Chapter 5 #2
For someone who claimed pink wasn’t her favorite color, she sure loved wearing it.
Her energy filled me up with strange calmness, and I even forgot about my earlier panic.
“I'm back,” she announced sitting back on the armrest next to me and her flowery scent surrounded me and I wondered how I didn't pick up on it sooner.
“What's in the bag?” I asked as I eyed the coffee she placed in front of me. “And what did you get me?”
“You got a decaf flat white. Whole milk, but very little. No sugar, don't worry,” she teased with a small smile as she ripped the paper bag open. “This is going to be your sugar.”
“Pain au chocolat?” I laughed, remembering her obsession with those.
“Nothing beats it,” she grinned as we each picked up one. Rosie bumped mine to hers with a small laugh. “Cheers.”
“Cheers,” I muttered as I bit into it. Fuck, it was good. The pastry melted in my mouth as the sugary, chocolaty taste overwhelmed my senses. It was fucking delicious.
“Was that a moan?” she teased me, taking a small bite from her own and laughed, when I moaned again, this time on purpose. “I may not have had a real orgasm, but I sure as hell know how to give a foodgasm.”
The amazing pastry suffocated me from her words, and I coughed. My mind was assaulted by images of her baking for me as I recovered, and I had to admit she was great at it. For sure knew how to give a foodgasm.
“Not arguing with that,” I muttered while she laughed.
It was a sound I could have gotten used to hearing. I didn't realize how much I missed it until just now.
“You never told me what happened over the summer,” I asked in a sly way, trying to get some information out of her.
Rosie glanced at me, an unreadable expression on her face, before she sighed.
“I re-injured myself. I had this plan that I'll take classes, join the dance team or audition, I only lost one year, I could still do it. But then, in mid-July, I pushed it too far. One day, when I was messing around in the studio, I heard my hip give a snap, and I knew I fucked it all up. It wasn’t the ‘my hip is tight, and I need to crack it’ snap; it was a painful one. I could barely walk for days. It got all bruised and swollen. After that, I kind of had to put all my hopes and dreams to rest and realize that this was my reality. My body could never handle professional life.”
My chest tightened. “Why didn't you tell me?”
She ducked her head, suddenly fascinated by her pain au chocolat. “I don't know. I guess... You were doing so well with your recovery. Getting stronger every day. And I was breaking down again. I didn't want to be the broken one while you were putting yourself back together.”
“Thorn…”
“I know, I know. That's not how friendship works.” She finally looked up, and I saw the guilt swimming in her blue eyes. “I'm sorry I went radio silent. I just... I couldn't face anyone. Especially you.”
“Especially me?” The words stung more than they should have.
“Not like that.” She reached across the table, her fingers brushing mine.
“You understood me in a way no one else did.
And that made it scarier. Because if I told you I'd failed again, if I admitted I'd re-injured myself through my own stupidity.
.. I thought you'd see me the way I saw myself. Weak. Careless. Broken.”
“I would never think that about you.”
“I know that now.” Her smile was sad but genuine. “But in July, when I couldn't walk without limping, and I was hiding it from my family… I had to accept that professional dance really was over... I wasn't thinking straight. I just shut down.”
“And shut me out.”
“Yeah.” She squeezed my hand. “I'm sorry.”
I squeezed back. “I missed you, you know. Your terrible baking updates and your check-ins and just... you.”
“I missed you, too,” she admitted quietly. “Every day.”
“I’m sorry you had to go through this alone, Thorn.”
“That’s okay, I thought it was going to be easier,” she smiled at me sadly.
“But if you ever need someone to talk to, you can always come to me just like before.
I'm not sure you'll always find me in a good mood, but I'm working on that. It’s just that this new wound is way too fresh. I was okay before because I had hope… now… I have no hope.”
“It's something we can work on together,” I offered, squeezing her hand.
Rosie returned my smile, and I felt something slowly shift between us. “We can add it to our list of things to work on.”
“Guess, you're not getting rid of me,” I winked, and she laughed.
“We are stuck with each other.”
But somehow neither of us seemed to mind it.
