Marriage of convenience

Chapter 17

If someone could pull off being scary while just being silent, then it would be Ray. There was silence all around us if not for the sound of the engine of the car. My heart was hammering and there was nothing I could do to ease the tension. My throat was dry and my mouth felt like a desert. There was no sound coming out when I tried to speak. This silence continued until we reached home and he walked inside. Unfortunately, grandma wasn't at home and I feared what would come next. I walked after him into the house and my stomach lurched when he locked the main door shut. He still didn't talk and that was my limit. I would have been fine if he started screaming at me, but this kind of silence, I couldn't take.

"Ray?" I called. He didn't turn around. "Why aren't you saying something?" When he still didn't reply, I asked again, "Ray, say something. This is scary. Please."

He slumped into the couch with his head in his palms and sighed deeply. "Did you know how scary it was for me when I heard that you were missing?" He asked, still not looking at me.

That took me off guard. "What?" I admit it, I wasn't expecting this out of everything that I imagined him to say! "I mean, sorry, what?"

"Are you an idiot?" He yelled, finally looking at me. He looked angry, yet worried and his face was as pale as a ghost. "I didn't know what would happen to you once Hunter let out our secret and I couldn't even keep an eye on you. When I came to check on you, you disappeared from the class. You were gone already. When Thomas told me that Hunter was the one who lead you out, I almost had a heart attack. Not knowing where you were almost killed me. I searched the entire campus and when I tried calling you, I couldn't reach you and Hunter's phone was switched off," he slumped back into the couch, his voice hoarse. "I only had one place in mind and that was a huge chance that I was taking. What if you weren't there? What if something happened to you? What if someone caught on to us? What if he did something to you?" He looked at me desperately and I was speechless. I didn't know how to react to this sort of situation and I was way too bad with consoling others. "There were so many 'what if's' and I wished none of them came true."

I sat beside him on the couch, holding his hand, silently offering him assurance that I was beside him and that nothing happened to me. All of a sudden, he pulled me into a hug and wrapped his hands around me so tightly that I felt his hammering heart beat. 

"R- Ray..." Was all that I could say at that moment. My eyes were wide open as if closing them would end this cruelly beautiful moment and my heart was pounding so bad that I was afraid that Ray could feel it just like I did his heart. My face was beet red and I prayed for this moment to last forever.

"Never disappear ever again. Promise me. Please, I beg you," he whispered in my ear. He sounded so vulnerable and my heart hurt for him.

But there will be a day when I will disappear from your life. And you will personally ask me to.

"I promise," I whispered, praying that I wouldn't have to break this promise.

And as all beautiful moments come to an end, ours came too, but to an awkward end. Grandma burst in along with two maids and a driver and they all got to witness our first moment together.

"Oh my God," she said in the most girly way possible for an old woman and squealed, "what are you all staring at? Get in the kitchen! Now!" The maids hurried in giggling at us and the driver awkwardly bowed and left along with the two. We separated awkwardly and sat at either of the ends of the couch and our grandma gushed, "I am so sorry for intruding this way! Oh my God, I never thought that I'll live to see this day! I want great grandchildren soon!"

"Grandma!" I exclaimed, my cheeks turning red and embarrassment kicking in full force. Why couldn't these old people refrain from making things awkward?