Chapter 5
Roxanne~
The meeting with my parents had gone well. Thirty minutes before school had started, Royce had shown up on my doorstep, ringing the doorbell and texting me at the same time. When I had answered the door, he had floored me by asking if my parents were home because he’d like to meet them.
A quick five minutes later, Royce Cameron had been introduced to my parents, and there’d been no awkwardness or drama.
Hands had been shaken, greetings greeted, and promises to speak more later had been made.
Then, when Royce had opened the car door for me this morning, just like he’d had on Friday night, that’s when it had occurred to me that Royce Cameron had the manners of a gentleman, and it was a very nice thing to see, especially in this day and age.
Now, parked in the student parking lot, I was sitting in his car while he was opening the door for me yet again. After helping me out of the vehicle, Royce grabbed my book bag from my hand, then tossed it over his shoulder, letting it land on top of his own book bag.
Grabbing my hand, we walked through the parking lot together and towards class.
Yosemite High was an open campus, so it wasn’t closed-in like some other schools.
It was nice during spring and fall, but kind of miserable during summer and winter; harsh weather was no joke.
However, I did like the rain. The rain was soothing, in my opinion.
As we made our way through the walkways towards my locker first, it was hard to ignore the stares, though I didn’t blame them.
It was rumored that Royce hadn’t been interested in dating anyone here, so this had to be a shock.
Plus, throw in the fact that I’d never had a boyfriend since starting high school, and this little PDA was bound to send tongues wagging.
When we finally reached my locker, Royce smiled down at me. “Are you okay?” he signed.
“Yeah,” I signed back, smiling up at him. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Everyone’s staring,” he signed, but the shake in his shoulders showed me that he was laughing.
I nodded. “Yes, they are.”
“Does it bother you?” he asked, still signing.
I shrugged. “Not really.”
Royce gave me a terse nod before letting me open my locker and get to business. However, the second that I opened my locker, Royce had me trapped inside the door, his hands coming up to cradle my face, and the second that his lips touched mine, my knees threatened to give out.
His lips were firm, but soft. They were thorough, but tender. They were sexy, but sweet. Royce Cameron knew how to kiss, and he tasted like a hint of mint and pure perfection.
My hands slid up his chest until my arms were wrapped around his neck, and I kissed him back, not caring who was watching.
While I hadn’t expected such a bold move, I wasn’t sorry that he’d made it.
I’d been wondering since Friday what his objective was, and now I knew.
While kissing didn’t necessarily mean commitment, Royce Cameron wouldn’t be kissing me if he weren’t serious about me.
He just didn’t seem like the type to toy with people.
When he finally pulled his lips off mine, he dropped his forehead to mine, his chest heaving as rapidly as mine was. “I’ve been wanting to do that since last year,” he confessed, talking precisely enough for me to read his lips. “And it’s all that I’ve been thinking of since Friday.”
I leaned back, so that I could sign to him. “Royce-”
“You’re my girlfriend, right?” My eyes widened at him being so direct. “I mean, it’s okay to kiss you, right? Since you’re my girlfriend, yeah?”
Royce Cameron’s girlfriend.
“You want me to be your girlfriend?” I signed.
His brows knitted in confusion. “I-” He went to signing. “I don’t understand.” I pointed between him and me, then re-signed the question, and his brows immediately jumped in understanding. “Yes, I want you to be my-” He stopped, then signed the word girlfriend by spelling it.
My heart was threatening to explode inside my chest. I’d never heard of a boy wanting to date a girl badly enough that he would learn an entirely different language just to be with her.
It was also sweet how he wasn’t embarrassed to mess up his signs.
I knew that he didn’t feel entirely comfortable with his limited knowledge of ASL, but I loved that he was still brave enough to try.
I nodded, then signed, “Okay.”
His smile carried across his entire face. “Yeah?” he signed.
I nodded again. “Yeah,” I signed back.
