Burning Moon (Wattpad Version)

Chapter 8

The wind had picked up, creating little ripples on the water. I was still wet, and although the breeze was warm, I suddenly felt very cold. I folded my arms across my chest to shield myself from the intensifying wind.

“Cold?” Damian asked.

“Freezing.” I started to shiver.

The man in the black suit returned to inform us that they were expecting a storm and we should get inside as soon as possible. I was surprised by how fast and furiously the storm escalated, beating the sky into a frenzy of raging wind and rolling black clouds. By the time we’d reached our room, the rain was pelting down, soaking our already wet clothes and hair. We rushed inside and I watched Damian get pulled into a wrestling match with the wind, until he finally managed to slam the door shut. 

Thailand was a place of extremes -- no doubt about it -- ten minutes ago we were enjoying a warm, tropical evening and now we were watching violent lighting severing a stormy sky. It was breathtaking.

I shivered, colder now than I'd been before, and all I wanted to do was slip into a warm bath. But then I remembered that slightly inconvenient problem -- the open plan layout of the room. I walked over to the bath and Damian must have noticed.

“I’m pretty sure I can resist the urge to look if you want to have a bath,” he said with that devilish, slightly skew smile again. “In fact, I’d love to have one too, so I’ll promise not to peep, if you promise not to peep?”

“Why would I peep?” I felt a little uncomfortable with this conversation and its subject matter; casually devising a strategy to get naked together as if we were planning to boil the kettle. And then because we were talking about it, I suddenly started to imagine Damian naked. I couldn’t help it, okay! It was human nature, or something. I banished the thought quickly, hoping that my shocked blush wasn't as visible as it felt. 

I was in a predicament; I was desperate for a bath, but the idea of communal nudity in such close proximity made me feel terribly uncomfortable.

“Um…” I scanned the room. “Okay, you have to sit on that couch over there with your back to me. And don’t you dare look, not like the airport.”

“Hey, that was an accident, I turned around at the wrong time, and it’s not like I stared.”

“Well, let’s try and not have any accidents happen this time,” I said, turning on the taps.

The bath was enormous, manufactured for optimal romance and relaxation, and stretching out in the warm water was exactly what my body needed. Of course, I made sure that my back was turned away from Damian at all times, and for added security, I'd dimmed the lights so that if there were any ‘accidents’, he still wouldn’t see anything.

We sat in complete silence, and I tried not to make any suddenly movements that would draw additional attention to me. Even though I knew that he knew that I was naked in the bath, I didn’t want to remind him of that with every splosh of the water, if you know what I mean?

“How’s the bath?” He finally spoke, which I was glad about, because it was all starting to feel pretty damn capital A.

“Good.” Monosyllabic answer, I didn’t want to encourage too much interaction in my current state of total and utter nakedness.

“Good.” A monosyllabic answer back.

Then more silence.

Is there some foolproof method for diffusing an awkward situation? Are there no self-help books about this common subject? Because I could really use a few tips right now. A joke, maybe? I was terrible at telling them. And what kind of joke; I didn’t see "Knock, Knock. Who’s there?” doing the job. Perhaps if we listened to music? But I didn’t have any, and I certainly didn’t want to listen to Depeche Mode in case I felt an uncontrollable urge to slit my wrists. Perhaps I could steer the conversation in another, surprising direction, “So what about that death penalty, hey?” I was fast running out of ideas when…