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Chapter 9.

Morning came way too soon.

I was woken by my throbbing ankle, making me groan against my pillow in pain as I contemplating on whether to get out of bed. Stretching out all of the tired aches in my joints, I sat up and sighed groggily as I hauled myself out of bed. My mind wandered to the night before as I gingerly padded across the room to the bathroom, making sure not the press too much pressure on my ankle.

Zach. The image of his dark copper eyes and him pressing me up against the wall in a passionate clinch pervaded my thoughts as I switched on the shower. With the memory still fresh in my head, my heart hammered against my ribcage and my pulse drummed loudly in my ears as if it had happened all over again.

Muttering a curse, I let my clothes pool at my feet and quickly sprung into the shower and beneath the lukewarm water to cool me down. I pondered to myself as I washed my hair.

Did I even like Zach? Surely not. He was always horrible to me, acting all mighty on his high horse when he ran me over in the first place. But...when I remembered the way his brow creased in concern when I sprained my ankle and how he carried me to the hospital he didn't seem so bad after all. Maybe the devil actually had a heart. I scoffed to myself as I remembered his abrupt dismissal when he took me home the day before. Maybe not.

I suddenly heard the familiar sound of my phone ringing, muffled by the splashing of the water from the shower. Crap. Snatching a towel from the rail I quickly turned the shower off and hobbled out of the room. I burst into my bedroom and hopped over to the bed, picking up my phone from the bedside table and pressing it to my ear.

"Hello?" I answered breathlessly. I shivered as a few droplets dripped from my hair on to my shoulders.

"Is your ankle okay?" I heard Alyssa question through the phone quickly.

"Um, yeah, it's fine. Who told you?" I assured her before furrowing my brows. I doubt Zach would have informed her about my little accident.

"Noah." she responded simply.

"Oh, what did he say?" I asked curiously.

"Nothing much..." she replied in a bored tone and I could almost hear the shrug evident in her voice, until she suddenly shrieked excitedly down the phone not even a millisecond later.

"Just that Zach Caldwell carried you bridal style through the building and to the hospital! What did I miss?!" she exclaimed so loudly I had to move the phone away from my ear in case she burst my eardrum.

"It was so embarrassing." I responded, fidgeting awkwardly.

"But he carried you!" she reminded me. "That's so sweet!"

"No. It wasn't. And I was perfectly capable of walking on my own two feet anyway!" I insisted firmly.

Alyssa scoffed. "Whatever, Lou. Anyway if you're so capable of walking, are you still coming to the cinema today?"

I internally groaned - I'd completely forgot about it.

"You forgot, didn't you?" she accused.

"No-" I began but cut myself off with a sigh. "Yes...is Josh still coming?"

"Yeah." she admitted quietly, sensing my reluctance. "Do you still want to come?"

Truthfully?

No, I didn't want to go at all. But did I have a choice? Also, no.

Noah, Alyssa, a cinema and her cheating boyfriend of whom I shared mutual hatred with didn't exactly sound like a good idea - something deep in my gut just told me it was going to go wrong; it always did when Josh and I were forced into each others company. We disagreed on everything and it usually ended up with an argument, which always resulted in an upset and angry Alyssa. Fact.