After The Ending (John Frusciante)

Chapter 34

September 1991

"What the.. Stop it!" Amaya squaled as she opened her eyes and sent a light smack in Ryan's direction, the blue-eyed surfer only laughing wholeheartedly while Amaya whined in discomfort and rubbed her nose, "I hate it when you do that!"

"I had to wake you up somehow, didn't I?" he continued laughing, finding himself utterly humorous over disrupting Amaya's sleep with slowly pinching her nose and cutting her from air supply.

"Yeah, that's definitely not a psychotic way to do it," Amaya muttered again and rolled her eyes, then wrapped herself tighter inside the blanket and turned her back against him.

"Okay, I'm sorry," Ryan chuckled as he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close, "I just wanted to tell you that I need to get going. I have that surfing thing in a couple of hours."

"Mhmh," Amaya rolled her eyes, making herself look more annoyed than she actually was, "Well, get going then. Don't be late."

"Still grumpy, aren't we?" Ryan laughed, then squeezed his arms around her even tighter and whispered, "Wish me luck? I love you."

Suddenly, Amaya shot her eyes open and stared blankly right in front of herself for a moment, then slowly turned her face towards Ryan and inspected the shy smile on his face.

"You.." he softly breathed, "You don't have to say anything. I know I was an asshole in the past."

"Ryan.." she managed to mumble after a second, the blonde surfer then cutting her off with a quick kiss on the lips, "As I said, you don't have to say anything."

He then jumped up from the bed and stated, "If things are going well today, we'll celebrate later in the club, okay?"

"Uhm.. yeah," Amaya slowly nodded, then pushed herself up from the bed and stared as the boy began making his way out of her room.

"Ryan?" she then worded the second he was about to step out of the door, "Good luck."

"Thanks," he beamed, then slipped out of the room while Amaya only continued sitting on her bed, dumbfounded.

This was definitely not a part of her plan, not that she really even had one, but if there was one thing she had been absolutely convinced of, it was that she didn't have to worry about finding herself in a situation like this.

Love? He loved her?

Amaya didn't know what to think and how to feel, only groaning by herself as she threw herself back on the bed.

She was not expecting this. Not in a million years had she thought that she was going to hear such words from him, the ultimate of all verbal expressions of affection, the words slipping from his lips so casually and so easily. It felt surreal, ironic even, the whole thing once again seeming like a sick joke from the universe that Amaya found no humor in.

It wasn't that she didn't care about him. Of course she did. After all of the months that he had been back in her life, she had grown to care about him and got used to having him around, finding comfort in his carefree manner and the fact that he knew how to have fun and make her feel good about herself, making her feel wanted and cared for and forget about all the things she didn't want to have in her mind. He was there for her at the right moments and Amaya truly appreciated that, but love..

That was just something she knew that she didn't feel towards him, at least not in its most direct and romantic sense, and she knew that it was something she was never going to feel towards him.

It was supposed to be nothing, just a casual thing to help her get over John and feel better about herself, which Amaya now realized was an incredibly selfish and stupid thing to do. And she had no idea how to fix this sudden mess, the words still lingering in her mind as she went on with her day and eventually made it to the night, the girl setting her steps towards a small club in Hollywood a few minutes after 11 PM.