Unfamiliar Ceilings

It was a while we we’d stopped kissing each other. I breathed in deeply and watched him as he watched me. He was smiling, he looked euphoric, but the look faded almost as soon as it came, and I can guess it was because of the look on my face. I was worried, scared, nervous and awkward. All in one.

Worried and scared, because what if it was exactly like last time? I couldn’t deny to myself or anybody else that I still didn’t like Dean, or that I was at least attracted to him. I’d be lying, a lot. If it was like last time, I don’t even know what I’d do about it. I was nervous and awkward, because normality for me didn’t involved going around, kissing gorgeous boys that I’d know for a month, and that drove me insane for half of that month.

“Leila,” he whispered, breaking that perfect, crystal silence and setting in more unease.

I took a few seconds longer than I’d meant to reply. “Yeah?”

“Want to crawl in a hole and die?” He was smirking slightly.

I laughed and messed with his hair a little bit. “No.”

He breathed another laugh and I felt him stroke my back lightly with his finger tips. “Do you regret that?”

I thought for practically a nanosecond before saying, “No.”

He smiled and placed his forehead lightly against mine. “Me either.” Then he kissed me, his lips lingering on mine all over again, making my legs shake just a little bit and my heart race. His hand slid around to my waist while mine went back to the nape of his neck. We stayed like that for a bit until I felt a drop of rain land on my hand. Dean must’ve felt it too, because he pulled away and lifted up his head. Before I could take another breath, rain was falling at an alarming pace, drenching the both of us to the bone instantly.

“Come on, let’s get you home,” Dean sad, picking himself off the floor then pulling me after him. He grabbed my jacket and handed it to me and we started walking quickly through the rain. The more I hoped it’d stop, the heavier it got. There was no point in walking as fast as we did; I think it actually helped to get us more soaked.

My dress was soaked and sticking to my skin and my hair dripped down my back. I was shivering violently and Dean put his soggy arm around my shoulders in some weird attempt to warm me up more. Didn’t work, obviously.

“We’ll run,” Dean said, stopping to strip his wet cardigan off. I nodded and took my shoes off, tucking them under my arms. Dean grabbed my free hand and we ran as fast as we could manage the rest of the way down the street. He came straight into the house with me before he died of pneumonia or something.

“Hello...” Mark said before laughing. “Drowned rats! I won’t ask how your night went.”

I smiled and rolled my eyes at him, peeling my jacket off and hanging it on the banister. Dean laughed and said his hello’s to my dad. He grabbed his cardigan and walked into the kitchen. I laughed when he started ringing out the water over the sink. I made my way up the stairs, changing quickly into a pair of pale blue shorts and a white Oceana shirt.

I could hear his feet squelching the entire way up the stairs, so I met him on the landing, towelling my hair dry, on my way to grab him something warm to change into. He entered my room, shivering while I went into Mark’s room and found a pair of sweatpants and a dry shirt. When I got back to my room, Dean was standing, staring at the walls, his soaked through shirt held loosely in his hand.
I threw the sweatpants at his head and jumped on my bed.

“Close your eyes,” he laughed. “Unless you really can’t resist.”

I rolled my eyes before covering them with my hands. I waited before asking, “Decent yet?”

“Yup.” I removed my hands from my eyes and he was standing there at the foot of my bed, shirtless, with his hair dripping wet around his shoulders. In a pair of my dad’s sweatpants. Image; completely destroyed.

I laughed as he walked and sat on the bed, because the pants kept falling around his hips because they were too big. From Mark’s fat days, I suppose.

“Shush,” he said, sitting cross-legged in front of my outstretched legs.

“Or what?” I said.

“I’ll shush you.”

“Oh, I’m terrified,” I said, raising my eyebrows. “That sounded like you were propositioning me or something.”

“Who said I wasn’t?” He smirked, letting his hand slide up my calf to my thigh. It felt nice, in a way, but I still rolled my eyes and slapped his hand away from me. His bottom lip jutted out in a pout and he widened his eyes, feigning a little innocence.

“No,” I laughed. “No propositioning.”

He sighed – overdramatically, might I add, “Fine.”

I laughed and sat up, crossing my legs so we were sitting knee-to-knee.

“Won’t your parents want you home?”

“I don’t think they’ll miss me for another hour or so,” he muttered. He shrugged his shoulders and looked at me. I said that I didn’t think Mark would let him stay over; complete bullshit. Mark didn’t care if Dean stayed, as long as he got no details. Not that there’d be details. I mean, nothing would happen...shut up. Anyway, Mark wouldn’t care, and I think Dean knew that.

