Chapter 14 August - The familiarity of the dark and quiet
Itold Daisy she looked beautiful earlier, right after I made her come. I didn’t want to look away from the way her cheeks flushed and her chest heaved, almost breathless. And I meant it, she really did. She always has, even when we’re fighting. Actually, especially when we’re fighting.
But God, it doesn’t hold a candle to how beautiful she looks right now.
The light cast from the moon and the stars are shining bright on her in the most magical way while she sleeps soundly next to me on the couch.
She fell asleep about an hour ago, and I didn’t have the nerve to wake her up to move her.
I know I could scoop her up and carry her upstairs without issue. But we never discussed sleeping arrangements, and I don’t want to assume. I can’t assume.
Not with Daisy.
If I brought her into my bed, I’d be assuming she was okay with sleeping next to me.
A line might be crossed. If I carried her into my spare bedroom, she might wake up alone and panic—needing possibly more than a minute to get her bearings.
If I just left her here on the couch…Well, that’s just not a fucking option.
Sometimes, people think because I’m the big guy who doesn’t hesitate to throw my weight around that I don’t have a lot going on in my head.
And I guess those who assume that might be half right—I’m not winning awards in academics or anything, but I can overthink a lot.
I never want to be the worst guy in a room.
I want…I hope, maybe someday, I can make someone proud.
Having Daisy here is…I don’t know how to describe it.
My head has felt underwater—borderline drowning—all night.
It’s like old times, but there’s more. It’s like every curiosity I had about Daisy Stiles was held in a limbo for a decade and now that the ice has cracked, I’m unsteady with no sense of balance.
I kept everything locked up. I chalked my teenage feelings up to be nothing more than that.
Because there never could be more. There still can’t.
I look over at Daisy, the blanket I gave her before we turned the TV on pulled up so it’s resting on her cheek.
The steady rise and fall of her breathing has a perfect rhythm I find myself counting.
She’ll always deserve better than the cards she was handed.
This thing we’re doing…It’s probably not healthy. It’s absolutely going to fuck with my head. But, I can handle it. To get quiet moments like this, I’ll take it.
My phone pings with a text, and I reach out toward the coffee table to grab it.
It’s a notification from a group text Sawyer added me to against my will.
There’s an unknown number included. Quickly putting the dots together that it’s Daisy, I save her as a new contact.
I ignore how bizarre it feels to finally have something as trivial as her phone number after so much history between us.
Red Bozelli
i think a night out is in order for this weekend, whooooooooo’s in??? p’s chilling with mel
Margot
Me! Sawyer! Us!
Red Bozelli
yes, my honey bunny pregnant queen. i assumed your rsvp would include sawyer
Red Bozelli
okaaaay, just waiting on gus gus and miss daisy to grace us with responses
Me
Sure.
Sawyer Hale
Aye, Gus in the chat!
Red Bozelli
daze? we’re waiting on u girl
Margot
DAISY STILES, YOU CAN’T IGNORE US FOREVER
Miller Caswell
She probably got scared off by Gus being here.
Red Bozelli
daisy i swear on all that is holy if you don’t text us back in the next 2 minutes i will find you
Shit. I can’t respond on her behalf because then they’d know she’s with me.
And these lunatics—no matter how much I love them—cannot know Daisy is staying at my place, not on night one of whatever this situation is between the two of us.
But I don’t want Daisy to not answer, because then everyone might worry and start asking questions.
I could…I peer over at Daisy’s phone resting on the couch beside her. No. Bad idea. Invasion of privacy. Not to mention, weird as hell.
I opt to sacrifice the peacefulness of her sleep and gently shake her shoulder to wake her. “Daze,” I whisper.
I’m not shocked by her jolting awake. “What?” she yells. “Ah! I fell asleep.” Daisy slumps back into the couch cushions.
“It’s okay. You’re okay. Sorry to wake you. Umm, I didn’t know where you wanted to sleep. Also, our friends want us to all go out this weekend, and they’re about five seconds away from sending out a search party if you don’t respond to our group text,” I say in one breath.
“We’re in a group text?” Daisy asks, rightfully confused.
She gathers the hair that’s fallen out of her ponytail while sleeping.
Her loose sweater creeps up, exposing a thin line of her soft belly.
