Unfamiliar Ceilings

It’s surprising how little I have to occupy my time when I’m trying to avoid a certain twat that lives next door, hence meaning that I can’t spend time with his brother because he tended to hang around with him. I had to keep turning down Johnny’s offers of going out because I didn’t want to see Dean.
I was still annoyed. This was getting to be a pattern with him; he’d be sweet, turn into an arsehole and I’d avoid him until he decided to be decent again.

Dean tried calling me a few times, but finally got the message that I was still annoyed and promptly gave up, since there was no chance in the near future that I’d actually answer the phone. Anna hadn’t called me since we went shopping, so I got all paranoid and instantly assumed that she thought I was a stupid little cow or something.

Late, Thursday night, there was a knock on the front door. I was in my room, my iPod plugged into the dock and some faceless band playing. Mark and Stephanie had gone out for the night and left me money and a menu for the nearest Chinese place that delivered. I massaged my temples and left my iPod as it was. I’d forgotten for a while that I hadn’t heard from Johnny or Anna in a day or three, so, I was shocked when they – plus Dean – were standing on my doorstep.

“So, you are alive,” Johnny smirked, letting himself inside. Anna followed giving me a quick hug on the way. Dean just walked past me without so much as glancing in my direction. Typical. I closed the front door and ran up the stairs to turn off my iPod. I joined them in the living room and Johnny revealed what they were doing here; they came over to watch Hostel apparently.

Anna, being the conniving little minx she was, coincidentally snagged the seat I wanted. Namely, the seat that wasn’t next to Dean. Couldn’t help but think she was completely and totally on to me.

I sat down, and Dean shifted as far away as he possibly could from me, without having to perch on the arm of the chair or something. The film started, but Dean’s closeness to me was distracting. Especially since he kept moving and looking at me when he thought I was unaware. It got too tense for me, so I stood up and mumbled a lame excuse about getting a drink.

“Go help her Dean,” Johnny ordered idly (yeah, right) his eyes still glued on the television screen, watching one of the sex scenes in the film. I exhaled lightly and rolled my eyes, getting up to go into the kitchen with Dean following behind me. I started bustling around for glasses.

“Leila?” Dean said, making me jump and almost drop one.

“Oh, you can talk?” I said, opening the fridge door and grabbing a carton of juice. I had my back to him, and I felt his warm hand on my arm. I shifted away, closing the fridge door and turning around to face him, glaring a little bit.

“Can we just talk about it?”

“What? That you just got up and walked out on me, after turning into some kind of emotionless...thing and then telling me that you can’t explain why? Yeah, we fucking can.”

I took a sharp, angry breath in after my tirade. Dean just stared at me, his mouth agape with shock that I completely called him out. He moved back away from me and for a couple of seconds I thought he was going to walk out again, but he leaning back against a countertop with his arms folded over his chest. I stayed where I was, except that I’d placed the juice down on the counter behind me before I threw it at his head.

“I owe you an apology-”

“You’ve owed me a few of those lately,” I mumbled, uncertain whether he even heard me.

“-and an explanation.”

“So, explain,” I said, louder. He shifted uncomfortably and kept averting his eyes from me, to the kitchen door, to the floor tiles and back again. It was winding me up. I was on the verge of just walking out of the kitchen when he finally said something.

“It’s hard to explain,” he said quietly, his eyes on the floor. “I got all weird. I felt weird. Things like this don’t happen to me.”

“Things like this?”

He shifted again and his arm tensed slightly. He stared at the floor and while longer before he looked up and met my gaze steadily and said, “I’ve never felt so...certain of something before.”

I rolled my eyes. “Look, stop being so bloody cryptic and tell me what the hell you’re talking about.”

“Leila,” he pleaded. “Just let me finish, it’s hard enough.”

“Fine. Go on. Certain of what?”

He exhaled. “Certain that I actually, genuinely have feelings for somebody that isn’t me. There.”

I stopped and stared for a couple of seconds, because that whole sentence came out as one jumbled word. When I figured out exactly what he’d said, I was surprised. I’d thought he was just being his careless, arrogant, I-can-do-what-I-want self when he walked away from me. Clearly not.

I wrapped my arms around myself and stayed quiet for a while, as I thought. So, he liked me. A lot, it seemed. Did I like him? Definitely. A lot? Maybe. He waved his hand in front of my face after a while longer.

“Hey,” he said, stepping closer to me.

“Hey yourself.”

“Are we okay?”

I bit my lip and smiled slightly. “I wasn’t aware there was a ‘we’.”

He laughed and stood directly in front of me, placing his hands on the end of the counter behind me on either side of my body. He said, “If you want there to be.”

