"You're the most interesting person I've ever met."
My cheeks heat up with his words. I don't reply, focusing my attention on the food.
As I take my first bite of the apple pastry, I moan. Blake turns his face, his eyes dark.
"It's nothing compared to Carly'spain au chocolatbut at least we won't die of hunger."
"I can't eat any sweets besides Carly's," he confesses sheepishly, then with a sharp tone he adds, "but don't ever tell her that. I'd never hear the end of it."
"Your secret is safe with me." I wink as I go for another bite.
We sit quietly for a while, eating our snacks. Silence doesn't always feel comfortable but with Blake it does.
"So I was thinking, maybe we could try breaking one of the windows to get out."
"Do you want me to get expelled?"
He rolls his eyes. "I hardly think breaking a window will get you expelled. Or even suspended for that matter. I will take the blame, anyway."
"Don't you want to stay here alone with me?"
He gets closer, dragging his hands over my short hair. "Believe me, I'd stay here forever."
"So why not wait? Carly will try to find you later tonight, won't she?"
He shrugs. "She will."
"So let's have our own Christmas Day. We've got a bunch of decorations and I'm looking forward to watching the parade from here."
"We're not going to see much. If we break the window, you'll get to see it from up close."
"If we break the window, will you see it with me? Follow it around together?"
He hesitates and I don't need his words to know what his answer is.
“Let’s just spend Christmas here. I’ll prove to you it’s actually fun… and maybe return the favor from yesterday.”
He huffs, a smile letting me know he's not serious. "No. I think I'd rather repeat what I did yesterday. Leaving you wrecked so you don't talk about Christmas anymore."
"I guess I'll just have to resist you."
Chapter 7 - Blake
It's already dark out. Carly must've figured out by now I'm not coming to the Christmas dinner and wondering where I am. Which means, this precious time with Poppy is ending.
It was the perfect day. A Christmas I'll never forget. We didn't attempt to escape this gym. Instead, the floor around the gym mattresses — our bed — got a Christmas treatment: there were wreaths made of leftover crepe paper, ornaments out of cardstock that Poppy cut into stars and circles, and she made me draw snowmen and Santas on them. She got a piece of red fabric and is using it as a headband, which suits her just perfectly, and she’s making me wear a reindeer headband too, one she found at the bottom of one of the boxes from the float that makes me look totally ridiculous.
We also saw the parade from afar. It passed briefly and we saw it through one of the windows of the gym. It felt special somehow, or maybe it's her that makes everything feel more special. We could've banged the window, trying to get someone’s attention, despite the loud music and how far we were, maybe someone would have seen us trapped in the college gym. But neither of us did, we just enjoyed the parade as well as we could before getting back to the crafts.
Obviously, I took care of the breaks, which were frequent yet not enough to satiate my need for her. It fueled it instead.Hence why I don't want anyone to find us. We don't have any food left so I guess it'd be selfish of me to starve her to death just because I want her here with me.
Will our relationship make it past these gym walls? Everything tells me this isn't right, that I should've kept my hands and my mouth to myself. And yet, I just couldn't. No. I'm loving every minute of it. I'm ashamed of it of course but not enough to stop. She's been on my mind all this semester and... to get her all to myself is a privilege I'm not going to let go just yet.
Not until someone opens that door.
Until then, I'll kiss her.
I pull her towards me, like I've done so many times since our first kiss and don't let her go. She giggles, claiming I'm not allowing her to breathe in between but I'm clinging to this woman. Mine. Mine.
