So I don’t know what’s happening there. It actually snuck up on me a few days ago.
Not to mention, I’ve been so tired, bone tired lately. So much so that ballet and practice and exercises are the last thing on my mind, which is fine because I already sent in my Juilliard application but still. I can barely drag myself out of bed in the morning and stay awake in classes after lunch.
I feel like my body is swollen and heavy and I just want to sleep till the end of time.
“Maybe I’ll go next week,” I say and smile reassuringly.
Hopefully I’ll be better next week, won’t I?
I have to be.
This can’t go on forever. Especially when this is what I want. Especially when it’s been three weeks since that night.
But hours later, long after Wyn has gone to sleep, I’m still awake.
I’m tossing and turning, so hot and so uncomfortable in my skin that I decide to sneak out. Coincidentally, it’s a Thursday and so a perfect night for sneaking out.
I’m not going to the studio though because I don’t have the energy or any will to dance, but I need some fresh air. So I creep out of the room, scale the fence and wander into the woods.
I walk aimlessly, my feet kicking up the leaves, crunching them, my fingers grazing the rough bark, the branches, trying to get rid of this nausea that has suddenly crept up.
I even walk over to the tree.Thetree.
Just by the side of the road. Where he kissed me.
I’m an idiot for doing that. I know.
But I just wanted to see it. I just wanted to touch it.
As soon as I do though, I snatch my hand back, disgusted with myself, and walk away, ready to go back to my dorm room, when I hear something.
Tires screeching. Bang of a car door shutting.
Footsteps.
Loud and thumping.
I can hear the crunch of the leaves. I can feel the force of the heels stomping the ground right in my chest.
Strangely, I know it’s him.
I already know it so I dive for the tree just by my side and hide behind it. I hunch my shoulders and try to shrink my body, try to make myself smaller because I don’t want him to see me.
Idon’t.
What is he doing here? Why has he come?
He’s looking for me, isn’t he?
He’s come to find me when he promised. Hepromisedhe wouldn’t.
Yet he’s here on a Thursday at midnight.
God, Reed.
I ignore my fluttering heart. I ignore that it soars in my chest, that a rush goes through me. At the fact that he’shere.
I slowly look over my shoulder from where I’m hiding. I dig my nails into the bark when I see that he’s striding down the path that I take to and from the fence. He’s going to that spot, the spot from which we sneak out.