I smiled. “Yeah, we’re okay.”

He smiled sweetly at me, relieved. Honestly, so was I. I never would’ve admitted it back then, but I know that I missed Dean when he wasn’t around. Even if it was only a few days. He raised one hand and touched my waist lightly while I looped my arms loosely around his neck as he leaned forward. Just as our foreheads touched and my eyes started closing, Johnny walked into the kitchen.

“Where’ my jui-shit, sorry,” he mumbled and rushed out. I distinctly heard him whisper-shout to Anna that “Leila and Dean are eating face”. Prat.

Dean rolled his eyes and chuckled slightly. “I think I’ll murder my baby brother for killing that.”

I shrugged. “Never mind.”

Dean chuckled and kissed my lips quickly, before pulling away and grabbing my hand. Anna was sitting where she’d been before, only now with Johnny’s head in her lap and smiling smugly. Johnny had a content smile on his face and she threaded her fingers lightly through his hair.

I breathed a laugh and let Dean pull me to where we were sitting earlier. This time, he pulled me up to his side and put his arm around my shoulder.

Could this get much better? I think not.

*****

I woke up lying on the couch, Dean’s head on my chest and his breathing deep. His arm was across my stomach and mine were around his shoulders. The title menu of Hostel was still playing; obviously, everybody fell asleep somewhere towards the end. I disentangled myself from Dean and kissed his cheek lightly. Anna and Johnny were sleeping together on the couch, him spooning her with his arms tight around her waist. Her pink hair stuck up in tufts, similar to Johnny’s.

I don’t care what she says; they’re perfect for each other.

After running upstairs and changing into clean clothes – i.e. pyjama pants and a vest top – I made my way to the kitchen, aiming to make myself a cup of sweet tea. The clock on the wall said it was around midday. I wonder what time Mark and Stephanie would be home.

Then, I remembered that I only had just under a month left here, before I had to go home and go to college. So, I kept thinking about that and trying to decide what I could do about it. Caroline hadn’t called me in the entire time I was here, so I’d forgotten all about going home to her and Jerry when the summer was over. Was there a college here I could go to, on such short notice? Did I even want to stay here?

My thoughts were interrupted by two arms curling around my waist and a kiss planted on my cheek. I realised I hadn’t done anything but take out a mug, put it down on the worktop and stared into space.

“Morning,” Dean said, his voice hoarse. He glanced down at my lonely mug and said, “Were you going to visualise some tea or actually make some?”

I laughed weakly and placed my hand lightly on top of his. I turned around to face him.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, his brow furrowed.

“Nothing.” Damn. I said that far too fast, plus I didn’t look at him either. He rolled his eyes and pulled me into his chest, hugging me tightly. He said, “You can tell me.”

“I have to go home in less than a month.” There was a deafening silence after I said that, leaving a ringing sensation in my ears and a knot at the pit of my stomach. Dean didn’t talk; he just kept holding me and stroking my hair softly. After a while, I pulled back and looked at him.

“All we can do is enjoy ourselves while we have time, and worry about it later I suppose,” he said, smiling reassuringly. “I’ll go wake up Johnny-boy so we can go home for a while.”

“For a while? I have to see you again?”

He laughed. “You love seeing me! But yeah, you do. Because you’re coming out with us tonight.”

I rolled my eyes. “I have to?”

“Yes, yes you do, you antisocial thing,” he said. I laughed and pushed myself away from him, leaving my mug abandoned on the counter and walking into the living room. Dean followed and smacked Johnny over the head with a rolled up magazine, jolting him away. He said, “Come on shithead, time to go home.”

Johnny made a little whiny noise, before burrowing his face back into Anna’s neck, in turn, waking her up. She unwrapped Johnny’s arms from around her waist – he pulled a sad face, aw – and stood up off the couch to stretch out her small body.

“Wow, your couch is atrocious to sleep on,” she said. “Got coffee?”

I nodded. “Somewhere in the kitchen.”

Dean finally got Johnny to get up off of my couch and started talking to him, telling him that we’d be going out that night. Johnny kept saying he didn’t feel like it, but all Dean had to do was mention that Anna was going and Johnny agreed. I laughed. Johnny called a goodbye and Dean stopped in front of me.

“Let Anna know about tonight, yeah?” he said, holding my hand lightly.

“Will do.”

“Okay,” he said. He kissed my forehead lightly and said, “See you later then.”

I said goodbye and heard the door click shut.

*****

“So,” Anna said, sipping on her coffee. “What you wearing later?”

I shrugged and leaned back on my headboard. “I don’t know, I don’t even feel like going.”

