But when my eyes reopen, everything but the here and now melts away, and my senses cast out to find Alex, lingering over every inch of him. It’s as if I’m homesick for a person lying fifteen feet away.
Out of anyone I could possibly feel this way about, why did it have to behim?
Chapter Fourteen
PINK GERANIUM:
I await your explanation.
I wake up to the harsh slap of my own arm hitting my face.
“Ow.”
“Keep your hands to yourself,” Trevor mumbles. “You keep flinging your arm over me. Ro, if you fall in love with me this is going to be so awkward.”
“Shh!” I sit up in bed, one eye open, panning the couch. It’s empty. Alex must have left, or maybe he’s in the bathroom.
I plant a foot on Trevor’s lower back and kick, propelling him onto the floor. He takes the blanket with him, howling. “Turn around! Don’t look.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s first thing in the morning, and I’m wearing nothing but a robe. It’s the Apollo Thirteen launch over here.”
This is all the motivation I need to scramble out of bed. The bathroom’s dark, door open. When I’m finished doing my business, I find that my notebook has been returned to the top of my bookstack.
“Oh, thank goodness. He’s gone,” I tell Trevor, body flooding with relief.
“Who’s gone?”
Alex’s face pops up on the other side of the open window. I scream.
“Sorry, was I interrupting your cozy couple time?” Alex leans against the ivy-clad exterior of the house, tranquil as a rose. “Y’all sleep inlate.”
I check my clock. “It’s not even six.”
“Six a.m.?” Trevor exclaims. “That’s not a real number.” He dives back into bed, yanking the covers up over his head, feet sticking out. “Nobody talk to me until noon.”
I scuttle outside to meet Alex, closing the door behind me. “I’m a morning person, for your information.”
“Not as much as I am. I’ve been awake since five.”
“I actually woke up at four, but kept my eyes closed.”
“I’ve been awake since five o’clock,yesterday.”
“Well, I haven’t slept in eighty years. I’m a vampire.”
Laughing, he sits down to pet a chicken. “Roxanne is my favorite.”
I run my fingers through her downy white feathers. “This is Suki.”
“Why’d you name her that? She clearly looks like a Roxanne.”
I take in his change of clothes (jeans and a plain T-shirt—naturally, he refuses to wear anything fun), a plate sitting nearby with the remains of his breakfast (toast and an orange). A thermos of coffee. The coffeemaker is near the bed, which means he’s been bustling around me while I slept. The thought is jarring. “Don’t you have a job you should be heading off to?”
“I’m on vacation. Why are you trying to get rid of me?”
“Stop answering questions with questions, it’s annoying,” I reply. He’s got bruise-like circles under his eyes, I notice. “Late night all alone with the darkness of your thoughts?”