Rosalie stayed with me for another hour, and we talked about non-sense. None of us wanted to bring on the heavy conversations anymore, and she seemed grateful for the normalcy.
The only strange thing was that she didn't move away from me.
Her legs kept brushing my arm as she fidgeted on the armrest, trying to come up with a comfortable seating position, while her smell surrounded me wherever she moved.
Her closeness mixed with the decaf coffee and the pastry got me out of my head, and all I could think about was her.
Time and time again, everything came back to her. She was great and kind, and it was becoming hard to deny that I loved spending time with her.
“Since I'm here,” Rosie motioned to herself, pulling my attention back to her boobs and body. “You should teach me how to flirt.”
In my mind, she was doing great in that department, as I haven't thought of a single coherent sentence since she sat down. But then I reminded myself that she was my teammate's little sister and it wasn't appropriate.
“Okay, lesson number one. You need to smile at people,” I said, making her roll her eyes in frustration. “Hold your horses, Thorn.”
“Don't call me like that,” she groaned, frustrated. “I know how to smile at people, I've been doing it my whole life. See, I smile at you.”
A fake, forced smile pulled on her lips. And despite being beautiful, I could tell her smile was full of shit.
“Yeah, not this polite, fakeness you use on stage,” I waved at her. “Smile in a way to invite people to want to talk to you.”
Her eyes bulged out, and I had to bite down on my lip to not laugh. She clearly didn't want people talking to her.
“Okay, watch,” I grabbed her arm to get her attention and flashed her my signature smile.
It came natural despite not being this person anymore.
I knew exactly how much to pull my lips up and sideways to flash my white teeth and make the perfect smile that had all the girls dropping their panties.
I was charismatic by nature and even sitting there sweaty and smelly in my workout clothes, I got the passing waitress slightly blushing as I maintained eye contact with her.
She stumbled and quickly shuffled away.
Rosie scoffed, making me drag my attention back to her. “That's how you do it.”
“Okay, let me try.” She sat up straight and pulled her lips into yet another forced smile.
I burst out laughing. “You're grimacing. Try to relax. Jesus, you smile all the time.”
“Yeah, but you want me to do some kind of magic with my smile, and it doesn't work,” she slumped back against the armchair. “I'm horrible at this. I'm going to die a virgin.”
I scoffed and wrapped my arm around her. “No, don't get discouraged. Just imagine it's your friend you are smiling at. A friend you like. Try to be natural and inviting. Just... try with that guy.” I pointed at a random student sitting a few tables away from us. “Catch his eyes and smile.”
Rosie pushed me away and gagged. “You smell so bad.”
“Wow, Casanova, we haven't even mastered smiling, and you're already moving on to flirting?” I grinned, making her groan. “Try charming the stranger.”
Rosalie groaned, and this whole interaction made me forget about my shitty mood. She was entertaining and cute as hell as she narrowed her eyes at me, before trying to catch the guy's attention and flashing a slow, seductive smile at him.
She lied when she told me she didn't know how to flirt and that she'll die a virgin, because the smile that pulled on her lips made my heart skip a beat.
The guy felt the same way as he blushed, before ducking his head and staring back at his phone.
Rosie leaned back, her body pressed fully to my arm. “See?”
“Yeah, I saw. You got a poor guy so flustered that he needs to leave.”
Her attention snapped to the poor freshman packing up his things and rushing out of the café. I suppressed a laugh when I saw Rosie's chin dip.
“I can't do this.”
“Hey,” I reached under her chin with two fingers and forced her to look at me. “He left because he likes you, not because you suck. I think you're so pretty, you intimidate guys.”
She arched her brow. “You think so?”
“Sure, looks like it,” I shrugged with a grin. “You just need to find a guy who can play in your league.”
Rosie grinned, and I was stunned by her radiant smile. I missed seeing the carefree, happy grin on her face. “Glad to know you think I'm pretty.”
I let out a long laugh, resting my head against the armchair, and watched her victorious smile. “This was your plan all along. Fishing for compliments?”
“Nah,” she shrugged, her smile taking up all her face. “I just wanted to make you laugh.”
This girl... She was trouble.
And I loved it.