“If you want me to go home, just say, Leila,” he laughed.

“I didn’t say that.”

He laughed and shuffled a bit closer to me. “I know, but I can ready anybody like an open book and you really can’t lie to save your life. You focus somewhere above my right ear whenever you lie to me.”

“No wonder you want to do psychology.”

He laughed properly and touched my hand. I was scared this would get all weird or awkward or something, but he seemed to be capable of influencing my mood, even the atmosphere around us. He could make me feel nervous, confident, happy, squirmy, even completely unnecessary in so many ways. Anything he wanted me to feel. And here’s where I destroyed that little moment.

“I was wondering,” I said quietly, looking down at the patch of blanket next to our hands. “What’s with you and Jay?”

“What do you mean?”

“Like, what are the two of you?”

I can say in all confidence that Dean actually enjoyed putting me on edge, because he took about five minutes to say, “Nothing.”

I moved my hand away and scooted back a bit. “It didn’t look like ‘nothing’.”

He let out a long, exasperated breath and I felt the weight shift off of the bed. I wanted to look at where he’d been, but I was too scared to look and confirm that he’d gone. This way, I didn’t know where he was. A couple of seconds more my question was answered, and the mattress on the right of me dipped under his weight. He used his fingertips to tilt my chin up, so I had to look at him.

“It – me and Jay – are nothing,” he insisted. “We were, a very long time ago.”

“Then why did you kiss her the other day?” Right after me...

He stroked his fingertip lightly over my cheek and all I wanted to do was lean into his hand. But I didn’t.

“You saw her kissing me, Leila,” he said. “I was so stoned; she saw it as an advantage. Okay?”

Okay? Okay?! Yeah, everything’s bloody okay now that’s cleared up! It did make sense, but I didn’t believe him. It didn’t explain why he’d gone to her first, or why he’d just let me drop like that. I didn’t believe him, but I wanted to, so I faked it. My instinct screamed at me to dig deeper; I told it to shut up.

“Okay.”

“Good,” he smiled. “Because there’s this one girl.”

I raised my eyebrows. “Oh yeah?”

“Yep,” he said, popping the p and putting his hand on my neck. “She’s beautiful and I like her, quite a bit.”

At the time, I just sat and stared at him for ages. I couldn’t speak. He did just say that, right? It’s not just my imagination, is it? But he did say it, about me as well. Eventually, I managed to compose my face to something near normal and put my hand over his on my neck. I smiled.

“Some words might be nice,” he said quietly, resting his forehead on mine. “You know, so I don’t feel like a complete tit.”

“You’ll always be a tit,” I laughed. “What words?”

He narrowed his eyes but still smiled. “Any.”

Then I had some newfound confidence. “I can think of something better.”

Before he had chance to answer, I pressed my lips back to his. He responded straight away, pushing his hand up into my hair while I put mine at his waist. His other arm snaked around my waist and he pushed his body lightly against mine, making me lie back again. We were like that for who knows how long. It still wasn’t enough.

“I could do that forever,” he mumbled quietly into my neck, each word between the kisses he pressed to my throat. Agreed, definitely. I felt his cold hand touch my stomach and I shivered. He moved it up slowly and he was getting too far ahead of himself. I tugged his arm, moving his hand out from my shirt.

“Don’t,” I said, looking at him. He laced his fingers with mine instead and put them at our sides. He mumbled an apology to me and we just lay there, looking at each other. I watched him carefully, and his face was changing. The look of contentment just vanished and he looked kind of...blank. All too soon, he was sitting up and running a hand through his now dry, wavy hair.

“I have to go,” he said, standing up off of my bed. He didn’t tell me to close my eyes as he changed back into his damp jeans and shirt, leaving Mark’s sweatpants folded haphazardly at the end of my bed. Once he was done, he didn’t look at me. Just turned around and walked, fast, out of my bedroom door.

I rolled my eyes and followed behind him, catching the front door before he closed it. It’d stopped raining outside, but it was still cold. I caught him by his arm just as he got to the garden gate and swung him around to face me properly.

“What the hell’s wrong with you?” I asked.

“Nothing.”

“Why’re you being so short with me now?”

“I’m not.”

“Dean...” I sighed, trying to soothe him by stroking little circles on his bare arm. “Just tell me what’s wrong.”

“I can’t,” he said, tugging his arm away from me and staring at the ground.

“Why?” Okay, getting irritated.

“Because.”

I exhaled angrily. “Because what?”

“Just because.”

I let go of his arm and gritted my teeth. “You know what, fine. Just go home.”

He looked upset.

For about a second, before his face went blank again and he walked away from me. I suppose it was like last time.