The Walls Caved In

I'd been home long enough to drop my things off upstairs, splash my face with cold water and grab a glass of water downstairs by the time Eric showed up. I opened the door for him, glass in hand, already turning back to walk through the house to the kitchen, expecting him to follow me.

He'd been in my house enough in the last two weeks that he didn't really need to follow me; he could find his way through every room.

"Do you want something to drink before we go?" I asked, before tilting my own glass back and swallowing the rest of my water. I put the glass in the sink, soaped up a sponge and started washing the few plates and cups that were sitting in the sink.

"Eric?" I said, taking a look over my shoulder. I didn't see him. "Fine, then. Get your own drink."

I finished rinsing the dishes, laying them out on a towel to dry. Arms encircled my waist, causing me to drop the plate I was rinsing off back into the sink. "I heard that," Eric whispered, just below my ear.

I smiled slightly, picking up the plate again. "Good. Did you want a drink or what?"

"Nope, I'm good," he said, placing a single kiss to the side of my neck.

"I already knew that," I told him, reaching up to wrap a hand around his neck, "but that's not what I asked."

He laughed, releasing me. "Let's get going, then." I nodded, taking a step in front of him and heading outside.

▼▲

"So," Eric said, once we both had our own ice cream cones; today it was some type of sweet, cinnamon-tasting mix. It was actually tasty, I confessed, after Eric pestered me about it for the first few minutes after he ordered it for me. I was still a vanilla girl, but he wasn't going to let me fall to that. "How was the first day?"

"Uneventful," I said, looking up at him."Same as every year, you know. How was yours?"

"The same, mainly." Already, he was making a mess. I pulled a few napkins from the dispenser between us and handed them to him. He flushed, smiling, before wiping his mouth.

"Just like old times, huh," he said.

"What do you mean, 'mainly'?"

"Oh," Eric mumbled, wiping his mouth again. "Well, I just... didn't really hang out with, you know, Brooke and Daniel and them. They, uh, came up to me, Brooke did, during the assembly, asked me how my summer had been going since I'd dumped you... better, she guessed, since I didn't have someone weighing me down."

Eric stopped talking. He didn't trail off, or stutter, like he usually did when he was uncomfortable.

"And?" I asked, holding my ice cream cone over the table.

Eric looked up at me, staring. "I got really hot. Like, I felt like the whole place was on fire. I looked at her and.. well, I said, 'I didn't fucking dump Joy, okay? I'd appreciate it if you didn't talk about my girlfriend like she's a piece of trash, either, because she's not the person who has to talk others down to bring herself up."

"Oh," I said.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm sorry," I mumbled.

Eric leaned forward, elbows on the table, making it creak. I looked up at him. He was as close as he could get. "Don't be."