Stuck With Me

21 | Somebody Else

When Alice walked into the kitchen she hoped for the kids to be there too, but to her disappointment it was just FP who was buttering his toast. He looked up when he heard her coming in and immediately met her eyes. 

They were thinking about the same thing, only neither of them was ready to admit that they had thought about their kiss all night. Instead of an honest heart to heart talk about what happened they would go for the easiest solution —  an awkward conversation. 

''How did you sleep?'' FP asked her with a small smile curling around his lips. This was just like any other morning, wasn't it? 

''Good, how did you?'' She answered as she grabbed a slice of bread too. 

To distract herself she just kept on spreading jam on more slices than she intend to eat, until FP broke the silence. The small talk was already killing him and it had been one minute. 

''Do we need to talk about last night?'' He asked her a little insecurely. Both of theme were trying to avoid the subject, but there was going to be a moment where one of them had to mention it. 

Why not rip the band-aid off immediately? They were never afraid to say what they thought, why was today any different?

''Do you want to?'' She asked him just as insecurely as he had sounded. Alice putted down her knife before she'd use the whole bread in front of her. 

''I just want to know if you have any regrets.'' He sounded soft, almost a little shy as if he was truly afraid that she hadn't enjoyed their kiss, or maybe even hated it. 

''I don't. Not one second.'' She stated instantly, a smile tugging on her lips. 

That felt good to say out loud. What the future would bring was a whole other question but she could say with certainty that she didn't regret kissing him — with or without alcohol. 

''Me neither.'' He smiled to her and poured her a cup of coffee as he said so. 

The tension hadn't disappeared though and both of them felt that the elephant in the room was still there. They may not have any regrets, but maybe that was exactly why it felt so weird. They just needed to go back to the way things were, if that was even possible. 

''Can we please not be awkward about this?'' She sighed as she couldn't take it any longer. 

If they had to talk about it then she wanted to get it over with as quickly as possible, instead constantly being reminded by the fact that they had an amazing kiss while he was still dating someone else. She couldn't have feelings for him, not now, not when he was taken. 

''It's all fine, Alice. We had a couple of drinks. Maybe it was just the alcohol taking over us.'' He reasoned, which sounded like the perfect explanation of what had happened. Both of them had been tipsy, or even a little bit drunk so it wasn't very weird that two people with an obvious connection had longed for physical contact. 

''That's probably it.'' She nodded along and let out a sigh of relief. He smiled a little when he saw her shoulders relax. 

''You are a good kisser, though.'' He teased her and poked her side with his spoon. They were so much better in making light of a situation instead of doing the serious thing and he truly wanted to get back to that same dynamic with her. 

''You weren't bad yourself. I was impressed.'' She raised an amused eye-brow and tried to hide her flushing cheeks. 

''Yeah, you were, weren't you?'' He said cockily, a big grin spreading over his face. 

''Just take the damn compliment, Forsythe.'' She rolled her eyes and brought her mug to her face. The tension on the air had disappeared and she was grateful for him to be the one to take it away. It was just a drunken kiss, nothing more, nothing less.