Changes

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Amity

We'd been sitting in the car for a while now waiting for the heavy rainfall to subside. Luz at some point had turned the music up and started screaming the lyrics. She'd held an imaginary microphone as her wet hair fell into her eyes. There was a bright smile on her face and I couldn't help myself but stare. She held out her hand, offering the fake microphone out to me saying, "come on Blight. Don't make me do this alone." She said softly and waited for a moment.

Without a way to respond for a few seconds, I watched her smile waver as she tried to pull it back from me. That was until I grasped her wrist to stop her with a small smile. Then I let it go and belted out the next lyrics. We both paused for a moment and as soon as the instrumental passed we both started to sing together this time. It was the most fun I've had with her in a long time. The moment was nice, much like our others, and I didn't want it to end.

However, the song ended and we were left staring at each other. She looked especially good in this lighting and that smile on her face made me feel weakened. I'm pretty sure if I'd been standing I would be unsteady on my feet. My eyes shifted between hers for a moment until she reached forward tucking a strand of hair that had fallen forward behind my ear. I felt my heart leap as I stared at her stuck in a trance. "You even make the aftermath of a storm look good. How do you do it?" She asked me gently and I opened my mouth but no words came out.

"You have a nice singing voice too. I never knew that." She grinned at me before tilting her head. "This is nice." She told me, her grin growing into a soft smile.

"You can be sweet sometimes and it catches me off guard," I told her after I had a moment to gather myself. Her kind words had been affecting my ability to form a coherent response.

"Well, I guess you'll just have to get used to it." She told me, her smile unfaltering.

"Get used to it? What are you implying there Noceda?" I asked her leaning closer to her without knowing.

"What?" Her face seemed to grow red, and flushed, under my gaze. Her face, her entire posture, seemed to retreat from embarrassment. "I just thought...well you want us to be...what I'm trying to say is." She stumbled over herself trying to get out a proper reply unsuccessfully.

"Are you getting my hopes up over there Noceda?" This seemed to cause her further duress and it made me smirk. "I think I may have got to you somehow." I teased her feeling confident and I tried to seem arrogant and unaffected by how she'd been acting. Though seeing her get like this made me feel accomplished because she wasn't the only one capable of leaving me flustered. I could do it to her too.

"Please, you just caught me off, guard." She scoffed as the red flush to her cheek settled and she rolled her eyes.

"Catching you off guard?" I raised a brow enjoying this a little too much. "I should take notes and make a list of out of it. Then I'll have something to go to when I want to have the upper hand. Do you have any other weaknesses I should know about?" I asked her jokingly leaning back to put space between us. It had been clouding my thoughts being so close to her like that.

"Yeah, be sure to write your smile." She commented though her eyes shifted away from mine the moment I moved to meet them with my own. There was a storm brewing behind her eyes, a rough tide that could easily sweep me away if I wasn't too careful. And now, the thoughts of her words plague my mind. And there she is again, in my head, and for what? What could it all mean in the end?

The wave is coming, one in a form I wasn't sure of. Do I hold my breath and brace for impact? Do I let this girl and everything that came with her crash back into me? I wanted to. I really wanted to. "Why can't I quit you, Luz? We're so wrong for each other. So why does it feel so right sometimes? In moments like this one, right now. Why can't I let it go? Why do you stay with me?" All of this passed through my head and I let it slip out and it lingered in the space between us.