Paralyzed

Chapter 21 : "Real date"

Chapter 21

The next day...  

Riker POV

"Riker?" Avery asked, coming in the front door.

"What?"

"Um... Well I got the mail, but there's paparazzi outside your house. They tried asking me a million questions."

"Did you say anything?"

"Yeah."

"What?"

"I said it was none of their business."

"Oh. Good," I said, laughing.

"I wasn't going to tell them anything. I can't believe they're at your house."

"I want to yell at them and give them a piece of my mind so bad. But I don't want them to get any more pictures of me."

"I'm sure they'll get bored and leave."

"Really? Because I feel like they won't have a problem sitting out there all day."

Avery started closing all the curtains in the house.

"Well we're not going to give them anything. Except some of them took pictures of me. But at least it's not you."

"They're probably going to use those pictures of you to write a new news article."

"Probably. But I don't care. I'm not famous. It's not going to bother me. I just want to make sure to protect you."

"You know, it's usually supposed to be the guy protecting the girl."

"Yeah well sometimes it can be the other way around. If they want to take pictures of me getting your mail, then fine. Let's see how much of a story they can make of that."

Avery sat down on the floor beside me. I put my arm around her tight.

"We should do something fun tonight," I said.

"Like?"

"Like... I feel bad that I can't really take you out on a date. I mean, I don't know when I'll be leaving the house again with all those people out there. What if we had a date night here? I could try to cook dinner."

"That seems like a lot. How about you let me help?"

"Ok, deal. But it needs to be fancy. I want this to feel like a real date night."

Avery laughed.

"What?" I asked.

"A real date night? So just hanging out isn't a real date night? A real date night has to be fancy?"

"You know what I mean. I just want it to be special. We don't really go on dates because we just live together. So I want this to be special."

"I like that idea. It'll be fun."

I grabbed her hand and intertwined our fingers.

"And then we can have a movie night and cuddle," I said.

Avery kissed my cheek.

"Sounds like a plan."

Later...

Avery POV

"Riker, don't!"

He flicked flour at me. I grabbed the flour bag and started throwing some at him.

"Hey! Not fair! I can't run away!" He said, laughing.

"We're making such a mess."

"I know. But it's worth it because it's fun."

Riker pulled me onto his lap and kissed me. When we pulled apart, I started laughing.

"What?" Riker asked.

"You're covered in flour."

"Yeah, because of you!"

I got off his lap and started cleaning up. Riker and I had made a big mess while making dinner, but we figured it out in the end. He lit candles and we had a very romantic dinner. But now we were making brownies because he insisted on making dessert too and that's when he started messing around with the flour.

"Why don't you go take a shower and get cleaned up? And I'll put the brownies in the oven and clean up the dishes from dinner?" I asked.

"Ok."

"By the time you get back, they'll probably be done cooking and we can have our movie night just like you wanted."

Riker POV

I smiled and pushed myself away from the table. I was getting really good at using the wall to push dad's office chair down the hall to get to the bathroom.

I closed the door but kept it cracked open. Avery was ok with not supervising me when I take showers, but she wants me to leave the door cracked open so I can call for her if something happens.

Honestly, I was getting pretty good at taking showers by myself, especially now that I had the shower chair Avery bought me.

I got undressed and started the water. I got in when it was finally warm.

Tonight has been so great. But I'm getting slightly worried that if I end up fully recovering, Avery will lose interest in me. I'm just worried that she only likes me because she's studying medical stuff and my injury is interesting to her. But the more we spend time together, the more I feel like she likes me for me, not just because I have an injury that's interesting.

So I'm happy for that.

I finished showering, dried off, and got changed into my pjs. But it was kind of hot out tonight, so I didn't put a shirt on.

I went back to the living room and got settled on the floor in my bed. I could hear Avery still cleaning up the dishes in the kitchen, so I decided to go on social media while I waited.

Of course there was another article published about me, using the pictures of Avery they took today when she was getting the mail.

Basically the article said maybe I didn't go on tour so I could stay home with my girlfriend instead, and that I didn't care about the band anymore.

I was just getting so mad about this whole thing.

"Riker?"

I looked up. Avery had a plate with a brownie on it, which she handed to me.

"Thanks," I said, taking it.

"You ok?"

"They wrote another article. I'm just getting really sick of this," I said, annoyed.

Avery sat down beside me.

"It makes me just want to tell everyone what's going on so they stop. But they probably wouldn't stop anyway. They'd probably just write more articles about me. What would you do?"

"Well... Maybe they're trying to annoy you so much that you finally tell everyone what's going on. I wouldn't want to give them that power over me. So I'd probably stay quiet. You can do whatever you want. But they're not going to get any more pictures of you. If you just stay inside, and I get the mail, what else could they possibly write about?"

"Good point. But I'm sure they'd still find something to write about anyway. I just wish they'd stop."

"You could make another statement, and just not say what happened to you."

"Like say the articles aren't true and that I want people to respect my privacy?"

"Yeah, something like that."

"Maybe that's what I'll do then... But for now, I just want to watch a movie and cuddle and eat brownies."