third time's a charm

"we're going to burnside's"

chapter three: we're going to burnside's

Saturday, December 8. 12:36 AM.

"When do people usually start going home, anyway?" I asked Jamie as we stumbled back into his house, laughing quietly to ourselves for very little reason.

"It just depends, honestly. I'm sure some people have already left, but some people don't leave until closer to two in the morning. I've had a fair share of people fall asleep here and wake up in the morning completely out of it." My nose scrunched in discomfort and Jamie tilted his head to the side. "What?"

"I just wouldn't know how to handle people... also, it's nothing against you, but I don't want to stay here until two in the morning. I wanna go home." Jamie laughed loudly at my words and I was glad he hadn't taken offense to them. Jamie grabbed my hand and pulled me into the kitchen; thankfully, we were alone. Jamie started to clean up around the kitchen, and he also put away the wine glasses we had used, and in the meantime, I hopped onto the counter and took a seat.

I couldn't help but watch Jamie as he moved around, and I knew I had a smile on my face while I did so. Jamie eventually glanced over at me, and I tried to subtly look away, but my actions were slowed due to my slight intoxication. Jamie laughed quietly at my failed attempt to be subtle and, instead of continuing what he was doing, he walked over to me.

"Can I help you?" he joked, placing his hands on either side of me. I shrugged my shoulders and stayed silent as he started to lean closer to me.

"Are you about to help yourself?" I asked, referring to him possibly kissing me, again.

"Not if you don't want me to," he said, starting to distance himself, but I pulled on his sweatshirt to pull him back to me. He smiled to himself before placing his lips on mine and, as I kissed him back, my hands trailed up to his cheeks. His hands found their ways to my waist and he pulled me closer to the edge of the counter.

Suddenly the only thing I could think about while kissing Jamie was how I was okay with it. This isn't something I do, so why was I so okay with it?

"I haven't seen her since we got here, which is not good," I heard a voice from somewhere near the kitchen, but didn't think twice about it.

"We can ask around," I heard another voice and my eyebrows furrowed as I tried to decipher why the voices seemed so familiar.

"Oh, fuck. Sorry, Burns," I heard a guy's voice and then a quiet laugh followed.

"Ellie?" Finally realizing why the voices sounded so familiar, I pushed myself away from Jamie and looked over to my right to see Rowan and Andy standing in the archway to the kitchen. Jamie also looked over at them and I saw a small blush creep onto his cheeks, which had already happened to me.

"Burns, my guy," Andy said, obviously amused by what he had walked in on. "What happened to your head, man?" I brought my hand to my forehead as I wished away the embarrassment I was currently facing.

"Oh, I cut myself... it's a long story, uh—" Jamie looked over at me and I peaked at him from under my hand. "Ellie actually helped me out, uh... she patched me up." I glanced over at Rowan to see her smiling smugly to herself as she stared directly at me.

"We've been looking everywhere for you, Ellie," Andy said as the two of them started to step closer to us.

"Yeah, sorry about that..." I sighed, feeling an immense amount of heat transfer to my cheeks. "Are you guys ready to go, or?"

"We were thinking about heading out, but if you want to stay—"

"Oh, shut up," I told Andy, rolling my eyes as I gently pushed Jamie out of my way to jump off the counter.