Shadows of Yesterday

Epilogue: Through the Clouds

74 days later, Christmas day

"Come on, lovebirds! We're gonna miss visiting hours if you don't quit making out and get up here!"

I set down the roll of wrapping paper in my hands to glare up the stairs where Ben's voice had come from. I was sitting on my bedroom floor, wrapping presents for my family's celebration later; the first Christmas we would spend together in five years. I had just finished taping the paper over my dad's present and picked up my mom's when Ben had interrupted. "Shut up, we're not making out! We'll be up in, like, five minutes," I yelled back.

Declan's legal counsel--well, mostly my mom, to be honest--had managed to negotiate inpatient rehab and court-mandated therapy rather than sending him to jail. He'd been there for a few weeks now, and my family was getting ready to go visit him to celebrate Christmas before it was over. 

Oh, and Liam was coming.

With everything going on recently, me and Liam were taking it slow. We wanted to wait until things were more settled with my family to introduce new kinds of relationships into it, so we hadn't put a label on anything yet. I was torn between being content with this decision and impatiently waiting for it to change, but as he had said before, he would, "wait until the world stops, if he has to." He was honorable to a fault; I had to give him that.

Our lack of a label hadn't stopped him from ingraining himself into my family like he'd always been there, though. My family was slow to completely warm up to him, just like they were with everyone, but once they trusted Liam, he was in. That meant he was coming with us to visit my brother, even though they had only met a handful of times, and he was currently wiggling his eyebrows at me as he taped my last present shut. "Maybe we should make out. Then all his complaining would actually mean something."

I smacked him on the shoulder of his cheesy Christmas sweater with a scoff. "You just want an excuse to pull out that ridiculous mistletoe again."

He'd been carrying a fake sprig of mistletoe around in his pocket since just after Thanksgiving. He said it was to carry a bit of the holiday spirit with him wherever he went--which I didn't entirely disbelieve, since it turned out that Liam Brown was a massive fan of Christmas--but I was convinced it was just so he could find excuses to kiss me. 

It was ridiculously cheesy. I would never tell him how much I secretly loved it.

"Oh, you mean this mistletoe?" He pulled it out of his pocket and waved it over his head with a grin. 

"Yes, that."

I obligingly crawled over to his spot on my floor and gave him a quick peck on the lips. 

I was already half-laughing when he caught my face between his hands and held me there, tsking at me like I hadn't given him what he wanted. One hand moved to bury itself in my hair, and the other slid down to my waist.

Liam pulled me into his lap and brought his lips to mine again, capturing them in a lingering kiss full of affection and longing. I wrapped my arms around his neck and sank against him with a happy sigh. 

He deepened the kiss, his fingers tracing little circles on the bare skin beneath my Liam-mandated matching sweatshirt that sent tingles up my spine. 

I could tell from his shaking shoulders that he was as close to laughing as I was. It made it difficult to keep kissing for long, and after a few more seconds, he pulled away to rest his forehead against mine. His eyes twinkled as he looked up at me. 

"You're ridiculous." I scoffed in amusement.

"-ly charming."

"No," I shook my head, the grin never leaving my face, "just ridiculous."