Page 36 of Shattered Veil

I exhaled in relief as I leaned my backside on Cassie’s green and white checkered kitchen counter, biting into a slice of cold pepperoni pizza. The bench was finally hung, the clock to my right on the stove read 8:07 P.M., and we ate in a comfortable, relaxed silence. Cassie sat at her kitchen table, chewing through a bite of her own slice, and she threw me a tight-lipped smile as I caught her eye. She finally swallowed, set her pizza down with purpose, and interlaced her fingers on the counter in front of her.

“So—are we gonna talk about it?”

I felt my head tilt to the side. “About what?”

“Your feelings.”

Her bluntness made me cough through the pizza I had in my mouth, I somehow swallowed without choking, and I gritted out, “Shit.”

Cassie spoke, “Sorry—you know me. I’m not coy…and neither are you. So, now that you’re here…let’s chat.”

“I thought you wanted to—to bypass all that?”

She chuckled bitterly. “Yeah, at the time. When I was hungover and felt like I couldn’t completely process sentences, I figured it wasn’t the best time to discuss it all.”

I opened my mouth, glancing to the front door and back, trying to figure out a way of escape because this morning was…different. This morning, when I had returned her text messages with a phone call, there was the distance of a speaker and several miles between us. If she had asked me to talk about my feelings then, I could have done so—that was my intention, at the very least. Despite the odd excitement I had felt upon receiving the messages, the plan was to pointedly tell her that I wasn’t going to act on them. That the emotions I’d been stuffing down would dissipate over time, and ask her to, I dunno, give me some space. Now, however, with her beautiful brown eyes staring me down, I was struck with the sensation of fight or flight. Just as I began to question whether or not I should finagle my way out of this conversation, Cassie spoke again:

“If you try to leave right now, I will literally tackle you.”

I had the urge to laugh—loudly—because I could picture her hitting me like a linebacker from behind. I couldn’t find it in me to do so, though, because I felt as though the internal battle within myself was coming to a head.

I just murmured, “I’m not going anywhere.” I silently placed my pizza on the paper plate that was waiting for me on her countertop, stepped to the seat beside her, and sank into it. I exhaled, nerves having crept up to the base of my throat, gathered my thoughts for the briefest moment, and began, “I…normally have an enormous amount of restraint. I’m a planner...with most things, I mean. I lay everything out in front of me and make calculated decisions—always have. Even when I’m doing something spontaneous, it’s…not. Plan A changes, and I quickly think of options B through F, you know?”

Cassie’s brow furrowed. “I don’t understand, what does that have to do with—”

“But you,” I interjected to continue to my point. “There’s something about you that throws all my options—all my plans—out the window. You make me tick, and I…I don’t have any plans for that, Cas. I’m a fuckin’ blank sheet of paper when it comes to you, and I don’t know how to deal with that.”

Her head moved from side to side, a tinge of sadness reaching her eyes. “What does that mean?”

“Oh, fuck it,” I said under my breath. My chest pounded as I confessed, “It means that I want you, but I can’t do anything about it.” Cassie’s gaze widened. The beginning of the admission out of me, the remainder was poised to erupt—and I let it out. “This,” I rubbed at my sternum with my palm, “has been going on for…a while. But you’re,” I considered how to phrase my qualms and decided on, “a friend’s little sister, amongst many other things…which feels a little more than wrong. I tried to shut it all out of me a long, long time ago, but you’re…you’re always there, Cas.” She remained silent, allowing me to speak further if I were so inclined, and I reiterated in a whisper, “You’re always there. In my head…under my skin…in my dreams. And fuck, when I was at Gas Lamp, you asked me if I just disliked you? I don’t dislike you. Hell, I never did. I’ve been trying to keep myself in check, and I think I’m fucking. Failing.”

Our gazes locked on each other in the same intense fashion as they had in the past, and I glimpsed at her mouth as it just barely opened. It sent a thrill through me that felt forbidden, and my inhale trembled through my nostrils.

“My turn?” she offered in a breath.

I nodded, and she moved swiftly. Rapidly leaning across the table without a trace of hesitation, I barely had the chance to gasp before she kissed me. Her lips were soft. Plush. And the feel of them against mine made any thought of denying this moment immediately fall to the wayside. A low noise rumbled from my chest, and I reached my hands up to the sides of her face. Her mouth opened, our tongues touched, she sighed against me, a metaphorical checkered flag waved in the air before me, and we took off. Our grasps on each other were suddenly insistent. My grip was in her hair beneath her messy bun; she leaned forward enough to throw her arms around my neck. My touch grazed down to her waist and squeezed; she stood to situate herself between my legs. I rapidly scooted the chair back, and it scraped against the tile loudly; she took the step to close the distance between us, and I pulled her body flush to mine. She stretched across me, and it was only three smacks of our lips before I forced myself to break away. Her head angled down to me and mine up to her, and we were panting, our heavy breaths lingering in the air.

Her pull on me had historically been akin to quicksand, dragging me down into the depths the more that I fought it, threatening to drown me. It was only when she kissed me that the metaphor had come to fruition because the moment that I stopped fighting, it was as if the grit was forcibly pulled from my lungs. I could breathe…and it was so simple. All I had to do was stop fucking struggling.

At that realization, my will to maintain my distance from her was leached from my blood.

I brought a hand up to brush my thumb against the freckles on her cheek, and Cassie leaned into my touch. She glanced to my lips and back, I found myself doing the same, and I spoke in a voice that could barely be heard:

“Okay.”

Cassie crashed into me, I caught her with my lips, and the usual repetitive mantra within me was silenced. The typical internal reminder that Cassie should be a no-fly zone was…gone. It was lost in a haze of her. The vanilla in her hair. The weight of her as I pulled her to straddle my thighs and take a seat on my lap. Her soft gasps when I pulled away to kiss her neck. Her removing my glasses from the top of my head so she could run her hands through my hair and pull at the roots.

The only noises surrounding us were our respective delicate moans…until the sound of a rattling engine and squeaking brakes forced our actions to slow. Our lips quietly separated, we each turned our heads toward the front door, and what appeared to be headlights shined through the front windows and onto the living room tile.

I breathed, “Is someone here?”

“Fuck,” Cassie hissed, pushing on my shoulders to separate us and leaving me cold. She sprinted out of the kitchen and to the entrance, peering through the window to the left of the door for all of two seconds before saying, “That’s Liam’s car; he just turned in.”

A jolt of shock ran through me, and the feeling of being caught committing a crime seeped into my veins.

My stomach dropped, and I groaned, “I thought he said he had class?”

Cassie paced the space between where I sat and where my cold pizza remained. She reached into her jeans pocket as she walked, checking her phone with a quick glance, and threw her head back in exasperation.

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