Bets and Wagers

Ten

The morning came around with a radio playing and the smell of food wafting through the air, it was domestically serene and one of the most pleasant ways I had woken up in a long while.

Kicking the covers off, I slowly sat up and rubbed the sleep from my eyes, wincing when a particularly sharp piece of sleep dust got caught in the corner of one of them.

My clothes felt twisted and uncomfortable, my hair felt out of place and my legs felt stiff, but I felt well rested and hunger was beginning to rise now that I had smelt food.

Swivelling myself into a better sitting position, I stretched out my legs and let out a small groan of satisfaction.

As though summoned, Steven appeared at the side of the couch and smiled down at me, looking too chipper for a Saturday morning.

"Hey," he greeted, "so we got hold of a spare key for you, it's waiting down in the office, hope you don't mind."

"Oh," I said, my voice coming out a few octaves higher, "that's really kind of you, thanks."

"Not a problem," he nodded, "though don't feel like we're kicking you out, we'd love to have our longstanding neighbour over for breakfast."

"I really don't want to impose."

"You won't be, trust me," Steven glanced towards the kitchen before leaning closer to stage whisper, "Jay always makes enough to feed a damn army."

From in the kitchen there was a call of; "Hey!" over the music.

"I love you!" He called back.

Something about the way they were interacting reminded me of my parents, who I hadn't seen in too long.

They had always been an inspirational couple to me and helped me grow the aspiration of what I wanted my own relationship to be like, loving and supportive, walking down the street while holding hands even after hitting the thirty-year mark.

I wanted what they had some day and my stomach churned at the fact that I was getting older and some day never seemed to be around the corner for me.

Not to say that I needed a relationship to be happy and whole, it was more than I still found myself imagining what my future 'other half' would be like during moments of down time and the older I got, the more I realised that I couldn't put a solid face to my lover.

Now I could add on the fact that for a fleeting moment I was beginning to hope that maybe Loki would be a push in the right direction, that he would take up that spot where nothing but a shadow previously was in my mind.

But of course someone like him would never stoop to the levels of someone like me.

I was so beneath him that I was nothing but mere cannon fodder.

"Hey, no sadness here."

I jumped as a plate was put down in front of me before the couch dipped on the other side.

Lifting my head, I looked towards Jayce, who had tucked her long legs beneath her as she settled down, resting her own full plate on the arm of the chair.

"I'm good," I said with a smile that didn't feel remotely convincing.

"Uh-uh, I've seen that look too many times and we're not going to let you linger on those bad thoughts, eat up and let's talk."

Steve had left at some point during my internal musings and returned with his own plate, sitting down on the floor on the opposite side of the table.

"Well," he started, looking between the two of us, "I think it's time we got to know one another better."

And that was how we spent a good three hours of our morning.

It was calming and it felt good to finally get acquainted with my neighbours.

I learned various bits of their pasts, including how they met when Jayce was a bartender and Steven was a dancer in the same club and what their family life was like.

Although I was hesitant to begin with, I did divulge information about my own home life and my current job situation but I continued to skirt around conversation about how I ended up outside on the floor crying when Jayce tried to steer it in that direction with subtle hints.

By the time I left to go and retrieve my spare key I felt refreshed and a little more jovial than I would have had I had to start the day alone.

As I made my way down to the office, I dared to turn my phone back on to check for any messages that weren't from Loki.

My phone continued to go off until I reached the office door, the ringtone bouncing off the stairwell walls until I turned the phone to silent to save my sanity.

Unsurprisingly, most messages or voicemails were from the God himself and they continued until around two in the morning before he gave up, I was tempted to listen to the ones he had left but I also didn't know if I could handle listening to his excuses just yet.

I swiped away any of his messages while waiting for my key, by the time I was on my way back to my room, I only had two non-Loki notifications.

One was from Tony, who had sent me a long email that sounded closer to a Pepper write-up than a genuine apology from the man himself, the other was a message from my best friend, asking for a follow-up on my night with Loki.

I didn't have the heart to talk to her about it yet, so I shot her a message to say that I would talk to her sometime later after taking some alone time and entered my apartment, closing the door behind me to lock myself back into my own isolation.