She pulls the elastic out of her hair and twists her curls into a pineapple-shaped bun on the top of her head. It’s messy and honestly?
It’s cute as fuck.
I shake the thought away and hand Daisy her cell. She scrolls through all of the unread texts, eyes going wide at the last one from Red. But then her face relaxes.
“It’s not like she’d go looking for me at your house.” Daisy laughs. “My car’s not even here. And it’s ten o’clock at night. Red isn’t leaving her house for shit.” I watch her type out a quick reply, and my phone pings with the notification.
Daisy Darling
Dramatic little bitches. I’ll be there.
She tosses her phone on my coffee table, not bothering to wait for anyone else’s response. I copy her, placing mine next to hers.
Daisy huffs. “Damn, your couch is comfy as hell.”
I stretch my arm out over the back of it and throw one leg on the ottoman. “Thanks, did a lot of saving to get the big one. I drove out to that furniture store with the 3D movie theater.”
“The one with the funky mirrors in the bathrooms?” she exclaims.
“Yeah.” I laugh. “That one. Place is fucking ginormous. I got lost like, seven times. But she was worth it.” I smooth my hand over the fabric.
“I have to agree with you. I’m okay to sleep here, by the way. You didn’t have to hang out down here and watch me drool.”
“A Stiles drooling? Can’t be. Your genetics wouldn’t allow such a disgrace to the family name.”
Daisy’s shriek could probably be heard all the way back to Main Street. “Fuck off!” She playfully swats my arm.
“Such language from a Stiles,” I keep the mockery going.
And Daisy just keeps laughing, and shit, does it sound fucking pretty.
So much so, the next words just fall out of my mouth. “I like the sound of that.”
“What?” Daisy asks in between hiccups of giggles.
“You. Laughing. This.” I gesture to the dark, quiet house around us. “It’s nice.”
Daisy criss-crosses her legs, scooting back into the cuddlier part of the sectional.
“I actually thought about something like this when we were camping. Do you remember the time I tried to sneak you into my bedroom? And we couldn’t fit ourselves on the bed together but kept trying until you crashed to the floor?”
“And Mary Jane came storming in to throw me out, but I was already halfway out your window?” I finish the memory, not bringing up how she did start to reminisce out loud on this particular one a couple weeks ago.
“She sucks,” Daisy says with a sigh.
“Things never got better, huh?” It’s a dumb question that I clearly already know the answer to.
Daisy starts smoothing out the blanket on her lap, her earlier playfulness gone.
“No. I mean—she tries. And I can’t say the same about our dad, so I guess she earns that point. For Hunter and Chase. Not sure what good it does seeing as Hunter is basically gearing up to be the next Dean Fitzgerald, and Chase…I don’t know what to say about Chase.”
“What do you mean?” The twins were babies, barely considered functioning human beings when Daisy and I fell off.
I see them around town. That’s a given in a small place like Merrymount, but I couldn’t tell you a single thing about them other than the fact that they’re practically carbon copies of Daisy in lanky, boy form.
Daisy blows out a long breath. “About two years ago, right around their tenth birthday, Chase stopped talking. And not like, in some bratty, defiant way. I mean, completely mute. My parents, to no one’s surprise, lost their ever-loving minds over it, but the answer remains a mystery to everyone but Chase.
He’s such a good kid, always focused on school, kind to everyone, sweet.
He’s just such a sweet kid. It kills me, to be honest.”
That’s some heavy shit. I don’t even know what I could say.
“You don’t have to say anything, August,” Daisy comments, basically reading my mind. “Chase being silent is honestly the least of my worries. He and I understand each other. Now, Hunter on the other hand…”
“Comparing him to Dean sounds rough. I can’t lie.” None of us have complained about the lack of Dean Fitzgerald since he skipped town earlier this year after getting arrested for drinking and driving, resulting in him losing his precious job at the police station. Good riddance.
“He’s a real fucking peach. I’ll tell you that much.
But, maybe that’s all twelve-year-old boys.
I don’t know. I’m not their mother. I’m just trying to make sure they turn out half decent.
And well, you’ve met my parents. There’s not much help in that department.
But what do I know? It’s not like I’m any better, right?
” She sounds so defeated. It makes me feel instantly guilty for adding to her pressure all these years.
