39. Split
Chapter thirty-nine
Split
NOAH
In my mind, Delane and I danced.
I was twirling her around, her smile growing brighter and brighter with each spin. I clutched her close to me, admiring her beauty, her red hair twisting around my fingers. I loved the fact that I was so close to her. I wondered, did she like to dance? Her aura radiated joy.
“Where are you, Noah?” she asked sweetly, eyeing me with a degree of worry.
“Right here,” I assured her.
“Noah?” She asked again, and the whole daydream began to melt.
The green eyes turned blinding grey. I was with Silas, I remembered.
Our late nights had become pretty regular in terms of meeting up.
Reaching him was challenging enough, but the thrill and fulfillment of our time together more than made up for the effort of getting there.
Silas stared at me quizzically, his wayward eyes penetrating my view.
“Where did you go?” Silas asked, a fixed smile resting on his lips.
I blinked, closing my eyes to escape his conviction. “I haven’t moved.”
Silas chuckled. “You’re an idiot. I meant your thoughts. You were daydreaming.”
“I was not.”
I opened my eyes to peer at him. He was ready to challenge that. “Oh, really now? Then what were we just talking about?”
I struggled to think back. “Well…” I cleared my throat. “We were talking about–”
“No, Noah,” Silas said with a smirk. “We weren’t talking about anything.” He pressed his mouth against mine roughly, but before I could return the gesture, swiftly pulled back. “We were making out, and you just,” he licked his lips sensually. “Vanished on me.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. I was unaware of how consumed I had become by my own rambling thoughts.
Silas shrugged. “I guess I forgive you.”
“You guess?”
Silas said nothing, only stared at me. I started to learn that his silence was a window into understanding his emotions.
When something bothered him, he would withdraw away from the world.
Being suspended between the uncertainty of what to say, do, or how to resolve the situation really irritated me.
I wasn’t sure exactly how to approach it, but I knew that if I didn’t figure it out, Silas would fester.
“What is it, Silas?” I wanted to know.
“I want us to go somewhere tomorrow.” He spoke suddenly, brushing his hand against mine.
I was taken aback by the abrupt change of topic. My brain whirled. “What do you mean?”
Silas frowned, and I watched the gears turning in his head as he contemplated his next words. “What I mean is…I want to take you out somewhere.”
I snorted. “You sound like you’re asking me out on a date.”
There was a long pause of silence. Too long for my liking. “Are you asking me on a date?” I asked, bewildered.
Silas looked to the side. Was he nervous?
“We don’t have to call it—” he hesitated, and his shaky breath made my heart pound. “Well, yeah, I guess I am asking you on a date.” He dipped his head slightly, returning his concentration to me, to my eyes that were probably as wide as saucers. “How about…dinner?”
I couldn’t believe what I had just heard. It took me at least a minute to assure myself that I hadn’t actually fallen asleep and was dreaming of this conversation. Silas Thorne, taking me on a dinner date? Impossible. “You know we couldn’t do that, Silas.”
“And why is that?” he returned with a snap.
“B-Because,” I rose from my point on the side of his bed, unable to stop my voice from cracking.
“It’s hard enough coming here, sneaking in, just to see you.
What makes you think we can just…flaunt ourselves around in public without anyone noticing?
Our families hate each other. Going out together would be ridiculous, and not to mention extremely risky. We’d end up everywhere online.”
“I guess that’s my answer, huh?” Disdain rolled off his tongue.
“Yes, it is,” I growled, running a hand over the back of my neck. “I don’t know what you think this is, but it’s not some silly-go-out-on-dates liaison.”
“Then what do you suppose we call our interactions?” Silas questioned with a smirk, obviously enjoying my temporary panic.
I thought about it, and only one word came to my mind.
“I don’t know, an affair?”
“Of course you would say that.” Silas shook his head, his laughter quieter this time.
A calm rose over us for what seemed to be the hundredth time. We were bad at talking, I realized then. Whenever it was anything sexual, talking wasn’t needed. But when left alone to speak, it seemed that the right words never came out of either of our mouths.
Silas stood and placed a firm hand on my shoulder. “Noah, look at me.”
I turned.
“What is troubling you?”
Everything.
“Nothing.” I realized then I was also the problem.
Silas was right. I wasn’t sharing anything that was bothering me.
I had kept my feelings for Delane a secret from him.
How could I share that? I didn’t tell anyone, not even Alex, how I wasn’t even attending my lectures anymore, I was just showing up to school just to see her in the food court for an hour or so every day.
I yearned for her and Silas both. How fucked was that?
Silas grabbed my chin, pulling my face forward. I grunted from the force.
“Look into my eyes and tell me that,” he demanded, his breath cool on my lips.
I obeyed. “Nothing is wrong, Thorne.” I used his last name to piss him off. He hated when I did that now.
“Fine then, Hansen,” Silas said with a sneer, returning my family label. He opened his mouth to say something else but stopped before anything could emerge.
My hands found his waist, and his grip on my chin loosened. “What?” I asked.
Silas stroked my bottom lip with his thumb, his eyes gazing intensely at mine.
“At least promise that I’ll get to see you tomorrow.”
A flash of the dance came into my mind. The whole reason I was distracted in the first place.
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
“Busy. It’s a family thing.”
“Hmm. Unfortunate…” Silas murmured, snaking his arm around my waist. “I suppose we have to make up for the lost time then, hmm?”
I curled into his chest. “I guess we do.”
And our dance began.