A terrorist attack takes place in Canada during the widely loved politician's wedding. The horrible incident leaves hundreds of people dead, but the politician's son survives. Luckily, he meets a gorgeous med student in the hospital of who he just...
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july 2nd toronto
"SO, THIS IS ME." Miles stood in the opening of the door with arms widely spread to offer me a warm welcome. Suddenly, an unexpected tsunami created by small bubbles filled with shyness mastered the system in my head I used to run, threw me off the throne, and took the lead. My cheeks started resembling a lobster's skin, while my hands started shaking, and throat felt like a desert. Miles had already walked back into his home, but both my feet were nailed into the ground.
I absolutely didn't want to meet his family, didn't want to introduce myself as the classmate he had only met about two days ago, and I certainly didn't want to be seen as his girlfriend. I was nineteen and didn't possess the basic skill to communicate with others as any other decent human being. A situation needed to include anger, or just utter comfort with a person, otherwise I'd go completely silent. Miles was the owner of an amazing aura that had the ability to get some non-sense making words out of my mouth without stuttering, and Hart's mother knew how to make anger grow in my stomach only by using a tone of voice I despised, and that made me speak up – but when it was about daily conversations, I simply failed.
Hart. I had promised him to come by this evening, but I traded him for a night with another man. A man I knew for sure he'd like. His dark curls that had gotten a little too long during his stay in the hospital and sometimes fell in front of his eyes, the perfectly shaped jaw, and the lips, the dark eyes, but most importantly; his smile, the unending knowledge of songs – that was what I had traded for a serious school night with Miles. I could imagine him sitting in his room, all by himself sadly eating his dinner as he listened to Blackbird by The Beatles. I wanted to be there instead.
"You'd rather discuss ALM RNA-sequencing outside?" Miles jokingly asked, his body partly turned to look at me. I looked at the blouse that once again was loose on his skin, and forced a smile onto my face as the thoughts of what actually responding yes to that question would bring.
Luckily, his family wasn't home, and we just sat in his room mainly discussing our project. As I explained my vision on how the hospital treated ALM, I figured Hart was intensely staring at me. When I looked up from the paper I had been putting notes on, he didn't bother to look away and the corners of his mouth curled up as his eyes sparkled, and for some reason I looked through his skin, right at his heart which started beating harder the longer I gazed at it. My eyes rolled up to his eyes, those green, bright peepers, and my throat suddenly got very dry. I was nervous.
He put his arm into the soft covers of his bed, and leaned forward, almost threatening me with what was going to come although his aura reassured me that it was what I wanted. He told me that it was all alright, but his lips didn't move. And my brain was screaming at me to make it stop, yet I didn't move.
"What are you doing?" I whispered.
"I don't know," his lips almost touched mine, "I can't control myself, you're too beautiful."
"Miles," I laughed and shook my head, "don't say stuff like that."
"What?" He put one hand on my cheek and the other on my leg. "You don't want me to call you beautiful?"
"I hate it," I whispered.
"You hate being called beautiful?" Miles frowned his brows and laughed. "Too bad, beautiful."
When he gently kissed my lips, there was not a single feeling going through my body, and it deeply worried me. Miles was attractive, he was clever, funny, yet my body didn't want to respond to that, just like it didn't when Leo kissed me. No affection, no passion, just my plain thoughts waving through my head.
I slightly pushed him away from me before he could kiss me again, and he looked more surprised than when I told him I didn't like being called beautiful. "We're not going to cure cancer like this, are we?"
"Cancer can wait," he said, grabbing my wrists and pushing them down, only to entangle our fingers.
"People die because of it every day – it can't wait. I'm sorry, Miles."
Just when I was about to stand up from his bed, he grabbed my shoulders and pushed me back down. His pupils were enlarged and from his tensed shoulders I could read that he was actually getting frustrated. "Nova, I've been dying to kiss you."
I chuckled. "Seriously though, stop saying those kind of things."
"I'm dead serious. I was so glad you were going to come tonight."
"You invited me so you could kiss me?"
"No, no, don't get me wrong; I just mean—well . . . the possibility sort of was there."
"Is that why you wanted to do the project with me? To get laid?"
All of the sudden, he went silent for a couple of seconds. "You know, I really want to say no, but then I'd be lying and I don't like lying. You can't blame me though – you're beau- pretty."
I sighed deeply. "Are you hearing yourself? You chose to do the most important project of all upcoming years with me, because you think I'm pretty. No offense, but that's a really immature way of thinking, Miles. You were willing to throw away precious time to have sexual intercourse. What if you didn't pass because of that?"
That's a nice way of turning a compliment into a sin, I thought to myself. I obviously was doing that on purpose.
"I get it, I was thinking with my dick. I guess I'm sorry."
"You don't have to apologize to me, apologize to yourself instead; if you keep thinking with your reproductive organ, you're going to make big mistakes in the future. And I feel flattered, really, but I think it's better if we find other partners."
"What?" Miles heavily shook his head, "No, we don't have to find other partners."
"I just feel uncomfortable working with you after hearing your actual intentions," I shrugged. I internally laughed.
"Now, that's immature!" he exclaimed, "You should get over this like an adult, and just see through my attraction towards you. I have lots of good quantities to offer to make this project turn out great."
"Honestly, it's just an excuse to work on this on my own. It's nothing personal."
"And now miss is acting all introverted?"
"I am an introvert!"
"Then why didn't you say no when I asked you to work with me?"
"Because I can't say no."
"Do you want to spend the night with me?"
I looked at him dead in the eyes, but deep inside, I kind of had to laugh, because it was clever.
"See," he said, pointing at my face, "that's a clear no."
"Miles," I exhaled.
"Alright, now I'm just fucking with you. No pun intended. Fine, if you don't want to work with me, whatever, but you go tell the professor that we're splitting up, because he hates me."
I stood up from the bed. "We can still be friends?"
The sweet, typical smile appeared just like the dimples, and he slowly nodded. "Alright then... but only this time."
