All Too Well - Erik Menendez

Together.

Princeton. NJ. 1988.

Eriks POV:

Sunlight beams through the faint glass, it hits the side of my face directly, it's my first reaction when I open my eyes. The weather is significantly better than it was yesterday. The earth is joyful.
This room is foreign however, it's not Lyles room.

Rummaging my head to the side, I catch sight of Whisper. I must've forgotten to go back to my room and just fell asleep. I'm aware of the smile tugging at my mouth as I breathe in her intoxicating smell. The bed sheets glisten with the notes of her personal fragrance.

Daffodils, summer evenings, sweetness, Whisper.

My fingertips itch at the possibility of reaching over and touching the sharp outlines of her collar bones, maybe even tracing my fingers over her soft lips. Her neck is swan-like and beautiful as it stretches across the soft pillow.
The covers are pulled just below the breast of her night dress and it's a blessing in itself to see her chest rise and fall with every breath.

She's a work of art.

As I sit up, the undeniably – uncomfortable – sticky feeling underneath my sweatpants is apparent. I allow myself to smile the feeling away as last nights wonder falls back into my mind.

The moment witnessed by nobody but the walls hindered in secrecy and redemption. After so long, our souls found their way back to each other for a grand dance. A moment that will follow me back from Princeton, back to the California land.

"This.. this doesn't make everything just go away."

Her sentence reverberates throughout my head. What happens if nothing will make our hardships go away? What if redemption is for exclusive sinners, not meant or shaped for all of us.

Please, trust me again. Forgive me, my girl. I cannot continue in this condition! I have to remind myself to breathe – almost to remind my heart to beat.

I'm torn between staying in her sheets – savouring my first time staying in a girls bed, wrapping my arms around her and cocooning our bodies tightly together. However, I shouldn't. I don't know if that would add fuel to the fire when she wakes up. Maybe she'd be terrified.

Sneaking away to shower is the option I go with.

A desperately needed shower.

~

"Menendez!" My brother annoyingly calls as he enters the kitchen.

My eyes peel in his direction as I attempt to whisk powerfully at the pancake batter I'm currently making. Pancakes, for Whisper. She should like this. Right? Hopefully?

He reaches beside me, his hand aggressively reaches the back of my neck before heartedly shaking me. "You absolute animal!"

Laughter follows and I immediately know what he's referring to, or at least – what he thinks he's referring to, what he thinks happened.

I bite down to infiltrate the embarrassed smile that attempts to make an appearance. "It's not like th-"

"I'll be honest," He places himself on the stool opposite the kitchen island, his arms placed on the table as his smirk is ever-growing. "I didn't think you had it in you, but you fucking did."

"Lyle I-"

"I mean, you know it must've been good if it's got you making pancakes this early of a fucking morning."

"Ly-"

"Was it good?"

I hit the whisking bowl on the island, hoping to cut through the pure vomit that endlessly pours from his mouth. Thankfully, it works.