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THERE was an anxious knock on Baby's door before she even woke up the next morning. And she was content to ignore it until they kept knocking. So, with a whine, she dragged the comforter off the bed, it wrapped around her shoulders to keep her warm as she opened the door.
"What?" she whined, not even opening her eyes as she did so — the sun was only just starting to come up, for god's sake. "Let me sleep."
"Baby, can we talk?"
Her eyes flew open at the sound of Tyler's voice, who was still in his sweatpants and t-shirt that he'd slept in. And he didn't look like he'd slept well at all. He'd been up all night, tossing and turning as he thought about Baby and what he wanted from her.
Maybe if she weren't so tired, she'd have been thinking better and would've shut the door in his face like he deserved. But Baby just sighed and let him inside, going back to sit on the edge of the bed.
Tyler took a moment to shut the door before facing her, only to hold back a groan as the comforter dropped from around Baby's shoulders.
Because fuck, if she wasn't only in a tight, white cropped shirt and a pair of soft blue underwear.
Tyler's felt like his brain was a malfunctioning all of a sudden, his mouth painfully dry as he spotted her nipples through the fabric. Suddenly, he couldn't even remember what he came to say.
Something about being sorry but it couldn't keep happening. He wasn't really sure anymore.
And Baby, still on their verge of waking up, just rubbed her eyes tiredly. "What, Tyler?"
After a moment, he collected himself and sat next to her on the bed, intentionally so that he couldn't look at her in her current attire as he stared forward at the wall. "I hate you being mad at me, Baby."
"I ain't mad," she mumbled. "Just hurts is all with you messing with me like this. It ain't fair."
"No, it ain't," he agreed. "I'm bein' an asshole."
"Least you're self aware," she said, the corners of her lips turning up. "But you gotta stop. You're getting my hopes up."
"Hopes for what?" he asked, so desperate to know what she was thinking.
Slowly, she looked up at him, and Tyler tore his gaze off the wall to meet her gaze. She looked so vulnerable as she spoke. "I've always had a crush on you, Ty," she admitted softly.
And Tyler's heart nearly skipped a beat. "Why ain't you said anything?"
She sighed and looked down at her fingers, picking at them nervously. "'Cause I know I'm always gone be Boone's little sister to you. I didn't have to say nothing."
