Luella

57 | sweet creature

H A R R Y

2 WEEKS LATER
06:43PM

It was raining the day Luella decided to go out. She had been insisting on it for no apparent reason. I joked about wanting to be kissed in the rain, but it was only a half-joke. I drummed my fingers against the steering wheel to the rhythm of a random song that was on the radio.

"We're on the road, maybe you should tell me where we're going now?" I looked at her sideways. She was humming to the song, a cheeky smile playing on her lips.

"I told you, it's my surprise," she turned to scowl at me. "You get to surprise me all the time, but when I want to do something for you, I can't?"

"No, you absolutely can," I nodded eagerly, smiling and pleased with her spoiling me.

"Then you need to take that U-turn and go right," she directed.

"Yes, ma'am." I chuckled when she smacked my arms playfully, letting the car wipers wash the trickling rain droplets off the windshield.

I followed Luella's directions and instructions the rest of the way, eagerly intrigued for our unknown destination. But I knew it, I knew it once I saw it.

"Oh, God," I whined knowingly. "A cats café? Really?"

Luella laughed at my reaction, expecting it for sure. We parked in front of a cats coffeeshop, a place where cats think they rule the world. Actually, no -cats think they rule the world anyway, café or not.

I secretly felt giddy when Luella was pinching my dimples. I want to see her with kittens. That would be adorable.

"You'll love it, you know you will," she singsonged the last word in excitement. I smiled and shook my head.

I reached for my umbrella from the backseat, smiling at the memory of the last time we used it, which was just the other night. I took my girl out to dinner and it rained when we were eating inside. That time, we kissed in the rain.

I got out of the car, umbrella shielding me from above. I rounded the car to the passenger's door, opening it and letting Luella hop out with her new little rain boots and jacket. Locking the car, I hugged her closer as we hurriedly made our way to the coffeeshop's door, dodging puddles in the way, huddled under the umbrella.

"Hello there!"

I almost jumped in surprise, only to find it was an overly excited waiter with a headband of cat ears.

"That made me jump," I took a breath, reaching to close the umbrella as Luella chuckled next to me.

"My apologies," Camilla, as the waiter's name tag said, giggled. "Welcome to Coffee With Cats."

"Thank you," Luella cleared her throat, making the waiter turn to her.
"We have a reservation by the name Styles."

"We do?" I raised my eyebrows, surprised. She really has thought into this.

"Right, Mr and Mrs Styles," The waiter looked at her notepad, nodding.

I glanced at Luella to confirm that, yes, her eyes matched my bulging ones. We both stayed silent, though. I chuckled quietly to myself at that.

It wasn't the first time we'd pretended our relationship was something it's not. Our first pretend was at Josie's mansion. We played along with her assumption of us being together and dating when we lowkey couldn't really stand each other then.

"That's right," I decided to say, a dorky smile plastered on my face.

Luella's face looked priceless. I wish I could've taken a picture of it, how she looked at me with an open mouth and narrowed eyes. She closed her mouth back up and bit back a smile of her own as she realized what I'm doing, shaking her head.