She pulled a face. “Come on, we haven’t gone out in ages.”

“You’re in my house, right now.”

“So? That’s not going out!” she complained, putting her coffee mug down and lying with her head dangling off my bed. “You can just come out, and stay the night at mine or Johnny’s or something. Please.”

I rolled my eyes. “Chill, I already said I’d go.”

She clapped her hands together and rolled backwards off the bed, then proceeded to clamber up off the floor and root through my wardrobe, inspecting my clothes. She asked if she could borrow some clothes off me; I didn’t have a problem with that.

“Do you know where we’ll be going?” I asked, coming up to my open wardrobe door and standing behind her as she kneeled to look through the bottom of it.

“Knowing Dean,” she mumbled. “It’ll be one of his mates clubs or something.”

“A club?” I raised my eyebrows. “As in, over-eighteen club?”

“Yep.”

I laughed. “As if I’ll pass for eighteen.”

“Ah,” she said. “But you misheard me, grasshopper. I said one of his mates clubs.”

Grasshopper? What the fuck? “Oh.”

“So, I’m thinking slightly casual.” She rooted around again, picking out my ripped grey skinny jeans and laying them on the floor, along with my Blondie shirt, followed by a pair of black denim shorts, and a pale purple flannel shirt.

“Here you go,” she said, thrusting the jeans and shirt into my hands.

“Bit early to be getting ready isn’t it?” I asked, looking at the time on my phone; 2.45pm.

She shrugged. “You’ll want to shower and stuff, won’t you? Plus I’m doing your make-up and everything.”

Why did that make me feel nervous? Because Anna is generally eccentric, and if she makes me look like a circus clown, a drag queen or both, I will have her throat. I shrugged and left her to keep looking around my room so I could go and get a shower. I washed my hair thoroughly, leaving the conditioner in while I washed the rest of my body, and then rinsed it out.

After my shower, I wrapped a towel around myself and brushed my teeth in the bathroom mirror. Considering that I hadn’t wanted to go out earlier, I was steadily getting more excited. There was a knock on the bathroom door and Anna shouted through.

“Have you drowned? You’ve been in there for over half an hour, Leila.”

Wow, that’s the longest shower I’ve taken whilst here. I spat out the last of my toothpaste and rinsed my mouth out before opening the bathroom door. Anna had found the airing cupboard and was sitting on the floor next to the door, a towel slung over her arm. She gave me a massive smile and shoved past me into the bathroom.

Once I got back to my bedroom, I put on a pair of old sweatpants and a vest, just while my hair dried out a bit. I pushed the play button on my iPod; The Bucket by Kings of Leon. Anna had emptied the entire contents of her make-up bag onto my vanity table. God, please help me.

I bounced around my bedroom slightly, putting away all the discarded clothes Anna had pulled out of my wardrobe back away. By the time I was finished, it was about twenty to four, my hair was damp and Anna made her way back into my room with her towel wrapped loosely around her chest.

“Okay, so,” she said. “I’m hating this song, and it’s time to get ready!”

She pounced on my iPod (currently belting I Gotta Feeling by The Black Eyed Peas – ironic, right?) and flicked through it until she found something she liked. Something she liked was Travis McCoy’s cut-up of Bring Me The Horizon’s Chelsea Smile. Fail.

“This is crap.”

“Why’ve you got it on your iPod then, numb nuts?” she laughed.

“I don’t know. Variety.”

She laughed and rolled her eyes, turning her back to me while she slipped her underwear on under the towel. I dug through one of the drawers on my vanity for my hairdryer, plugging it in when I found it and drying my hair properly. It set into curls, as per usual. Anna only had to towel her pink locks dry.

“Right,” she said, tottering around in her underwear and a hoody. “Time to do your face.”

“What?”

“...Make-up.”

I laughed. “Oh yeah.”

She rolled her eyes again and grabbed my chin, turning my face this way and that before plopping me down in my stool. She rummaged through the cluttered tabletop and picked up various different tubs and tubes and bottles of cosmetics. I squirmed about a bit when she kept putting all this alien stuff on my face. I just hoped she didn’t put so much on that I couldn’t lift my head.

“Done!”

I turned in my chair, anticipating. It looked...good. Different, very different. But it was nice too. She’d used a pale foundation on my skin and lined a thin black line on my upper eyelids. She’d done an impressive fade effect with some silver and black eye shadow; the inner corner was silver, and it gradually got darker towards the outer, then ended in a little wing. To top off the whole thing, she’d used a slick of deep red lipstick.

I didn’t look like me.

“Like it?” she said. I nodded and she said. “Okay, now move.”

I took a last look before standing up.