LANCASTER AND MAXWELL ( ✔ )

chapter seventeen.

Chapter Seventeen.

SULLIVAN has always hated the color yellow. 

Scratch that —  that's too broad of a statement to make. He doesn't actually hate it; in fact, he adores the way it looks on anyone else but him. The way the hue sits on his pale skin makes him uncomfortable. It feels ostentatious, overwhelming, and makes him feel as if he's overcompensating; yellow makes it obvious that he's never been one to have eyes on him. 

So naturally, the El Sayed siblings make it their life mission to put him in the brightest yellow shirt in existence. 

He grudgingly tugs on the sleeve of the shirt as he sits in the passenger seat of Abasi's Audi, a wrinkle in between his neat brows and a frown on his lips. The fabric feels scratchy on his skin even though he knows the shirt is the softest thing he's ever felt. He can't tell if this is some sort of plan the siblings concocted in order to boost his self confidence, but it does quite the opposite. Yellow makes him feel insecure, unsure of himself. It reminds him of a past life — bruised knees, crooked glasses, words bitten back, and blurred feelings he couldn't put into words. Sullivan has spent a long time trying to stay away from that version of himself, and he'd rather not retract from all the progress he's made thus far. 

Abasi swats the boy's hands away from his arms, a playful look on his face while he parks. "Stop scratching, or else you're going to mark up your skin."

"The shirt is itchy," Sullivan grumbles. 

"It's silk." 

"So?" 

Snorting from the backseat, Aziza doesn't move her eyes away from the compact mirror in her hand as she applies more gloss to her lips. "Someone's been a little testy ever since we picked out that pretty shirt for him," she sings. 

His back hits the leather of the seat with a huff, folding his arms across his chest and allowing his eyes to analyze the shirt he has on. It's a button-down silk yellow shirt with magenta flowers all over it, first three buttons undone to reveal the underwhelming sight of a golden rosary dangling down a flat, pale chest. Blowing curls out of his line of eyesight (he's been meaning to go get a haircut), he replies with a murmur, "Because it's an obnoxious color; yellow is the color of attention whores."

"Yellow is my favorite color." 

"I'm not taking back what I said," he snips. "Plus, I look shitty in it."   

The girl snorts and clicks the compact close. "Oh shut up, you look great. You're totally giving me Harry Styles vibes right now." 

He turns and lifts an eyebrow at the Egyptian in the backseat.  "And is that supposed to make me feel any better?" He opens his mouth again to give another snarky remark, but Aziza picks that moment to pop her lips together and purse them at him, the pink shimmer glinting within the dim lighting of the parking lot. After that, what he wants to say leaves him entirely and all he's left to do is shut his mouth closed and turn around. It seems like an innocent enough action; though, his guts tugs and tells him that she did it on purpose. 

"Kid. Look at me." Reluctantly, the young man turns his body to the left and makes the mistake of looking into intense hazel eyes, eyes that seem so old and cryptic yet young and playful at the same time. How is that even possible, to seem so old and young all at once?

"You look absolutely gorgeous in any color you wear." Abasi never takes his eyes off of him, and the leather of the backseat hisses when Aziza leans up and wraps her hand around the nape of his neck, her small thumb running gentle circles where his jaw meets his throat. The air gets so thick around him, it feels as if he's going to have an asthma attack right then and there. The moment feels too intimate to be innocent, everyone in the car knows it, and yet nobody pulls away. Abasi's sultry eyes and the feeling of Aziza's soft hand grazing gently against his skin are enough to make his head spin and his heart pound a little harder in its bony cage.