Love and Lies

Chapter 13 - Never ever.

I woke up late Sunday morning, with my eyes still painfully puffy from the crying last night. Thoughts of yesterday evening came flooding back; how I’d been kissed, how I’d ran away, how I’d trashed my room…but my room was tidy now, everything back in its place, as though I didn’t place a finger on it. Maybe it was a dream then…

I shook the thought off with a confused shrug and made my way downstairs. The reflection of the girl walking downstairs in the hall mirror didn’t quite look like me anymore. Her black hair was tangled and bedraggled. Her dismal brown eyes surrounded in red. Everything looked so wrong, from her hair right down to those stripy bed socks she wore. I didn’t recognise her. I couldn’t. I saw no emotion in her eyes. Only did I realise it was me when I looked down at my stripy socks.

I looked disgusting yet I didn’t really care. All I saw were images of William. Something was different…I might be heart broken. Ugh.

I loped off to the kitchen and put the kettle on, preparing to drown my sorrows in a cup of tea. After all, who needs boys when you have tea and chocolate?

I walked over to the table to see a note.

‘Gone shopping with grandma. Mum – 9.30am

Gone to golf. Dad -10.15am’

Ah. Regardless, I grabbed a family sized bar of Galaxy and headed for the living room. But as I was walking down the hall, the doorbell rang.  

‘Probably the post-man’ I muttered to myself as I approached it. But instead I opened it to a boy in jeans and a red hoodie with sandy blond hair. My instinct was to slam the door in his face and curl up on the sofa and cry until I couldn’t anymore, but before I could move he was inside and had shut the door behind him. In his hands were a bunch of flowers, which he pushed towards me saying, ‘For you.’

‘Thanks…..’ I replied timidly and carried on into the living room. He followed. I sat down on the two person sofa and he invited himself into the space next to me.

‘You look beautiful.’ He said sheepishly.

‘Thanks.’ I replied bluntly, trying to stop the conversation.

‘Look I‘m sorry about yesterday. I know I must be really hard for you to understand at the moment, I know. Telling you I killed my own father then kissing you…. I’m not really acting myself am I?’

I shook my head and looked down at the flowers in my hands. They were so gorgeous.

‘Look. I love you too. I didn’t want to make you feel uncomfortable. Never ever. I felt like such a …well I just felt stupid when I kissed you and you left. I know you didn’t want to kiss me and I shouldn’t have forc…’   

‘I wanted you to. I wanted to kiss you, you didn’t force me.’ I cut him off.

‘What?’ William recoiled a fraction of a centimetre but I still noticed it.

‘I’m sorry I walked out yesterday. It all got a bit too much for me. But I wanted to kiss you. I have done since the moment you sat down next to me in class on your first day. I love you William’

The words escaped my mouth before I had time to stop them. But I had nothing to regret. I had been truthful and loyal and if he wanted to walk out, he could. I wouldn’t stop him.

He took the flowers off me, placed them on the floor and pulled me to his chest. My ear was right over his heart and I could hear it beating at an incredibly fast pace. How sweet. He sighed into my hair.

‘I love you too Zara, you don’t know how long I’ve been waiting to tell you that.’ I felt his warm lips press down onto my forehead gently and his innocent smile appeared once more right in front of me.

At that moment in time, I didn’t care what William had done. What he had done and what he will do. As long as I was in his arms, I’d be safe. As long as I could hear his heartbeat, I would manage to live. I snuggled down into him and closed my eyes, feeling completely comfortable and content.

I know William hurt people in the past, but I knew that he would never even dream of hurting me.

Never ever.