chapter one
louis
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When I first met her, I guess you could say I acted a little too nice. A few things factored into this, like my recent breakup. But now that I roll it over around in my head, I was completely mesmerized by the way she looked - and that's saying a lot, because when I saw her, hair unkept and tossed over her shoulders, she was sleeping. Yes, I adored a girl who was asleep. I don't exactly know how it all started, but now I was walking back with two cups of tea in my hand, one for I, and the lovely beauty, Ethel Deerling.
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BURNS CEMENTED into my thumbs and white palms as I carried two porcelain figures down an aisle in a rather over-the-top cleaning airport. The sky was a little dreary, a normal thing for old London, and the terminal was nearly empty. I walked with straight lined posture, my pace merely on my tip-toes for the sake of bringing the cups of tea safely to a very sleepy girl.
I took a sharp right, halting for a second to regain my control of the liquids, then resuming to sitting down across from the figure who slumped on a couch. She rested an elbow lazily on her bags, hand propped up to hold her chin up. She sat up when I arrived, a smile brushed on her lips, seeming like it had gone through a lot of wear and tear through the years.
"Thank you. What was your name again? I have a terrible memory." She reached over the table to grab a packet of sugar that I had dropped out from the pockets of my coat. Her chocolate and auburn strands pressed against her delicate face, a hand swiping over the crown of her head to sort the untidy mess of her locks.
"Uh, Louis. Louis Tomlinson." I murmured carefully, my eyes fixed on the beige gray pool that steamed up into my nostrils, which i held quite close to my face. "Oh, and, no problem." I added, glancing up at her, only to be impaled by warm milky almond eyes that looked deeply into mine. She was smiling, the rim of her cup hanging to her lips as she took a sip.
"How much do I owe you, now, Louis Tomlinson?" She hummed as she blew down on the grungy brown surface, making it spiral before she took another quick gulp. "I'm Ethel Deerling by the way." I was simply taken away by the way her syllables came out, the way she said my name, that i almost missed her own.
"Nothing at all, Ethel Deerling." I countered back, my lips plucking up, but my words stammering. I rested my elbows on my knees, taking larger sips than her dainty intakes. "So, you're going to Africa as well? I guess we'll be on the same team, then." I commented, my tone finally sizing up to my lifted eyebrows and grin.
"Mhm. I'm absolutely excited, I really can't explain how excited I am." Suddenly her spine straightened, her shoulders bouncing up so loose strands of her hair tumbled off. Her skin was a neat pale, soft but barely kissed by the sun. "I've never been to Africa before - which is probably obvious." She cuffed a hand over the zipper of her leather jacket, the skin below her temples wrinkled and her eyes bright.
"Can't say I've ever been to Africa either." I laughed, teeth teetering over eachother in a playful smile. A long silence was caught between us just afterwords, but instead of the distance growing between us, we both just smiled at eachother, not breaking our gazes, no matter how painful to me, as we drank.
"Would you like to play a game?" Her voice broke the stare, making me duck my head down swiftly to take a sip of tea. I nodded and swallowed, eyebrow peeking up a bit in curiosity in what kind of game she was offering.
YOU ARE READING
hotfoot - tomlinson
Fanfic" in which dreamers race across the depths of africa in three glorified rickshaws. "
