Be My Juliet [on hold]

Chapter 37

*Jess's POV*

"Wait, if that's Romeo, then where's Juliet?" someone in the restaurant asks. Shit. I'm done for. We're done. Shit, shit, shit, SHIT. Almost immediately, James drops my hand, leaving me longing for his touch and the sense of protection it'd give me right now.

"Yeah, who is that?" a teenager with his family asks, eyes wide and looking me and James up and down.

"Who the fuck is she?" a woman around my age asks, putting down the fork in her hand and focusing her attention on us.

"Who the fuck are you?" I hear someone else direct at me. I look around the restaurant, seeing that everyone is either staring directly at us or watching from the corner of their eyes. They're embarrassed for us, trying to look away but unable to seeing as there's no other conversations going on. It's dead silent, apart from the questions being shouted out and the acoustic Spanish guitar music playing softly over the speakers.

I look at James, studying his face for any inkling of what's going through his head right now. Obviously, I worry that he is suspicious of me, that some part of him knows that I'm the one that called Angeline and set him up. "It's alright babe," he whispers to me, trying to smirk but almost appearing as though he's too self-conscious in this moment to do so. "We were just about to leave, yeah?"

I nod softly, still very scared of what's going to happen. "My place?" I add. This time he finally manages a smile, and nods back at me. He grabs my hand again, squeezing it and circling his thumb in attempts to soothe me, probably picking up on my feeling of extreme discomfort and terror.

He's the first to start walking, my feet not yet listening to my brain which has been screaming at me to get the hell out of here since I first laid eyes on the reporter. I trail behind, still holding his hand tight as we weave through the tables of the restaurant towards the exit.

That's when they start.

Angeline's camera is the first to go off, snapping a picture of us escaping and James looking back at me to make sure I'm alright. I see a teenage girl take out her phone and take another photo, followed by tons more. The sound of the cameras going off and the image of the flashes lighting up our path just make me feel exponentially worse, wanting to break down and cry right then and there. James continues to pull me along, keeping his cool in a way that is far out of character.

"You can't just leave!" someone calls. "We deserve to know what's happening!"

"Yeah," someone else adds. "Grow a pair and tell us who she is!"

"You know what?" James says, stopping dead in his tracks.

"Babe... don't." I tell him, knowing he's about to explode.

"Don't 'babe' me! I don't owe them an answer! This is my life. Our lives. Not theirs. They don't 'deserve' to know anything about it!" he starts to boom, drawing what seems like even more attention to us.

"Please, can we just leave?" I ask as sweetly as I can muster. "It'd mean a lot to me if you could just leave with me right now. Don't reply, don't talk back, just leave." He looks me dead in the eyes, letting me see the fire burning under them in this enraged state.

"Fine." He mutters.

We start walking again, letting the sound of the restaurant buzzing fall quiet as we close the front door behind us. "For you." he adds under his breath, making me smile and blush ever so slightly. I hail us a taxi, and tell the driver my address.

We sit in silence for a few minutes, both of us still processing what just happened. "That was easily the strangest dinner I've ever had." I say, trying to break the silence.

It makes James crack a smile, which then turns into an uncontrollable laugh. "It really was," he adds quickly. I join in, giggling like an idiot at something that was not funny at all but helping us to calm down. We keep laughing together, unable to stop even though our stomachs start to ache. I see the cab driver look back at us using his mirror, just making me laugh even harder. He quickly follows, feeding off me until we have tears streaming down our faces from smiling so much.

Suddenly James grabs my face and leans over, planting a kiss on my lips. Before I let him pull away, I grab his shirt and tug him closer, letting the feeling of his lips against mine and the smell of his cologne drown out every other sense I have. Focusing solely on him lets me start to forget about how I feel, making me more attracted to him. He gives in, kissing me back much more passionately than before and wrapping an arm around my waist to yank me closer.

"That'll be eleven pounds," the driver tells us, stopping the car abruptly in front of my door. James breaks away from me and glares at the man, handing him the fare and getting out without a word.

"Thank you..." I say as I exit, James pulling me out quickly and not letting me say anything else. He slams the door behind me and we watch as the car drives off, James' arm snaking around my waist yet again while we do.

He kisses the top of my head as we walk towards the door, smiling down at me as I fish for my keys buried somewhere in my bag. Eventually I find then, and put them in the door only to find that it's already unlocked.

"What the hell?" I say under my breathe, sure that I remembered to lock it when I left. I burst through the door, fully expecting the place to be ransacked. "Hello?" I call out, earning me a confused face from James.

"JESS!" I hear someone call, followed by loud footsteps running to greet me at the door. Pen emerges from the hallway, watching helplessly as she stops in her tracks and studies James and I in the doorway. Just like he did in the restaurant, he lets go of me almost instinctively, as if he's embarrassed to be seen touching me in front of her. Her face crumples into a confused and disappointed glare, not speaking again.

"Is that her?" I hear a male voice call, already knowing it's Dan. Oh shit.

A/N: Hi guys!! I am so so so insanely sorry that I took so long (again) to update. I've been really busy with school! I hope that this chapter kind of makes up for it; please don't hate me. I'd like to just say a quick thank you for 1 million reads, it's honestly so so crazy to me. I'm still in shock. how can MY dumb little thing have so many reads???? pure insanity. I don't deserve you guys, you're too sweet to me even through the way-too long bouts of me not posting/disappearing to focus on schoolwork. Please just remember that even if I don't reply to a message or comment or something, you guys do mean a lot to me!! <3 <3 <3 Today, I'd like to bring it back in the comments to a version of a game we used to play a lot. Recently, I've been listening to a lot of Halsey, Radiohead, and ALLIE X. If ya want, tell me which of these bands you like the best, what song of one (or two, or all three of them!) you like best, a band that reminds you of these artists, or just whatever you've been listening to recently!! Have a great day if you've made it this far into my author's note, and stay amazing xx