I was awoken by a deep laugh. And I mean a deep, resonant, quivering laugh. It was so loud; the sound had us all alert and ready for and attack in less than a minute.
The sun was just rising in the distance…and the person that blocked the morning rays was no more welcome than an alien invasion. Xaeren was laughing so much; he had to lean against one of the walls for support. As soon as he put his full weight on it, it collapsed inward and sand covered him from head to toe. It made his laughing pause for a minute. There was a stunned silence. Then it picked up even louder.
“Ha. Nice place…you got here…how much does it…cost to keep it….looking so good?” Xaeren asked between laughs. He was actually wiping tears out of his eyes.
“If y’all need a place to stay, I’m sure we could all stay in the same house.” He said. I wasn’t sure is he was being genuinely nice, or if he was mocking me.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, trying to sound casual, but my heart was trying to crawl up my throat.
“I come here to run. What are you doing here?” He asked, genuinely interested.
“My brother set off the fire alarm last night and we couldn’t get back to sleep, so we brought this stuff out here to watch the sunrise.” I said, blushing as I realized I was only in some very short shorts and a small tank top.
I quickly grabbed one of the blankets I had thrown off, and I used it to cover myself. Xaeren smirked at me as he saw me cover myself.
“Alright, since you asked so nicely, I’ll watch the sunrise with you too.” He said as he moved towards me, and when I wouldn’t move over, he picked me up and moved me bodily. He picked at the tangled blankets, drawing out the thickest one and wrapped it around himself.
His eyes shone with some weirdly optimistic emotion. The sun rose through the clouds, reflecting off of the waves. The sun was lightly swathed with a fine down made of clouds. Small rays of sunshine broke through, making the surrounding clouds light purple and pink. It was like a little slice of heaven on Earth.
As soon as the sun was free of the clouds, I let myself fall back into a comfortable sleep once more