I’ve only let myself think about it three times—maybe four. A set amount of time to feed that nagging, pest of a spot in the back of my brain that asked, Why did you stay?
Why remain in the house you always referred to as a prison? Why put up with two failures for parents? You wanted to get out. You were getting out.
But her face says it all, no words needed.
She saw little two kids, with no different of a start than each of us had, and saw the fork in the road. Daisy made the decision to not leave her brothers’ lives up to the same chance we had growing up. She took on a burden that wasn’t hers without complaint.
For all of those same years, I laid into her every chance I got. I threw around words like selfish, pretentious, and self-centered. And she never even made the time to deny it, only throwing my own ugliness back in my face in repayment.
Well fucking deserved and more on my part.
When she decided to stay, I have no idea. Was it before everything, and she just didn’t tell me? Was all of it…for nothing?
I feel like the damn wind just got knocked out of me.
My socked feet abruptly hit the hardwood floor, and I pull myself up to stand. I’m not nearly ready to let this conversation go any further. I’ll say the wrong thing and—just nope.
I click the muted TV off and toss the remote on the couch.
“You’ll never be your parents, Daze. And you’re not sleeping on the fucking couch. The spare bed has fresh sheets, and mine is available too. Well, the left side is. I sleep on the right.”
Daisy doesn’t move, twisting the blanket between her fingers. She refuses to look up, but I can see her toying with that pouty lower lip of hers.
“No, really. The couch is perfectly fine,” she says stubbornly.
I don’t bother arguing. Fuck this coy act she has going on. I take a chance and bend over, hoisting Daisy up over my shoulder, blanket in tow, dangling and swishing on the floor.
“August!” Her fists rap against my ass, and I chuckle the whole way up the stairs.
While she puts on a little show, her body is relaxed against me.
Once on the second floor, I gently place Daisy back on solid ground in between my room and the spare.
A bathroom door sits between, with a second door connecting to the spare bedroom. There’s another full bath in my room.
Daisy plants those same fists on her hips. “I have a say in this! You can’t just throw me around like a sack of potatoes!”
I attempt to imitate her pose, and I swear I see her want to break character for half a second. “Just did. Get over it. I gave you two perfectly respectable options. Pick one.”
I think she’s about to actually stomp her foot when she pivots left, marches in, and turns again to slam the spare bedroom door in my face.
“Goodnight, August,” Daisy ends the conversation on her terms. Just like she always does.
Except this time it doesn’t grate me like it normally would. This time, I have to really respect when a woman like Daisy takes what she wants, and accepts nothing less.
I change into a pair of sweats and halfway through brushing my teeth, I realize I forgot to bring Daisy one of my extra toothbrushes.
Mouthful of toothpaste and balancing my toothbrush between my teeth, I cross the hallway, peace offering in the form of dental hygiene in hand, when the door opens before I can knock.
My toothbrush bobbles almost out and onto the floor when my jaw falls open on its own accord.
Daisy stands in the doorway, right hip popped out wearing a T-shirt that’s entirely too big for her, the dark grey cotton skimming maybe an inch or two above her knee.
My T-shirt.
She’s wearing my shirt, and wildly possessive caveman instincts try to break through. I swallow them down, keeping my shit in check.
“I was literally just coming to ask you for one of these. Thank you,” Daisy says, plucking the toothbrush I’m still stupidly holding up from my limp hand.
“Glad you found pajamas,” I stammer.
I think things can’t get worse, and then her cheeks darken. What the fuck is wrong with me right now?
“This is okay, right? Sorry. Should I have asked? There’s a pile of T-shirts and shorts—”
“Daze.” I go to cup her shoulder, but I stop an inch away and now my hand is just awkwardly hovering.
I don’t trust myself to touch her right now.
I need to get back to my room. “It’s cool.
You didn’t exactly have time to pack a sleepover bag.
Looks good on you.” I retreat back and turn to shut the door. “Night.”
I jerk myself off later in the shower to the image of Daisy standing there in the low hallway light with a deep blush on her face, looking back at me in only my thin T-shirt, whispering an almost silent goodnight.
One of her small hands, nails painted a blue that matches her eyes, wrapped around the doorframe.
I thought it felt like old times before, and it does—to an extent. But I’m starting to realize the new I’m finding might be even better.