Chapter 44
Light was flooding in through the window beside the bed. Her eyelids fluttered until Lisa finally woke up. She squinted it and closed it again. She groaned. She didn't feel like waking up just yet.
Lisa heard noises from downstairs. Soft paws running against the vinyled floor. The sound of bodies thumping softly against something solid. There were hissings, too. And meows. Leo and Luca, Lisa thought and smiled a little. Her two boys were always active in the morning and would either judge her or shower her with love when she gets down later. The judging part would mostly be done by Leo. There was definitely something with that cat. And Luca--that beautiful boy was always so sweet and compose and didn't have issues. They were a complete polar opposite, in Lisa's maternal opinion. There was music, too.
Her mornings had always been like that, except the music playing on the speakers. Nothing new. Nothing extraordinary. Nothing unusual. Except that she did not feel ordinary at all. Something was persistently prodding her semi-conscious state of being. It was hanging in the air and clearly demanding for her attention. It wasn't thick. It wasn't too thin, either. But it was there, just waiting for her to acknowledge it.
Lisa stretched her long limbs until her muscles ached and protested and let out a long yawn but stopped halfway and suddenly wondering why there was a strong essence of strawberry seeping through her nosetrils in the morning. Why was she inhaling strawberry in the morning? She squeezed her eyes more. She had always been disoriented in the morning and had to actually recall what occurred the night before, every time.
She went to a party with Doona. That part she could practically remember easily. And Jennie arrived. And Jisoo, too, in her pajamas. And Jennie again, in the car with her. And Jennie. In her house. Jennie, in her bed. Jennie and all sorts of sounds that Jennie made when...
Lisa snapped her eyes open. She sprung up and looked at the empty space beside her. At the crumpled sheet, in furrowed brows.
"Jennie?" Lisa uttered the name a little too loudly--laced with panic and confusion--and noticed the neatly piled office clothes at the foot of her bed that obviously weren't hers.
"Down here, by the kitchen!" Jennie replied from downstairs.
And that was what made Lisa's morning different today. The promise of a good breakfast was wafting in the air. Pancakes, definitely. She could smell the buttery goodness of it already. Not burnt (thank goodness!) and sniggered at the thought. There was a delicious mixture of aromas from coffee and chocolate, too. And also the expensive strawberry scent that lingered comfortably on her bed, and the outburst of excitement and embarrassment inside her, yes. Lisa started to wonder what Jennie was wearing while working on the kitchen below, now that her clothes from last night were, well, abandoned.
And Lisa was still wearing the red dress from last night, she finally noticed as she pushed herself up from her bed, groggily at first because she was still finding her bearings. She went straight to her closet and randomly picked something to wear--an oversized white tee that stretches towards half of her long thighs. She bunned her hair and headed to the bathroom to remove the make up she was still wearing and brush her teeth.
She smiled and snickered at herself through the misty mirror when the intimate memories from last night started to flood in, especially at the thought of where her mouth and tongue had transcended, while she was brushing it. Her face was burning hot, even after she splashed cold water into it to wash off the facial foam she applied on it.
"Lili?" Jennie called, probably wondering why Lisa hasn't descended yet from the loft.
"Coming!" Lisa responded and quickly dried her face with a towel.