Then stepping back to give me some space, he signed, “Good. Now, get your books, so that we can go.”
I couldn’t stop my smile, even if I’d wanted to. When I went to grab my book for class, Pepper came racing around the corner, and when she spotted us together, her smile matched mine.
Sauntering up to us like she had all day, she came to stand next to us, her eyes flying back and forth between us. “So...”
Royce looked down at her, still smiling. “Roxie’s agreed to be my girlfriend,” he tried to sign, though it was a bit of a mess.
“You agreed to be his girlfriend?” Pepper signed slowly, correcting his mess.
“Yes,” I signed back as I nodded. “We’re official.”
After dropping that little gem, I went back to getting my stuff, and after shutting the door, we made our way to Royce’s locker.
Pepper already had her stuff with her, so we just needed to get Royce’s stuff, then head on to class.
I wasn’t sure if Royce realized that Pepper was in all of my classes, so there’d be no privacy between us.
However, something told me that he wouldn’t mind.
When Royce finally delivered me and Pepper to our first class, he stopped me from going inside as he let Pepper on by. “I’ll give you and Pepper our breaks, but I get you at lunch,” he voiced. “Is that okay?”
I nodded, then signed, “Okay.”
Royce grinned. “Good. Okay,” he signed before he leaned down, then kissed me on my cheek, adding, “I’m going to start speaking to you in sign more, so be patient with me, okay?”
My heart thumped again. “Okay,” I signed again.
Another kiss, and then Royce was on his way.
I watched him jog off because the second bell for class had already begun.
He might be late, and that realization just warmed my heart again.
Royce was putting in some considerable effort to do this thing with me, and I couldn’t lie and say that it didn’t make me feel special, because it made me feel very special.
~
Royce~
I hadn’t wanted to give her our two breaks to be with Pepper, but I hadn’t wanted to scare her off, either.
I’d gotten a major win this morning when Roxie had agreed to be my girlfriend, so I didn’t want to undo the progress that I’d made.
However, truth be told, I wanted to be with her every second of the day.
I’d wasted so much time waiting to ask her out that I was annoyed that we couldn’t just speed things along.
While this was all new to Roxanne, as far as I was concerned, I’d been dating her since last year when I’d first gotten here.
“That was one hell of a kiss this morning.”
I turned to see Hudson making his way towards my locker, and the asshole had the biggest smile on his face. It was our first break of the day, and Hudson and I always hung out together during breaks and lunch. After all, we were super close and teammates.
“Saw that, did you?”
“Everyone saw that,” he smirked. “You’re lucky it’s not going viral right now.”
I winced. “It was just a kiss,” I murmured. “It’s not like we’re the first teenage couple to ever do it.”
“True,” he agreed as we made our way to the courtyard.
The courtyard had two snack kiosks, and we usually grabbed something to hold us over until lunch.
“But it’s the first time that Royce Cameron has been seen kissing a girl at Yosemite.
Plus, it’s also the first time that Roxanne Rafferty has been seen kissing a guy. ”
“They’ll get over it,” I replied dryly.
When we got to the courtyard, Hudson nudged me. “Looks like someone is waiting to talk to you,” he muttered low enough for my ears only.
Glancing in the same direction that he was, I noticed Kaley Frost and Simone Lewis waiting by the kiosk that Hudson and I usually frequented. Granted, they could be there to buy some snacks, but I doubted it. I’d never seen them here before today, so it was odd.
As soon as we got within hearing distance, Kaley pounced. “So, is it true?” she asked. “People are saying that you’re dating Roxanne Rafferty.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “But...that’s impossible, right?”
“Excuse me?” I asked, and because Hudson knew me well enough to know the tone of my voice, he stayed quiet. Simone also had enough sense to understand that my love life was none of her business, nor was it any of Kaley’s business as well.
Kaley dropped her arms. “Well, I mean...how do you even talk to her?” she asked like a complete idiot. “Why would any guy want to date a girl who can’t hear them?”
