Chapter 6 Aurora #2
Once dressed, I turn and survey myself in the mirror.
I hadn’t paid much attention to what I was grabbing, but there’s no way my outfit could compare to what Mabel’s wearing.
While she’s not in a leather miniskirt or hot pink sequins this morning, she still looks ready for a photoshoot.
I run my eyes over my bare face and damp hair, then picture the gorgeous rock star currently standing on the other side of the door with her million-dollar blowout and perfectly winged eyeliner.
If she’s not going to judge me over cotton granny panties, she won’t judge me over a cotton sundress. I know this, but it doesn’t eradicate the feelings of inadequacy that creep into my head.
I give myself exactly thirty seconds to feel out of place. Thirty seconds to internally panic about how I don’t belong here and how I should have just stayed home. Then, when those thirty seconds are up, I meet my eyes in the mirror and whisper to myself.
“Shoulders back. Deep breaths. You’re here now, Aurora Jade. Stop being a baby.”
I smooth my hands down the skirt of my sundress, adjust the pendant of my necklace so it sits right between my collarbones, then I step back into the bedroom.
Mabel has made herself comfortable, sitting cross-legged on the little loveseat by my window with my room service in front of her.
Her eyes scan from my face to my toes and back, and then she smiles.
“You look good in green.”
“Oh. Um, thank you.”
I drop my eyes and try to suppress the goofy grin that wants to take over my face. Movement draws my attention back to her, though, and I catch her popping a berry in her mouth. I laugh.
“Are you eating my breakfast?”
Mabel smirks. “Want some?”
“Do I want some of the breakfast that I ordered for myself?”
“Do you?” She scoops a spoonful of yogurt from a glass parfait cup and holds it out to me. “It’s pretty good.”
I don’t move right away, but I let my gaze stay locked with hers.
The smirk on her pink lips grows slightly, and then I catch a flash of challenge in her amber eyes.
The challenge is what sets my feet in motion.
I close the distance between us slowly, until I’m standing over her, but when I reach for the spoon, she moves it away. I huff a laugh, and she arches a brow.
I know what she wants me to do, and the way my heart races makes me dizzy. I tell myself it’s a little, harmless thing, but I have to remind myself to take slow, controlled breaths. I sink my teeth into my bottom lip, hesitating for a few seconds before finally sitting beside her on the loveseat.
I watch her attention drop to my mouth as I open for her, and I swear I see heat flash in her amber irises as I close my lips around the spoon.
The cold yogurt hits my tongue, but I can barely taste the sweetness.
I’m too busy staring at Mabel’s expression as she slowly pulls the spoon back through my lips and watches as I swallow the yogurt.
She looks from my mouth to my eyes and darts her own tongue out to swipe over her plump lower lip.
“Well?”
I nod and swallow twice more before I can respond. “Yum.”
“You’ve got just a little...”
She brings her hand up slowly between us. When I don’t flinch away, she rubs her thumb at the corner of my mouth, and my skin erupts in goosebumps from her touch. Then my stomach flips over on itself when she sucks her thumb between her lips and hums.
“Yum.”
My inhale and exhale are shaky, and when I feel my face and neck heating, I break our stare and force out an awkward laugh. I can still feel her eyes on me, but I keep mine fixed firmly on the ground until she finally, abruptly, stands from the couch.
“C’mon, Roar. Let’s go before Savvy sends out a search party. She’s very impatient.”
The rapid change of mood leaves me scrambling for a complete thought, and I’m slow to follow as she starts to leave. We’re silent as we step into the hall. Thankfully, too, because I doubt I could carry on even the lightest of conversations.
What just happened? Was she testing me, pushing to see how I’d react? Or is that normal behavior between friends?
The way she fed me the yogurt. The way she smirked at me. The way she touched me. Her thumb on my lips. In her mouth. The tone of her voice when she said yum.
I replay the whole thing, then run through my memories, sifting for some comparable experience, but I come up short.
I really need to find some friends. I’ve had no friendships, or even friendly interactions, with any other girls since high school, and nothing comes anywhere close to my interactions with Mabel.
It could be normal, I suppose. I’m probably over thinking it. I’m just being ridiculous and out of place, which is further proof that I don’t belong here. Or...
Or...maybe...
I flatten my palm over my stomach and note the strange, tickling flutter of nerves.
Or was she flirting with me?
No. I almost laugh out loud. Definitely not. Mabel Rossi wouldn’t flirt with me. She’s a gorgeous, talented, famous rock star, and I’m, well, me.
I try to squash the thought, but it gets louder, demanding to be considered.
Maybe...
Everyone knows the drummer for The Hometown Heartless is queer.
Mabel Rossi is attracted to women. I’ve seen pictures of her with girlfriends in the past, and even the big drum of her drum set is emblazoned with a glittery rainbow flag.
I don’t think she’s dating anyone right now.
Or, at least, I can’t remember any recent pictures with a current girlfriend. If she’s single, then maybe...
No. No. No.
That’s ridiculous. She wouldn’t flirt with me. She was just messing with me. Testing me, and I probably failed whatever it was. That’s the only possible explanation, and I walked right into it.
I frown at the hotel carpet and keep my strides in time with Mabel’s, trying and failing to ignore the sinking feeling in my stomach. Maybe I am just the butt of the joke. Maybe Brady was right. I don’t belong. I don’t—
“Be honest. Have I made you uncomfortable?”
My head jerks upward, my eyes colliding with Mabel’s.
From what I’ve learned about Mabel in the last few days, I shouldn’t be surprised to see concern there, but I am.
I bounce my attention to the hotel door behind her.
We’re at Sav’s suite. Family breakfast. I take a deep breath, force a smile, and look back at Mabel.
“No, you haven’t.”
It’s not a lie. She’s made me feel a lot of confusing things in a short period of time, but none of them has been discomfort.
“Are you sure? Because it wasn’t my intention. I was just teasing.”
Teasing.
Just teasing.
Not flirting with me. Not making fun of me, either, but...
I resist the urge to frown, but I picture myself stomping on the embers of disappointment I feel glowing in the pit of my stomach.
“I’m sure,” I say, my voice tight as I nod multiple times. “I’m not at all uncomfortable.”
Mabel scans my face, the lines between her eyebrows deepening for a moment before she finally returns my nod.
“Okay.” She gestures to Sav’s suite door. “Sustenance awaits.”
It takes a good ten minutes to settle back into my thoughts before I’m able to enjoy, as Mabel called it, family breakfast. I try my hardest to keep my eyes off her despite the strong force trying desperately to pull them in her direction.
I try but I fail.
I was just teasing, she’d said. Not flirting.
It shouldn’t feel like a letdown. It shouldn’t make my brows slant and my shoulders droop as if I’d been filled with the weirdest, most confusing kind of hope, only to have it popped in an instant.
I’m married. I have a husband. And moreover, I’m not even into women.
What happened with Mabel...
It was teasing. Playfulness between friends. Completely and totally normal. I’m just not used to it because it’s been so long since I’ve had a friend outside of Brady.
Of course Mabel wouldn’t actually be flirting with me. I’m definitely not her type, and I wouldn’t even know what it felt like to be flirted with, anyway.
Of course I am not disappointed.
Because I feel absolutely no attraction, whatsoever, to Mabel Rossi.