Fine Line

chapter nineteen

Three More Seconds

I hadn't gotten to sleep till at least two o'clock in the morning last night. Arguing was coming from the living room when I got home. And it had to be at least eight a.m. when I was woken up by the harsh sound of tapping on the window glass. It was unlocked, I could remember closing it when I walked in to stop the cold breeze reaching through, but I didn't lock it.

The knocking started again after a short pause. My eyes had still yet to open, but a loud groan escaped my lips as I turned away from the window and hid in my blanket. This was not the way I was planning to spend my Saturday morning.

And then, the words I had been expecting since I came to consciousness arrived as the window opened: "What have I told you, fuckface? Lock your fucking window," Jaden snapped as he traiers hit the woode floor of my bedroom. I sighed and sat up, rubbing my eyes in hopes it would wake me up.

It did nothing.

But my eyes did open, and they immediately met with the piercing blue eyes at the end of my bed. Just from the second log glance, I knew something had happened, and he had come here first, which meant all the anger he had built up was going to be taken out on me.

"Is there something I can help you with? I snapped, raising my eyebrows as all the anger from him radiated onto me just from knowing what he would do now that he was here.

I was close enough. The clock on my desk had the time 9:07 in bright red lighting. And Jaden was at my house, his stance still filled with anger but his eyes losing their harshness slightly. He shrugged his shoulders, dismissing the question as he took a seat on my desk.

"I was bored," he replied.

"That's not my problem." I threw myself backwards and turned away from him, covering my bed once again with my quilt. But he didn't move, and he wasn't going to. "Fine, just be quiet."

"You can't just go back to sleep," he stated. I ignored him and kept my eyes closed. But he was accepting that and interrupted the silence by walking across the room and pulled the cover from on top of me.

"What the fuck, Jaden!" I shouted. "What is your motherfucking problem?"

When he didn't reply, I just sat up with a sigh and moved myself backwards so that I was resting against the headboard. Jaden wasn't leaving, he wasn't going to tell me anything, and he wasn't going to let me sleep.

"Why are you really here, asshat?" I asked groggily, wiping my eyes again like it had helped before.

"Needed to get out of the house," he replied vaguely as he moved himself to sit on my bed this time. I held my tongue from asking him which house it was that he had to leave.

His arms were crossed as he looked at me, not knowing my train of thought but also knowing that he wasn't going to like what it was. I was almost certain that the judgement was written all over my face, but it was too early to hide it.

"I don't know why you put up with all that shit," I let out.

"You wouldn't get it."

"Try me."

"You grew up with two loving parents in a nice home, you wouldn't get it, Val."

My eyebrows scrunched together, reliving last night and the arguments that took place downstairs. If I had the strength, I could have punched him. Maybe mine wasn't as bad as his, but who was he to decide what kind of childhood I grew up in? He didn't know my family just as I didn't know his.

"You'd be better off living with your father."

He stood up.

"You don't know how I'd be better off."