𝐄𝐳𝐫𝐚 | 18+

16

"Damn..." I trail off, looking at the gruesome piece of glass on my forehead.

"Why can't I feel it?" I ask Ezra as he grabs the tweezers.

"I don't know, bellissima. This might hurt a bit, okay?" He asks, standing up straight. I nod.

He slowly takes out all the pieces of glass and I try my best to stay still, wincing when it hurts more than others.

"Last one.." He murmurs. I feel one last pull and it's replaced by a stinging sensation when he puts disinfectant on it.

"How do you know so much about doctor-ing?" I ask him as he gently starts drying it. I bite on my lip to contain a shout.

"My mother taught me how to clean cuts when I was younger. I learned how to stitch later on, when I got into working." He explains, pulling away and standing in front of me, examining the wound on my forehead.

"I bet you're an undercover doctor." I say. He smiles.

"I wish I was, bellissima." He mutters. He starts putting everything away but I stay on the counter, dangling my legs off the edge.

"You don't like your job, do you?" I ask lowly. He shakes his head.

"You can't change?"

"No, I would've a long time ago."

"My job gets annoying sometimes, too. Customers get real snobby sometimes. I don't know why people they can just walk all over waitresses and people who work in shops or cafés in general. I may not be a lawyer but still..." I mutter. "There was this one woman, today, you know what she had?" I ask.

"Balls?"

"Good guess, but no. She had fucking audacity. She told me black coffee and I made her a black coffee, then she insisted I made her green tea because apparently I heard her wrong. I might come off as stupid but my ears work damn well." I say.

"Was it a Karen?" He asks, crinkling his nose.

"It was. It was." I nod slowly. I turn around and look at my reflection in the mirror. He did a nice job, now I'll just have a scar for a while.

Scars are awesome, they say 'I went through something dangerous, but I came out of it alive' and this goes for every type of scar.

"Also, I had to go to work tonight, so I'll be back at around four or five in the morning. You can stay here, though. I'll drive you to work, tomorrow." He says, standing up straight once he's out everything away.

"Okay..." I nod. "I can't get down..." I say, realizing the belt-hole of my jeans got stuck around something behind me. Belt holes get stuck in the worst places in the worst times. Like, I'll be having a bad day and the loop gets stuck on a door handle and I just want to burn the whole place down.

"Why not?" He asks, confused.

"The belt hole..." I say, squirming around to undo it. In the moment he steps forward to help me, I get it undone and hop down. So now our chests are practically touching. I look up and find him staring down at me. His eyes, lit up by the light above us, dance across my face as if he were trying to memorize every detail, every freckle and mark. His full pink lips are slightly parted and his hair is hanging messily over his forehead. His eyes flicker with something I don't recognize before glancing down at my lips. His Adam's apple bobs up and down as he swallows harshly. Time feels like it's frozen and I feel my stomach slightly churn with butterflies.
For a second, I thought he was going to kiss me, but that would be absurd. And it would ruin our whole friendship...

"Do you know how to play Five Crowns?" I ask, ruining the moment. A part of me wanted the moment to never end, the other wished it never happened.

"Huh?" He asks, his eyebrows creasing.