Fallen

Chapter 32. The morning after [Caleb]

The next day, early in the morning, I sneak out of bed, careful not to wake M up. Before leaving him, I sit down on the edge of the bed. Mattress dipping under my weight.

I softly trail my hand through his hair. He's warm, skin soft when I graze his cheek. The bruise is in a different ray of colors, purple and blue, even with some yellow.

He lets out a content sigh. A painless one. Turning a bit until half of his face is hidden in the pillow beneath him. Face a mush.

I leave him like that.

Taking some fresh clothes from my drawer. I make my way downstairs.

I stretch out while walking down the stairs. Bones in my back cracking, making popping sounds. I'm sore from last night. The dancing, walking and then fighting for my life, all parts to blame. Maybe one more than the others.

The house is silent, just as it always is. My bare feet pat down the floor.

I follow the mud trail from last night. It trails down the stairs, down the hallway all the way over the bathroom. It's dry, the brown, caking, solidified on the floor.

The bathroom's also a mess.

The content of the medkit is still sprawled out in the sink. Used plastic from plasters on the floor. A little dried blood on the toilet seat.

I yawn, rubbing my weary eyes.

I place my clean clothes on the top of the sink.

Instead of starting the cleanup as the first thing to do, I drop my underwear on the dirty floor heading for the shower. I stop short of the showerhead, letting the water turn from cold to warm before diving under.

It's refreshing. The water washes off the remnants of last night. Rinses off the testimony to the horrors. There's still a part of me that is shaken by it. I must have been a fool to think I could face whatever is after M, bravely, and without him getting hurt in the process. But the brave face I put on last night only masked how scared I really was. Still is.

I step out of the shower, drying myself off with a towel and putting on the fresh clothes. A simple black sweater and some loose-fitting sweatpants. I clean up the bathroom before stomping over to the whiteboard, still in the living room. Empty of many answers.

There's nothing much to it for now. There are more questions than answers. But we're both a hundred percent sure that someone is out to get M. More than ever. Now that I think about it, his costume being an angel wasn't really the smartest of ideas. Especially when we're supposed to keep it on the down-low. To not draw attention to ourselves, mostly M, and the specific anatomy of his.

I pop the lid off the marker and start writing what we know about the beasts we faced last night. Under the bold letters of 'What we know.'

Vicious, evil-looking, and unrelenting, at least when it comes to wanting to bite our heads off. Not the best summary of them, but I'd rather not revisit the night in full detail again.

If things were different, I would have much rather fancied to solve all of this with an open-minded discussion. But the beasts weren't much for talking or making it easy for any of us.

"Don't forget their dislike for bright light in your little reminisce of last night," I hear M's voice, deep and groggy from having just woken up.

I turn around to see him leaning against the wall. Reading the whiteboard from over my shoulder.

He looks good, as good as he can, when he not only got punched in the face for smacking faces with a guy's girlfriend, but also for the well, you know how it goes.

"How would I be able to forget," I chuckle softly and start to write it down. "Or the fact that you literally went full-on flashlight mode and burned all of those beasts to ash."

M stops next to me, crossing his arms and cocking his head down to look at me with an unimpressed look.

"I still don't know how I did that," He says.

"Well, we need to figure out how to make you do that again as fast as possible because we're probably gonna need it," I add.

"Yes," M frowns. "Unfortunately."

I can feel his hand on my shoulder. I put down the marker, ready to give him my full attention.

"I never wanted it to come to this," He says. "But I guess we both know it was only time before something like this would happen."

He shrugs his shoulders. Hand going up and down to rub my arm.

"We'll get through this," I then say, like a broken record. I would be rich for every time I've been saying things to convince not only myself of that but also M. "Can't have evil beasts lurking in the shadows every time we try to kiss."

It makes M chuckle.

"They're not here to interrupt us now," He offers, stepping closer and wrapping his hand in mine, linking fingers.

"You don't know that for sure," I joke. "-Could be waiting just around the corner."

That makes M's smirk fade. He looks out the window to the backyard. Eyes prying every crook and cranny for anything alarming. I regret the joke instantly. My stomach drops at his worried face, the way his breath catches.

"It was a bad joke. I'm sorry," I cringe, slamming my face into an imaginary wall inside my own head. "It's too early to joke about that. I'm sorry. I guess I'm just trying to cope with all of this."

"No, it's fine," M says. "I'm overreacting."

I scoff.

"M, there's no overreacting with what we've been through," I reply.

He nods, having to agree with that.

I wrap my arms around his neck, pulling myself up and closer to him. The tip of my nose is almost grazing his.

"Now, what were we about to do?" I ask him smugly.

He smirks. "I believe we were going to suck faces," He says with a straight face. "Or like the cool people put it, swapping spit, tongue wrestling, necking."

"No one says that besides, where did you learn that?" I stop him but decide otherwise. "You know what, I don't want to know, just kiss me."

"Happily," He kisses me.

It's the third time, yet it's just as great as the first time. It's like fireworks pop in all sorts of colors. Their explosions, erupting in the bottom of my stomach, doing somersaults. Making me weak in the knees.

I'm such a cliche. M's sappiness must be rubbing off on me.

We stop to catch our breaths.

I want to ask him how he is, how he's handling all of this, what's on his mind. I really want to, but before I can do that, a loud yell interrupts me right before doing so.

"What is this?" Lucy screeches from the entry, the door closing with a thundering bang. "Why is there mud all over the floor? And is that blood!"

It takes a few seconds before Lucy stomps into the living room like an angry gremlin. Pink backpack dragging across the floor.

M raises his eyebrows at her scowl and red cheeks. Shocked at her outburst, but I know it's more because of worry than anything else. It's not every day that she comes home finding the house looking like this.

"Welcome home," I greet her.

She opens her mouth. Ready to sprout a million questions at once.