sun blazing into our room, or the realization that Brandon wasn't there. Maybe it was both, I don't know. Either way, I pictured my morning starting much more differently. I was looking forward to having the first thing I saw be his handsome face awash in the fresh glow of morning, still asleep. He got to watch me after singing me to sleep last night, so it's only fair that I get to watch him sleep this morning, right?

Just then he emerged from the bathroom, barefoot, his hair wild from sleep, with his toothbrush in his mouth and his shirt draped over his left shoulder. I hadn't seen him without a shirt on before, it made me feel things I had only read about it trashy romance novels. Unfortunately, however, Brandon is overly self-conscious. He told me that he used to be really heavy when he was younger and still carries an extremely negative self-image about it even though he could hardly even be called chubby anymore. His broad chest and powerful arms and shoulders, which normally filled out his shirts very nicely, were finally on display and my ravenous eyes hurriedly devoured as much of his exposed skin as they could.

"I'm sorry; this is the last thing you need to see when you first wake up." He said as he hurriedly tried to put his shirt on.

I held up my hand to stop him. "No, I like it.” My cheeks burned and a delirious grin threatened to split my face in two. “I like it a lot."

Brandon flashed that wicked, lopsided grin of his always that made my head spin. "Now who needs to behave?"

I still couldn’t believe how lucky I was to have this man in my life. He was everything I didn't realize I was looking for in my perfect mate. He placated me by leaving the shirt off and sat on the bed next to me and touched his blazing hot hand to my cheek. I turned into his touch and kissed the palm of his hand and then took his wrist and lowered his hand to my heart. He leaned down and kissed me softly, lovingly. I had to catch my breath.

"The bus to the amusement park leaves in two hours; do you want to have room service bring us breakfast in bed, or would you prefer to go to the diner on the corner?"

With his hand still resting on my heart, and now his index finger tracing small circles where my collar bones meet, I carefully processed his request and answered, "… What?"

Brandon leaned in and kissed me on my forehead, his lips leaving a good kind of lasting burn on my skin, and got up from the bed to put his toothbrush away (and unfortunately his shirt on too) and asked again.

I jumped excitedly out of bed, "We have to go to the diner!"

Brandon pulled me into is strong embrace, "See, that's why I love you!" and kissed me so deeply that my right foot lifted off of the floor involuntarily.

The diner was, naturally, full of our classmates. Austin and Jessica called us over to join them instead of having to wait for a table of our own. They told us that they had tried to get Michele and Lola to come, but they never answered their door. The waitress came over and gave us menus. Brandon and I ordered coffee while we looked them over and tried to keep up with our table-mates yapping a mile-a-minute about the events of last night. It was obvious to me (and a quick side-glance at Brandon confirmed that it was obvious to him too) that their night was much sweatier than ours was. As far as I was concerned though, I was aware that other people were at prom too, but it could have just been Brandon and I and my night would have been just as fabulous. I put my hand on top of his and squeezed. Brandon pulled my hand to his lips, blew lightly on it (giving me goose-bumps) and then kissed it which left another pleasant burning sensation.

I consulted the menu again; I looked at Brandon, about to ask him what he was going to get, when I saw him staring intently at Austin. I looked at Austin, whose face was a mask of terror, but he wasn't looking at Brandon, he was looking at the front door. I went to turn to see what he was staring at, but Brandon urgently asked me not to move.