It took everything in me not to go off on this girl. I tried to be respectful at all times, especially if it involved a female, but my heart was racing inside my rib cage, and not from excitement. Rage was steadily coursing through my veins right now.
However, this went beyond defending my girlfriend.
This was about defending a girl who couldn’t defend herself.
Sure, Roxie could probably kick Kaley’s ass, but this wasn’t about that.
Kaley had the advantage of being able to go around and talk all kinds of crap about Roxanne, and Roxanne would just have to take it because not enough people knew sign language enough to hear Roxanne’s side.
There was also the risk of Pepper going off half-cocked, and it was up to me to protect both girls.
Roxanne, because she was my girlfriend, and Pepper, because she mattered to Roxanne.
“Not that it’s any of your fucking business, but I am dating Roxanne,” I snapped.
“Also, something else that’s none of your fucking business, is the fact that I’ve been taking sign language classes just so that she’d say yes when I did finally ask her out.
” Kaley’s eyes widened at that. “I’ve been wanting to ask her out since I first transferred here last year.
” Straightening to my full height, I stared the girl down.
“And just for the record, I’d rather date a girl who can’t hear me talk, than one who doesn’t know when to shut the fuck up. ”
Kaley’s mouth dropped open, clearly offended. “Well, fuck you, Royce Cameron,” she spat. “You didn’t need to talk to me like that.”
“Yeah, I did,” I argued. “You were implying that my girlfriend wasn’t worth the effort, and that’s simply not true. She’s worth more than the effort, and I have every intention of taking that girl with me to the fucking altar.”
Too angry to give a shit about snacks, I stormed off, leaving Hudson to fend for himself, though it was a crappy thing to do.
None of this was his fault, but I couldn’t hang out there any longer.
I was furious, and not just at Kaley’s jealousy.
Roxanne Rafferty was beautiful, and her inability to hear did nothing to diminish that.
Kaley mentioning Roxanne’s deafness was an inexcusable low, and I thanked God that I’d never dated Kaley Frost.
Heading out of the courtyard, I rounded the corner of the math building and saw Roxie and Pepper sitting in the same, quiet, safe corner of the picnic section in the lunch area, and I didn’t think as I headed straight for them.
When I approached them, they both smiled up at me, but my guess was that I didn’t have a very good poker face, because their smiles immediately fell from their faces.
Roxie was the first to sign at me. “Are you okay?”
I dropped on my haunches, placed my hands on her hips, then said, “You’re beautiful.”
She quickly glanced over at Pepper before looking back at me, then repeating her question. “Are you okay? Is everything alright?”
Letting go of her hips, I signed, “I’m fine.” Then because I still needed to learn a lot, I voiced, “I just don’t think that I’ve told you that yet, and I want you to know that I think you’re so fucking beautiful, Roxie.”
“Hey?” We both looked over at Pepper. “If you talk at the same time that you sign, she’ll know what you’re trying to sign to her.
” As I stared at her, I realized that Pepper always talked while she signed when I was around, like my father had suggested.
“She can read lips, so I think it’ll help you learn faster. Roxie can correct you as you speak.”
I looked up at Roxie as I signed, “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” she signed back, nodding. “It can’t hurt.”
I smiled up at her, but I was still in my feelings something fierce. I was so fucking angry, and I wasn’t sure what to do about it because I didn’t get like this often. So, I put my hands back on her hips, then dropped my head in her lap.
When Roxie’s fingers started running through my hair, I wanted to stay like this forever. Being near her felt so peaceful that it didn’t matter that Pepper was sitting with us. It also didn’t matter that we hadn’t even been on a real date, had known each other long, or could communicate fluidly.
None of that mattered.
The only thing that mattered was this girl and making sure that no one ever got through me to get to her. While there were a million Kaley Frosts, there was only one Roxanne Rafferty, and I was going to protect her like the rare gem that she was.