Leal

39.

Leo wanted to sit outside for lunch again to talk about Friday night.

"I'm just not comfortable with it," he shrugs as he eats a protein bar.

"With what?" I furrow my brows.

"I'm not comfortable with how Alexsei acts around you," he tells me.

"What?" I chuckle, because I genuinely find this quite amusing.

"This isn't funny, Chiara. He's way too comfortable around you, babe. You should've seen the way he touched you on Friday."

"I can't remember much from that party, I drank way too much," I tell him, shrugging.

"He got way too close to you, especially taken the fact I'm your boyfriend and I was stood right there."

"Alexsei wouldn't do anything to harm me," I tell him gently.

"I'm not on about him harming you, I'm on about him respecting our relationship," Leo scowls.

"Oh. Alright."

"I don't want to talk about this anymore," he says.

Fine by me.

We sit in silence for a couple seconds before my stomach rumbles.

"How are you hungry?" He scoffs, "you ate breakfast, didn't you?"

"Uh, no I didn't," I run my hand through my straightened hair.

"Good, you don't need the extra weight," he takes another bite of his protein bar.

I don't know what to say in reply to that, but thankfully I don't need to say anything as he changes the subject.

"There's another party this weekend, we should go," he says.

"Is it Aaron's party again?"

"Yeah, why?" We both get up from the bench when the bell rings.

"Just wondering," I shrug.

That means I won't be allowed to go, as I was filled in on that situation after I was told about the mafia.

"Let me know if you're allowed to go," he kisses my head before we have to go out separate ways, "I love the straight hair, by the way, babe."

I head to English, extremely drained even though it's only third period.

"You okay?" Alexsei asks as he and Archie watch me set my stuff down near my seat.

"Yeah," I sigh tiredly.

I fold my arms on the desk, putting my head on top of them.

"Chiarabald," Archie pokes my forehead.

"Hmm," I hum.

"What's wrong?"

"Tired," I say, slightly muffled by my arms.

"Okay," he says softly and I use the rest of the lesson to nap.

The rest of the day seems to drag and I'm thoroughly exhausted by the time I'm getting out of Giovanni's car and walking to the front door.

"You okay?" Lorenzo asks when he stops me on the stairs.

I just nod, not looking into his eyes.

He gently nudges my head up to look at him properly, "tired?" His eyes flash with understanding.

I nod again, not having any effort to verbally respond.

"Come on, little star, we're going to have a nap because I'm quite tired, too," he leads me to my bedroom.

"Get into some pyjamas, I'll be back in a second," he leaves and shuts my door.

I do as told, quickly getting into some pyjama bottoms and a matching top.

A minute or two later, he knocks on my door, "am I okay to come in?"

"Yeah," I call out.

"Come on," he enters my room and shuts the door behind him, turning my lights off as well, "hop into bed."

I get under my light blue duvet and he does the same, pulling me into a hug.

He starts playing with my hair and one thing about me is that playing with my hair will send me straight to sleep.

"Go to sleep, Chiara," he says quietly, continuing to run his hand through my hair.

Soon enough, I fall asleep.

- LATER -

I woke up before Lorenzo did, so I rolled out of the bed and went to go find Roland.

"Hey, boy," I rub his belly when I find him sat near Taylor.

"I walked him not long ago," he says without looking up from his phone.

"Thank you. Who you messaging?" I ask.

"No one," he immediately gets defensive and turns his phone off.

"Weirdo," I scoff.

"Shut the fuck up," he says with an overly sweet smile.

"Taylor, that's five dollars," Harry calls out from the kitchen.

Taylor just shrugs and pulls five dollars out of his pocket, making his way to the swear jar.

Oh. I was looking forward to him getting into a tantrum.

"Chiara!" I get distracted by Harry, "can you call Lorenzo down for dinner?"

"Sure," I yell back.

I make my way back up to my room with Roland behind me.

"Jump, boy," I tell him.

With a bark, he jumps and runs around my bed.

"Okay, I get it, I need to get up," Lorenzo mutters.

"Morning, sunshine," I grin.

"Glad to see you're not tired anymore," he gets up.

"It's dinner time," I tell him.

"Come on, Roland," I open the door and he runs down the stairs.

I sit at the table, trying to make it seem like I'm eating more than I actually am.

Nobody pays too much attention to my plate, so it's quite easy to get away with.

"I'm going upstairs," I get up whilst most of them are still eating, "night, guys."

I get multiple 'goodnights' and a 'fuck off' from my brother's as I make my way back up to my room.

I lock myself in my bathroom, take a deep breath and kneel down by the toilet bowl.