Living In The Shallows (UK Crush #1)

Chapter Fourteen

 The Thursday night traffic was sparse, and we arrived back at the hotel before 1:00 AM. As we were going up in the elevator, Matty suddenly turned to me and asked, "Are you tired, or do you  want to hang out for a bit?"

"What? I thought you didn't want to go out because you were tired?" I asked in confusion.

"I never said that. I didn't want to go out because those girls were horrible, and most of the people we meet when we go out to those kinds of places are like them, and I have better things to do with my time." He took a deep breath.

"I'm good, wide awake, actually, and we can sleep in tomorrow morning, so yeah, let's hang out. Your room or mine?" I responded.

"Um, yours," Matty said happily, so we went two doors down to my room. We chatted about the show and the dinner as I changed into my pajamas in the bathroom and washed my face. I came out, freshly scrubbed, and Matty took one look at me and smiled in a funny way.

I looked down at myself. "What? You don't like the Clippers?" It was my favorite jersey, certainly modest by anyone's standards; it came down nearly to my knees.

"No, it's not that, it's just, with your face all washed and everything, you look like a wee bairn—a little kid," he explained.

"I know what 'wee bairn' means," I said as I sat down on the sofa next to him. "I've seen Trainspotting, you know."

"Do you even know how much I love that you didn't say Braveheart?" he said to me.

"Oh, I've seen that one, too," I assured him. "I love movies. You name it, I've seen it.

"Hey, Matty," I said as I sat down with a glass of wine from the mini-fridge. I tucked one leg under me so I could sit facing him.

"Yes, Tink," he returned with a smile.

"Am I imagining it, or have things been a little off between us the past couple days?"

He swallowed. "Wow, you can be blunt when you want to."

I sighed. "So I'm not imagining it, then."

He looked out the window at the city and didn't say anything.

"Matty, why?" I thought back over the past few days. After all, I'd actually only known him for a week. Granted, it had been a time-intensive week, where we'd been in each other's presence nearly constantly, but still. What could possibly have gone wrong? Especially when he'd chosen to come back here with me, to my room, rather than go out to a nightclub with the people he was closest to in the whole world? Could this have something to do with the hand holding in the car? Oh no.

He took a deep breath, as if he was going to say something, then he closed his mouth. He opened his mouth, then closed it again. Wow, this was serious. Please don't let this be about me.

"Matty, please. You're starting to scare me. What? You obviously wanted to get me alone so you could talk to me about something. So here we are, all alone, don't lose your nerve now; talk to me." I took another swallow of wine.

He took another deep breath. "Okay. I want to talk to you about something. I want to ask you something, actually. And it's embarrassing, because I know it's none of my business, but not knowing is killing me. I'm actually losing sleep not knowing, so I'm just going to ask you. If you don't want to answer me, if you want to tell me to sod off, I'll go back to my room, I'll understand completely. Okay?" He looked everywhere but at me, took another deep breath, and finally, he looked me in the eye, and I was surprised at the pain I saw in his dark blue ones.

"Okay, Matty. Okay." I put the wine glass on the table, scooted closer to him, and took both of his hands in mine. He returned my grip with a firmness that was almost painful. He seemed to realize this, and relaxed his hold a bit.