Soul Mates (Tori Kelly)

Chapter 40

Lynnon's POV

Bacon. Waking up this morning, all I can smell is bacon, and I can feel my right arm lightly and slowly rising and falling. I peel my eyes open and for a second I forget where I am, until Tori takes in a deep, sharp breath, reminding me that I'm at my grandma's...with her.

Leaning up on my elbow, I let my head rest in my hand as I stare down at her relaxed features. She always looks so serene while she's sleeping, and no matter the nature of our relationship, I always love waking up to it. I mean, who wouldn't? She's beautiful.

I continue to watch Tori sleep, fighting off the urge to lean down and kiss her cheek as thoughts of yesterday come flooding back to me. The whole ride from the airport, I couldn't figure out why Kamari would lie about Tori coming and why she would want to set us up here, but then our grandmother kindly reminded me why.

Kamari found out that I still hadn't told anyone about Tori and I breaking up when we randomly called Granny one day just to chat. It was two weeks after I came back from Jamaica, and at the time I was too grateful that she didn't question me about being dishonest to worry about the fact that she didn't question me about it. Now, I know why she didn't. She just decided to use it to scheme up whatever she has planned, and I hate to admit it, but this was pretty genius on her part.

I wasn't sure how Tori would feel or how she would react learning that I've been lying about us, but I'm glad she's cool with going along with it. I'm not ready for our break up to be that real yet. Honestly, I never was. I was just angry, so I never thought it was necessary to tell everyone if there could still be a chance for us, and after the few times we've talked, I know there still is. And although I do want this, I'm still a little nervous that this might be too soon, so I guess we'll see how this weekend goes.

I go to get up, but I stop when Tori grabs my arm that's laying across her stomach and she rolls over to her side, pulling my arm tighter around her as she does so. I chuckle softly to myself because I guess we ended up cuddling last night anyway. When I know she's settled back to sleep, I get up to brush my teeth and wash my face before heading downstairs to see what Granny is cooking. Coming down the stair case that leads into the kitchen, I see my grandma mixing up what looks like pancake batter.

"Morning, Granny. Mind if I help?" I know how she is about people being in her kitchen sometimes, so I had to double check and make sure she wasn't in one of those moods this morning.

"Good morning, honey bunch." She sticks her cheek out for me to kiss and she gladly returns the gesture, "Not at all. You can start cracking some eggs for me."

I nod my head and I grab another bowl from the cabinet. As we're busy prepping breakfast, we fall into a lighthearted conversation about everything and nothing. She starts fussing at me when I get some shell in the eggs, and I fuss back that it's her fault because she can't just spring it on me that she thinks a man that works at her bank likes her. But, before I can pester her about this man and if she likes him back, Kamari and Tori come walking down the stairs.

We all greet each other and I give Tori's hand a light squeeze when she walks past me to hug my grandma. Kamari ends up going back upstairs when she gets a phone call while Tori wanders off into the living room, and I watch her for bit as she looks at all the family photos my grandma has sitting on the shelves of her entertainment center.          

"What was that?" Granny asks as she swats me on the arm with the back of her hand.

I juggle with the saltshaker since she almost made me drop it and I look over at her, "What did I do?"

She juts her thumb towards Tori, "I know that's not how you greet each other in the mornings when you're back home."

I sit the shaker down on the counter and I glance over at Tori to find that she's still engrossed with looking at the pictures. I had to make sure she wasn't listening since there's no wall separating the kitchen and the living room, just a breakfast bar. "Granny, I–"