'Til Sun Beams Find You [COMPLETE]

Forty-seven (Part 2)

Wednesday

A lot of the shelves at the grocery store were scarce as people did their Christmas dinner shopping and emptied the store, so Nico and Carter bought mostly the essentials they'd need for breakfast, lunch and dinner for the next three days.

For dinner that night, they got a ready-made rotisserie chicken and then Nico just made some rice, asparagus and mashed potatoes on the side as a quick meal that didn't take her more than 40 minutes to cook.

She couldn't be asked to do more than that.

The two of them sat across from one another at the rather large dinner table fit for 16 or more people in absolute silence.

Nico finished her food about ten minutes ago while Carter had seconds, but she didn't leave the table.

She was tired as hell, especially after they got caught in 3 PM traffic that kept them on the highway for an additional 40 minutes, right around the time they started to get hungry. They made it to the grocery store in town literally seconds before they shut the door, and since it was the holidays, the manager let them take their time shopping.

It was only 7:30 and she just wanted to sleep already.

There was an old grandfather clock that ticked, and the sound was starting to bother her.

Carter ate the last piece of chicken on his plate and then pushed it towards the middle of the table as he leaned back in his chair.

The window in the dining room overlooked the lake behind the home, and it was frozen over and covered in snow with a beautiful back drop of snow-covered mountains behind it. The snow on the lake was perfectly smooth except for a few animal track marks that walked past.

She wondered what animal was around during the winter, and she figured Carter would know, but she felt he wouldn't answer her question.

He hadn't been saying much.

She felt his gaze on her and turned her eyes from looking out the window to look at him. She held it for a very, very long time.

Nico refused to look away and let him win.

"I don't get why you brought me here.." she finally broke the silence, speaking the first words between the two since he told her to get the bigger bottle of ketchup and not the small one back at the store.

Carter's jaw shifted.

"We literally coulda just turned back around when you realized you didn't wanna speak to me ever again."

She much preferred the silence in her own home, amongst her own company, than drowning in his.

"Don't put words in my mouth, I never said I didn't wanna speak to you ever again."

"Oh. A sentence," she deadpanned before rolling her eyes. "You know what my problem is with you? You're a hypocrite, Carter. You're a fucking hypocrite."

His brows furrowed. "I'm a hypocrite?!"

"Yeah, and the worst kind. You're free to fuck whoever you please but when I do it, it's the end of your world. You spat that shit with that girl in my face literally the night after I begged you to be with me and I didn't act anywhere close to how you're acting right now. We both have been with other people... so what?! That's what two people who've been broken up do! Isn't that what you said?!"

Carter scoffed. "Have I ever brought a bitch that I fucked in your face? Would I ever do some shit like that? You even realize how disrespectful that is??"

"I didn't bring him in your face!" She yelled at him. "You insisted you come inside. You did that! I don't know what the fuck else you were expecting."