Zevran.

At this point, I am guessing that some of you may already be exhausted from always hearing me say the same thing over and over again. But there was no way I could ever stop.

There is never a day that would go by without me reminding all of you of how beautiful Leilani is, and this— the way I sound— is exactly how I felt as I watched her busy herself with something in the laptop she had borrowed from me some days ago.

She was working— that I could see from how furrowed together her brows were. Even her eyes, now hidden behind large cute transparent glasses, were thinned as she probably tried to tackle some problem related to work.

Beside her was a glass of juice which I had switched some time ago with the cup of coffee she had been drinking from.

Her hair, falling over her back and shoulders, were like a cloud of mist... or fog. Goddess, it even almost looked like a curtain, shielding her from the outside world and adding a sprinkle of mystery to her already ethereal- looking figure.

I sighed.

"I guess you’ve had your fill, haven’t you?" Her voice suddenly snapped me out of my reverie, causing me to flinch slightly before cocking my eyebrows at her.

I leaned against the sofa, pressed my head against the headrest and looked at her. And usually, this posture was one to show relaxation. It was to depict the image of a man who was barely touched by everything happening all around him, so why was I panicking?

Why is my heart beating against my chest like some fucking animal on rampage?

"Huh?"

"You’ve been staring at me for the past hour, and—"

"It’s distracting?" I cut in, interrupting her, and not missing the almost unnoticeable hitching of her breath before she slowly lifted her head to meet my gaze,

And goddess, once more, I was mesmerized.

I was pulled into whatever it is that she always pulls me into.

"No," she snapped, "I just find it very uncomfortable."

"Hence... you’re distracted." I answered cockily, and this time, instead of responding, she simply rolled her eyes at me and turned away.

But I did not want that.

I do not want to have her attention only for a couple of seconds before she returns to ignoring me for the rest of the day.

I do not want to have to watch her from afar like some forbidden fruit which you could see but could never touch. Mind you, I like watching her, I love it even. But I wanted more. Craved for more...

So with this in mind, I decided to make the first move. My knees protested as I rose to my feet and went to sit on the chair closest to the stool she was perched on; And like this, even with the ’about ten inches of space’ hanging between us, I still felt her warmth.

I still felt her aura and presence envelope me like a mother’s caress. It soothed me in ways I could not explain and made me smile despite myself.

Her eyes lifted one more time to pin me with a glare, and then she hissed; "What?"

"I am bored," I answered quickly, truthfully. "I am tired of sitting back at home without doing anything and I am tired of having to watch you work when it is obvious that I can help."

"You should go and help your brothers..." her voice trailed off but stopped when something finally shone in her eyes.

I smiled. "I can but they won’t allow it. They still do not believe that I am fine now despite being told by the doctor that I am responding fine to my treatment."

At the sound of my words, she lowered her head, only for a brief second before she suddenly lifted it one more time to cast me a shy glance. "Then I guess you can help me."

For the first couple of seconds after she said that, my heart simply skipped beats. My blood rushed wildly into my ears and hell hot bloody moon goddess, my face burned.

Like literal burn.

It felt as though my face had been shoved into a pot of boiling water.

She tilted her head to the side and asked; "Are you blushing?"

I froze.

Blushing? Hell, eww... never!

And that was exactly what I intended to say to her until I then began to stutter. "No... I cannot. I should not. Why would you even ask me something so preposterous?!"

"You are,"

"I really cannot!" I snapped, "it is unethical!"

My flustered nature coupled with my stupid words made her chuckle even more and like this, I couldn’t help but notice how brightly her eyes shone at me as she pressed even harder.

Her teasing made me feel some type of way. Not mad. Not embarrassed. But good.

I felt too good, it was surreal, and knowing that this may probably not be my forever, and that one day, she might decide to leave this house— that is after all of this is over, I frowned as I quickly rose to my feet. I waved my hand in her face, I snorted; "don’t worry! I do not wish to help you anymore, even if you crawl on the ground and beg me to!"

And that, ladies and gentlemen, made her laugh harder.

"Come on!"

"Oh, you come on!" I snapped back, rolling my eyes sassily, "...you’ve been laughing at me ever since I asked to help you and now, it’s beginning to feel as though you don’t want to..."

"I’ve been laughing because I find you funny and cute." She answered, but as if suddenly realising that she had said something she wasn’t supposed to, she clamped her lips together and looked away.

"I didn’t mean it in the way it sounded... I didn’t.."

Now, she was the one stuttering and I was the one having fun. Well, not really, because my heart wouldn’t stop hammering against my chest at the thought of her calling me cute.

I wouldn’t stop blushing so hard, I probably looked like a beetroot right now.

With a triumphant smile, I plopped back into my chair, crossed my arms over my chest and leaned so close, I could see the almost nonexistent freckles scattered all across her nose. I drawled;

"You think I am cute?"

"I think you’re stupid." She answered back, but I was sure that she didn’t mean that anymore.

Hell, she could no longer look me in the eyes— not like I wanted her to because that would literally turn me into a puddle at her feet if she did.

However, she ignored me and my taunting and turned to focusing on her screen, and at this point, I had begun to think that she would no longer require my assistance until she pushed the laptop in front of my face and muttered; "I have been stuck there for all of eternity."

"Where?" I asked;

"There," she answered softly, pointing to a technical design that was so complicated, it made a whack headache settle at the back of my skull as soon as I laid my eyes on it.

I squinted at the page and tried to trace out the outline of the image on the laptop screen, and for some reason, that was exactly what she intended to do at the time too.

And how do I know this?

I know it because our hands brushed. It not just brushed against each other, it struck each other, causing jolts and jolts of cracking electricity to fly high between us.

She jumped at the contact but because she was perched on her stool, began to fall backward, and I, a fool, tried to catch her even though I wasn’t balanced on my stool properly either.

And do you know what happened next?

She fell. I fell too.

And we both tumbled to the floor like two humpty donkeys, crashing to the ground and into each other’s arms.

"What the hell?"