I need you to let me take care of you.
“I need you to eat.” I hold the spoon back up.
“Seriously.” She lays her head on the couch cushion.
“Don’t make me play airplane with you,” I say, holding a spoon in the air. With that, I get a smile.Almost.
“Tyler,” she laughs again “Please.”
“Please, airplane?” And I start makingfucking airplane noises.
“Absolutely not!” She hops from the couch. “This is childish!”
Yet, she’s laughing and smiling. It’s the most incredible thing. I’d do anything for that smile—even playing god damnairplane. So, I continue to chase her around, making fucking airplane noises if it means those laughs will continue to grace me with their presence.
“Tyler, no!” She laughs, running around the apartment, still wrapped in her blanket. Her feet pad the floor as she runs around the kitchen.
Here we are—just Tyler and Sunny.
She stands on one end of the small island while I stand on the other, spoon still raised.
“No,” she says with a grin full of laughter.
There it is. A full fucking smile. And I just stare, completely forgetting what I’m even doing as I watch her. Cheeks round with happiness, eyes wide with mirth, and those lips, pink and smiling and all because of me.
I did that.
What she does to me is something I can’t name. I can only feel it. An undeniable pull between us, as if there is something deeply woven in my heart. The way it stutters and finds a new beat to be in rhythm with hers. The way I know the number of freckles that cover her nose. The way there is something so real between us, despite not being able to see it. What started as an obsession has completely morphed into something so much deeper. And yeah, we are far beyond friends now. Even if she doesn’t know it yet.
She seizes my moment of failure, my moment of weakness, and dashes towards her room.
I never got to act this way.At all.She lets me open up that part I didn’t even know existed. Thehumanpart. The childish part. The part I thought died the day I was nine years old, laying in that hospital bed.
She jumps into her bed, heavily breathing despite the grin on her face.It’s there. I did that.
“A little out of shape there?” I tease.
She rolls her eyes. “I’m compromised.”
“Well, since you aren’t going to eat this, I’m going to go package it and put it in your fridge.” I point behind me towards her little kitchen.
After I pack everything up, I come back to the makeshift doorway of what she deems her room and lean against it, my arms crossed.
I notice a book on her nightstand and nod towards it. “Whatcha reading?”
She turns the bathroom light off and walks over to the nightstand. Her face is bare of any makeup, glowy from her skincare routine I know she just did andfuck, despite the fact her nose is still red and she’s sick, she’s so fucking perfect.
She grabs the book. “It’s calledLooking for Alaskaby John Green. It’s basically my Bible.” She hugs it to her chest.
“Read it to me,” I say.
She blinks. “You might not like it.”
“I like you,” I smile. “Does that count?”
She breaks my stare, trying to hide the blushing smile forming her lips. “Okay.” She sits on her bed, and I follow after, cozying myself right next to her. Andfuck, my heart beats a little faster.
“What happened to the book?” I ask, noting it’s ripped up with some burn marks on it.
