Four am

Chapter six

I bite my lip as a habit when I'm thinking about something, where could he be taking me.

"Hey stop doing that." Cole squeezes my hand tighter and I feel sparks all over my body.

"Doing what?" I sound oblivious but I knew what I was doing.

"You know what, peanut don't play dumb." He says looking over at me and pulling his hand from mine to turn down the music. Is it bad that I want his hand back on mine, it feels cold without his touch.

"Hey peanut, we're here." I was zoned out but I was that we were parked in front of an old abandoned bridge.

"C you trying to kill me or something by pushing me off this bridge."

"Wait what did you just call me?"

"C..." I said confused.

"You've never called me that before." He said smiling

"You call me Peanut and I think should get a nickname too." I say nudging him with my shoulder "So what did you want to show me?"

"Come on." He intertwined his hand in mine. He took me to the side of the bridge and hopped down onto large cement blocks, then he grabbed my other hand and helped me down.

"Wow." We are looking at an ocean with big rocks everywhere and the harsh waves are crashing into them.

"But wait until you turn around." Cole stepped behind me and covered my eyes with his hand and with his free hand he touched my shoulder lightly with the tips of his fingers and they went down the side of my arm and slowly turned me around. "Ok are you ready?" He asked.

"As ready as I will ever be." I replied. As he moved his hand we were overlooking the city it was like we were on top of the world. I was speechless. I didn't know what to say, it was amazing. It was unreal.

"Wow."

"Yeah you already said that peanut."

"I don't know what else to say, it's unbelievable." I replied.

"You should see it when the sun is setting" He sits down facing the ocean with his legs dangling over the edge and I sit facing the city right beside him. Looking at him examining every single feature of his face.

"Checking me out now, peanut?" That stupid, stupid smirk.

"W-what, I am not." I felt my cheeks turning red, trying to hide it from him. I turned back to look at the city.

We were just laying down now looking at the stars in silence. I was shivering, there was a cold breeze. I'm wearing black legging and an oversized band t-shirt. Now I'm really regretting not bringing a hoodie.

Cole starts taking his hoodie off. "What are you doing?" I question him.

"Giving you my sweatshirt silly goose."

"Why." I counter.

"Why what?" He throws his hoodie at me and I put it on.

"You know what, never mind Silly goose." I replied using the same nickname he gave me.

I turned around and laid beside him, breaking the silence I say. "How often do you come here?"

"Whenever I need to think, or clear my head." He turns his head to look at me "can I ask you a question now?"

"Sure"

Cole Pov

"Why are you so hard on yourself?"

"What to do you mean?" she turned her whole body towards me and sat up.

"Well you were beating yourself up for getting one bad mark on a test, you are literally never home always at the studio practicing even when you don't have a class. You never ever go out the only place i've seen you go is either to the mall with Adri or to go get more food." I took a deep breath and looked into her hazel eyes. "I guess I just mean why don't you ever just let go and forget about it all even if it's a one time thing?"

She took a deep breath before talking "I don't want to let people down. My mom, my dad, me, Mrs. B. I just want to be the best that I can, so I push myself to be the best that I can."

She looked away. "And as a matter of fact, I do take time for myself. I watch a lot of Netflix and I'm here with you, aren't I?" I rolled my eyes.

"Don't you ever feel like your parents are always expecting the best from you at all times?" She asked me, while laying her head against my shoulder.

"Yeah I guess." I gave her a blunt answer because honestly my parents don't give that many fucks about me. In some way she's lucky for having parents like that. She lifts her head.

"What do you mean you guess?" This girl is so persistent about getting me to talk about my feelings all the time. It gets sappy... way to sappy.

"Do you always ask so many questions?" I chuckled.

"Well if you don't want to open up to me I'm going to ask you questions until you talk. "She play-punched me in the shoulder.

"Fine" I gave in. "You can ask me one question. But that's it."

"Ok." Her eyes light up, oh no. "Do you miss your parents?"

"Really." She gave me a confused look. "I told you to ask me anything and you asked if I miss my parents?"

"Yes, now answer it."

"Yeah I miss my mom" I shrugged

"What about your da-" I cut her off

"He's not my dad...Well I mean yeah sure he's been a father figure or whatever, but my real dad died when I was only 6 months old. He had cancer, leukemia stage 4. A little over 2 years after he passed my mom met Richard Vanderbilt." I rolled my eyes. "Yeah sure he felt like a father to me but after I found out about my dad on my 9th or 10th birthday. Richard started keeping a distance from me. I wasn't sure why after I found out the truth he was detaching himself from me. I felt over the years the same thing was happening with my mom almost like he was taking her away from me.

They started traveling more, without me because it was for 'work' and they would show me all these pictures of them doing absolutely nothing. They would also work all these long hours at work and I either ended up home alone or at a party blacked out, not that they would care. I paused to catch my breath and continued.

"I don't think it was my mom's fault, it was his." I don't know if he thinks that he'll lose her because I knew the truth, but it feels like I lost both my mom and dad. When he's not around she acts different, more motherly. I tried to talk to her about it... but I don't know.

"Maybe it's all in my head and you're probably going to ask me a thousand questions now." I looked at peanut and her eyes were glassy, then a tear rolled down, her cheeks stained red. I wiped the tear away.

"I'm sorry."

"Hey it's ok, it's not your fault."

"I know but I was talking about how much my parents worry about me and they care about my grades and how I dance and I complained that they're too overprotective an-"

"Hey peanut, parents can be a lot sometimes don't apologize. Okay?" I lifted my eyebrows up asking her.

"Okay, but I have one question."

"Shoot." I shook my head.

"You took his last name, why?"

"Once they got married they changed my last name as well as my moms, I asked my mom what my dad's last name was but she never told me."

"I lied." she said, my brows furrowed at the statement "I have another question." She giggled and I let out a sigh of relief.

"What's your full name?" She asked with a twinkle in her eyes, her beautiful hazel eyes which from time to time look almost yellow.

"Colton Thomas Vanderbilt" I answered "and you?"

"Zoelle Jade Angelos."

"Zoelle" I repeated in a whisper and she bit her lip. Every time she bites her lip I want to kiss her.

I put my hand to her cheek and my thumb gently touched her lower lip. She was looking at my lips, she wanted to kiss me. She closed her eyes and I leaned in.

And then.

And then what?

Don't forget to vote!

Love you beautiful

J