Be Free, Be You

I started awake with an unattractive snort, shooting into a seated position and running a hand through my snarled hair. Taking a few deep breaths and blinking slowly, I surveyed the room. The menu of the DVD was on, a picture of Tyra looking beautiful with the options of Play All, Episode Selection, Language Selection, and Advertisements next to her taking up the screen.

Puck was on the other side of the couch, curled up into a ball, snoring lightly. It was strange, how young and innocent he looked when he wasn’t putting on his cocky, asshole-ish demeanor. He almost looked human.

I pulled out my cell phone and saw that it was a few minutes to one in the morning. His mom was definitely going to kill him, and my mom was going to kill me. I’d asked to work on a project with Puck, not for him to sleep over.

“Puck,” I whispered harshly, shoving my foot into his thigh. “Puck, wake up.”

He groaned loudly and blinked a couple of times. “What the fuck? Where am I?”

“In my den,” I replied, yawning. “We fell asleep.”

“Oh, okay. So why are you waking me up?”

“Shouldn’t you be getting home? Isn’t your mom going to worry?”

He snorted and went back into his previous position, a side fetal position, one arm folded under his head as a pillow. “No. She’ll figure out that I passed out drunk at a party. She’s not going to care. And it probably wouldn’t be safe for me to drive, anyway.”

“Good point,” I agreed. “I’m gonna go to my room. Do you want anything here?”

He shook his head for a second before his breathing got slow and even again, his mouth falling open slightly.

I climbed to my feet and fixed my shirt, which had slipped in a way that exposed my cheetah-patterned bra underneath. A bit of searching in the closet of the room revealed a fluffy Toy Story blanket from when I was a kid. Thankfully, it was pretty long for me then, so I figured it’d do the job for Puck.

I laid the blanket on top of him, and he immediately snuggled into the thing, letting out a soft sigh.

Staring down at him, I totally forgot that I had been entirely pissed at him a few hours before for saying that he’d settled for me. How could someone who looked that innocent ever say anything like that?

Shaking my head, I turned off the DVD player and left the room, shutting out the light before closing the door softly behind me.

As I made my way down the hallway, my stomach clenched when I thought about what Valarie would think. She’d definitely call me a sucker. After all, if I had been more seasoned to guys, I wouldn’t have fallen for Puck. I wouldn’t have let him stay, even though he admitted that the only reason he wanted to hang out with me was because there were no better options that he knew of.

Yet that dickhead still made my heart rest and made butterflies appear in my stomach. Life as a teenage girl was so complicated.

On the way to my room, I stopped in Val’s, knocking on her door lightly before entering.

But when I flicked on the light, instead of seeing her glaring at me for waking her up, I saw an empty room, complete with an unmade bed and various clothes from her dilemma earlier strewn about the place.

“Ooo, scandalous,” I snickered to myself as I pulled out my phone and sent her a text.

ok it’s like 1 in the morning, you didn’t give it up already did you?

Only a couple seconds passed before Valarie responded: really Steph? no i’m staying over, and it went great btw. i’ll tell you tomorrow. and why are you still up? go to bed you hermit!

Oh, it went great, did it? Then she might be tempted to do certain things that wouldn’t be great for her in the long run…

no babies!(;

After I sent my last text, I left her room, leaving everything the way it had been when I entered.

Instead of changing into pajamas, I just kept on the clothes I had been wearing before and climbed into bed. My baggy Victoria’s Secret sweatpants were far comfortable enough to sleep in, and I’d just have to remember to readjust my V-neck shirt in the morning to make sure that no underclothes were trying to be outer clothes.

The second I closed my eyes, I lost consciousness, thankful that everything was going okay.

***

When I woke up in the morning, I stretched my arms over my head, smacking my knuckles against the wall. Although it hurt like a bitch, I was too tired to react much.

“Morning, sleeping beauty,” a deep voice granted me, cutting through the thick silence.

I screeched and bunched my blankets around me as I glared at Puck, who was sitting in my desk chair, spinning around in circles to amuse himself.

“What the fuck are you doing in my room?” I hissed at him. I wanted to scream, but I knew that if my parents heard me, their golden child, swear, they’d have conniptions.

“I was bored in the den,” he answered. “So I came in here and sat down, and I’ve been using your computer. By the way, you mumble in your sleep. And nice bra.” His eyes traveled down to my chest conspicuously, even though the comforter I’d surrounded myself with cut off anything he might have seen.

Blushing like mad, I fixed my shirt and got to my feet. “Yeah, well, you snore. So now we’re even.”

“If you were wondering, I managed to get here without your parents seeing me. I’m kind of an expert at sneaking.”

“The thought didn’t even cross my mind.” With that, I exited my bedroom and walked down the hall to the bathroom.

After cleaning up and brushing my teeth, I walked back to my room and leaned against the doorframe. “You want anything to eat?”

“Aren’t you afraid your parents will see me?”

I rolled my eyes and walked to the window, throwing up the blinds. “Look. There aren’t any cars in the driveway. They’re both gone, o master of sneakery.”

He coughed to hide his embarrassment. “I swear, they were still home when I came in here.”

“Whatever you say,” I allowed, going down to the kitchen. I didn’t have to turn around to know that Puck was following me, since his footsteps were so damn loud. I was pretty sure the neighbors heard him.

“What do you want to eat?” I questioned, going over to the cupboard and looking to see if we had any bagels left.

“What? You’re not going to make me pancakes?”

“Not unless you want a hard disk with a runny middle.”

He gave me a confused look.

“I suck at cooking. If my parents aren’t home, Val cooks. Or we order pizza, if she decides to ignore the Cheerio diet for a night.”

Puck nodded. “Alright, then I’ll just have a bagel like you.”

“Two bagels, coming up.”