Sparks To A Flame

|44| Blur

Jackson

The next morning...

I leaned over the kitchen counter resting my elbows on its surface as I lifted my cup of coffee up to my lips, confusion swirling throughout my mind as I tried to think back to last night, most of the night being too hazy for me to recall.

Earlier this morning, my mind was completely left in the dark but now that I was wide awake with a little caffeine in my system, just recently, my memories gradually began to reveal themselves to me.

And they terrified me...

When I woke up this morning on my couch, butt naked with nothing but a thin, white blanket hardly covering me, I hadn't thought anything of it until images of Nicole being in my home began to surface back to my mind.

The memories were anything but clear to me and there were numerous gaping holes as I recalled seeing her at the bar, to speaking to her in my kitchen, then... Kissing her in my car.

I groaned as I set my cup down and rubbed a hand over my face as I tried to remember how we ended up in that position and, more importantly, what happened after that.

I guess it'll help if I knew how we ended up at my home in the first place...

I knew I drank a little more than I should have at the bar and I take full responsibility for that. It's why I was having such a hard time remembering anything from last night, it's why I couldn't do enough to help Nicole while she was in so much pain last night.

Which means she's never even left...

"Dammit." I huffed out in realization, remembering now that she stayed the night here because she had a sudden hangover and still has not woken up from it yet.

I'd better go check on her. I thought as I began to head to the room she slept in.

Before she knocked out, I remember her complaining of her stomach twisting and she was a bit dehydrated as well. I knew it was from the way the detoxifying tea conflicted with the extra bottle of beer she had in the car and there wasn't much I could do about that except give her water and have her rest while her body tries to get rid of the drugs that were snuck into her drink that night. That has been helping her feel in less pain but the whole experience was definitely not easy on her.

As I was making my way to her room, I noticed that my laundry room door was cracked open, a small green light coming from my dryer machine indicated that whatever was inside was ready to be taken out.

When did I do laundry?

With a raise of an eyebrow, I headed there instead to check and see what had been placed in there, not getting the slightest memory of anyone ever stepping foot in there last night.

As I approached the dryer, I noticed the mess of powdered detergent soap on the floor near the washer machine, making me scratch my head. It looked as if someone tried to do laundry in complete darkness.

And it most likely had been me.

I shook my head and turned my attention back to the dryer machine, making a mental note to myself to clean that mess up soon. When I opened the machine, I found that Nicole's sweatpants and my own outfit from last night had been tossed in there and nothing else.

That explains where my clothing had gone.

Just as I was trying to figure out exactly why I washed these, my phone suddenly rang in my pocket, startling me.

I let out a deep breath and answered it after seeing Rebecca's name appear on the screen, "Uh, hey Rebecca. How can I help?" I tried not to sound tense.