Please, take my heart

28.) I need coffee, and you

I wake up to the faint sound of rain against my window, the air in my room cold enough to make me curl deeper under the blanket. For a second, I let myself exist in that half-asleep haze where nothing is real, where I don’t have to think about anything—about Ivan, about whatever the hell is happening between us, about the way my heart keeps betraying me when it shouldn’t.

Then my phone buzzes.

I groan, reaching blindly to grab it from my bedside table. My vision is still blurry, but I don’t need to see the name on the screen to know who it is. No one else texts me this early.

Ivan: Wake up.

I stare at the message. Then another one arrives.

Ivan: I know you're awake.

I scoff. He’s annoyingly perceptive. I type back—

Me: You know too much. Go away.

A second later, there's a knock at my door.

I freeze. Then narrow my eyes. “You’re texting me from inside the house?”

Ivan’s voice comes from the other side, amused. “Genius deduction.”

I sigh, dragging myself out of bed. My feet are freezing against the floor as I shuffle toward the door, but I’m too stubborn to put on socks. I open it to find Ivan leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed, looking way too awake for someone who barely sleeps.

He raises an eyebrow. “Did you brush your mouth?”

I roll my eyes, shoving past him toward the bathroom. “I’m doing it now, your highness.”

“Good,” he says, following me like an annoying shadow. “Because I brought you coffee.”

That makes me pause. I peek out from the bathroom, and sure enough, he’s holding a takeaway coffee cup, his fingers wrapped around it like he’s been warming them.

I squint. “You didn’t go out in the rain just to get me coffee, did you?”

Ivan tilts his head slightly, smirking. “Maybe I did.”

I scoff, stepping back in to finish brushing my teeth. When I come out, he’s already sitting on the couch, one leg folded under him, scrolling through his phone like he owns the place.

I plop down next to him, grabbing the coffee from his hands. “You’re being suspiciously nice.”

He glances at me sideways. “I can take the coffee back.”

I clutch it to my chest dramatically. “No. Mine.”

He chuckles under his breath. “Thought so.”

For a second, we just sit there, the sound of rain filling the silence between us. I sip my coffee, the warmth spreading through my chest, but I’m hyper-aware of Ivan next to me—of the way his fingers drum against his knee, of the way he exhales through his nose when he’s lost in thought.

Then he speaks, voice softer than before. “What are you thinking about?”

I shake my head. “Nothing.”

He doesn’t believe me, I can tell. But he doesn’t push. He just shifts a little closer, so subtly that I wouldn’t have noticed if I wasn’t already paying attention to every tiny move he makes. And then I go back to my room.
.

I have to do something. Anything.

I glance at the time. 7:43 AM. Too early for classes but not early enough to go back to sleep. My stomach growls, and I realize I haven’t eaten anything since last night’s mess of emotions and Manchurian. I decide to make breakfast.