Breathe

Chapter 9- Talking Time

When we walked into my house hand in hand, I could immediately feel a sense of relief in my system.

So much had happened in two days and I was still having a hard time understanding it all. All I knew though was that Liam and I were on an actual date now, in my father's home.

"I just need to put the flowers in a vase," I said leading Liam towards my kitchen. "Thanks again."

"It's not a problem Kate," Liam said as a small smile appeared across his pink lips.

I searched in each cupboard of my dad's kitchen until I finally found a round vase with a flat bottom. My mother had always loved to put flowers in vases and set them on the center of our dinner table while we ate. It always seemed to bring some cheerfullness to our rough relationship.

"Liam," I began as I started to fill up the vase with water. He nodded his head to let me know that he was listening. "Why now?"

I seemed to have taken him off guard a little bit, but I had questions that I wanted answered. I wanted to know why he was so suddenly open to being partners with me for the project. I wanted to know why he really broke up with Mandy. I wanted to know why he had actually asked me out on a real date. I had so many questions that I wanted him to answer, and I'm sure he had some for me too.

"What do you mean why now?" he asked as his face scrunched together with confusion.

"I mean, why did you ask me to go on a date with you now. You hated me forty-eight hours ago in Mr.Dugan's classroom," I stated.

"I never hated you Kate..I just hated that you hated me," he said avoiding eye contact with me.

I turned the water off on the faucet suddenly noticing that I had become so intent on listening to his answer that the water was starting to overflow out of the vase.

"I hated how I could only talk to you when we argued. I never actually hated you Kate, that would be impossible seeing that I've liked you since six.." he stopped midsentence and I glanced up at him to see him nervously fiddling with his fingers.

"What'd you say?" I asked, curious about what he was going to finish saying. I could've sworn he was going to say "since sixth grade" which would've shocked me even more. I could recall liking Liam for a while in sixth grade until he changed over to the popular group in middle school and the first two years of high school.

"Uh..nothing," Liam said avoiding the subject easily. "Do you need some help with the flowers?"

I held up the flowers that were already placed into the water filled vase. I could see his cheeks turn a light pink as he mumbled out a subtle "oh." It was actually kind of adorable how he blushed when he was embaressed.

"Mr.Popular is blushing?" I asked with a small smirk spreading across my face.

"No," Liam said, trying to rid of the pink that had overflown his cheeks.

"Alright then," I said placing the flowers on the wooden kitchen table. "So what are we doing on our date then?"

"Well I brought movies," Liam said holding up two movies. One was some horror film which I wasn't really looking forward to watching and then the other was Friends With Benefits, one of my favorite movies.

"That one," I said pointing to the DVD.

"Why not the horror one?" Liam asked.

"Not a real fan of those kind," I said as I started to walk into my living room.

Although the room was small, it still managed to fit a small couch in front of the flat screen TV. My father had decided to buy it when he moved into this apartment/house after the divorce between my parents. He said it would help him feel more "manly."