AGLOW [L.T]

67

They say that distance makes the heart grow fonder, but I am pretty sure that my heart grows fonder every time I get to touch his skin.

My finger slowly reaches out to touch his sun kissed skin on his face. His eyelids are shut and his heavy breaths tell me he is deep in sleep, so I just let my finger gently brush the skin covering his sharp cheekbone. He is hot and his skin is soft under the pad of my thumb. He doesn't move or react in any way.

The sun was shining through the windows, covering us in daylight. The clock behind him read 10 a.m. and I had watched him for nearly an hour, simply admiring every feature on his face. His long eyelashes, his sharp cheekbones, his cute nose and the slight stubble starting to grow on his chin. His hair was still wet when he fell asleep last night and it was a mess on his head, his fringe swept across his forehead and the rest with strands peeking up. He slept so peacefully, no crease between his eyebrows and his jaws are totally relaxed. He is laying on his stomach with his arms stuffed under the pillow below his head.

I never know when he is going to wake up, so I usually put away whatever I've been doing during the night and lay down by 8-9 a.m. to pretend as if I've only just woken up. It's starting to wear on me, I feel my eyes getting drier each day and my chest feels somewhat heavy from exhaustion. All I need is a few hours of sleep but I am so genuinely terrified of what the nightmares will be like after that incident in my room that I am not going to risk it. Me and Louis are doing so good lately and I don't need him to worry about that too, not right now when there's so much else going on too.

I have now come to the point where I have no current school work, because I have done it all during the nights and then some. I have started reading this book that I brought but never ended up reading, and now I'm closing in on the end of it. I don't think it's going to end that well for the protagonist, but the read is good.

My hand moves to cup the side of his face, letting my thumb brush up and down his cheekbone as I watch him breathe slowly. He is well tangled in the sheets while I'm on the edge of the bed, dressed in his t-shirt with only the edge of the duvet covering my legs. Maybe I shouldn't be touching him in fear of him waking up, but I can't stop myself. I need something of him to touch me, it's like an addiction. I want to OD on him, his scent, his voice.

He lightly winces and I see his eyebrows furrowing before his eyelids start fluttering open. I feel bad for waking him but I kind of felt lonely, so I keep moving my thumb up and down until he squints his eyes to look at me. I smile at him and move my head a little closer to his pillow, not moving my hand.

"Are you watching me sleep? you little shit." He says with a tired scoff, his voice raspy and low as he blinks a few times. He rolls over from his stomach to his side and get his arm out from under the pillow to place his hand on my waist, his thumb caressing my waist like I do his face, "How long have you been awake?"

"Not too long, forty minutes maybe." I reply quietly with a shrug, moving my hand down to his neck where my thumb finds his jawline instead.

"Did you sleep okay?" He asks and I look at him for a brief moment before I nod lightly. It is easier to lie if you don't speak, but his eyebrows still crease a little, "You look a bit tired, you have dark circles under your eyes." He says, taking his hand up to my face, touching the skin underneath my eyes.

I take my own hand from his neck and move away his hand from my face and then I put my palm down flat on the mattress between us. He looks down at my hand and then moves his to the hem of my shirt, sneaking under it and placing his hand right where he had before, but now under the light material. His thumb gently draws circles on my skin.

"Probably just stress." I try to brush it off and continue to let my eyes wander of his face, the sun making it light up and seeming almost golden. His eyes so blue and the sun making it even clearer that they looked like the ocean's surface on the sunniest of summer days, "I think they're becoming a permanent part of my face."