Cherry Pie

First Night

[Rayne]

Dean was going to kiss me. I saw the resolve in his eyes....prepared myself for the move. And then he just stopped. He pulled back and continued to dance with me like we didn't just have the most intense staring contest ever.

As much as I couldn't ignore the sting of rejection, I was also slightly relieved. I didn't think I was quite ready to kiss him yet. It would have made things too real. In fact, I would've probably bolted from there if he hadn't of stopped it first.

My stupid, over-thinking brain that couldn't help but over-analyze every little thing did not make the rest of the evening any easier. I couldn't stop from wondering if maybe my mom was wrong after all, and that Dean was utterly bored with my blushing, babbling, and flustered ways. I thought my heart was going to jump out of my chest when he pulled me closer to him on the dance floor. I tried to appear cool, calm, and collected, but I was pretty sure he wasn't fooled. 

We got back to the motel room a few hours later, but the elephant in the room had unfortunately followed us there. There was an awkward tensions in the air between us that I did not appreciate. Sam was asleep, sprawled out on the bed that was closest to the bathroom. My palms went clammy as I mentally prepared myself to voice the inevitable.

"So, what bed should I take?" I whispered to Dean, trying not to wake up his brother.

Dean scratched the back of his head uncertainly, his eyes shifting between the two beds. "Well, Sam's a kicker," he explained, not bothering to lower his voice. "I'm more of a stay-in-one-spot-all-night kind of guy." He gave me a somewhat crooked smile — a bit shy, a bit daring.

I was dreading...or maybe hoping for his answer. He shot me a playful wink and my heart rate picked up instantly. Definitely hoping, then. "Okay, your bed it is."

As he went to take off his jacket and boots, I slipped into the bathroom with some pajamas and my toiletries bag. Thankfully, my bedtime routine wasn't extensive. I was never big on makeup. If I was any good at it, I might have worn it more often, but more than anything I was always too lazy to put it on and even lazier about taking it off.

Staring at myself in the mirror, I briefly wondered if Dean might have kissed me if I had the smoky eye look and perfect contouring, but then the stubborn part of me quickly shut down that idea — if Dean didn't like me without makeup, I wasn't about to spend my whole life walking around in a mask just to please him.

In the end, I simply washed my face, put on some night cream, and brushed my teeth before changing my clothes. My sleeping attire usually consisted of some old, comfy clothes, but for the first time in probably, like, ever, I really wished I had some fancy Victoria Secret pajamas on hand. That notion, I also immediately brushed off. Growing up, I never went through the trying-to-please-a-boy phase since I never really had a crush on anyone for longer than a day, so clearly my growing feelings for Dean were causing me to go a bit nutty.

Trying to convince myself that it didn't matter what I wore or didn't wear, I exited the bathroom. I was in my dad's old Lynyrd Skynyrd t-shirt and a pair of hot pink yoga shorts. The shirt was grey, several sizes too big for me, and had the band's faded logo on the front. I loved every square inch of it. My dad bought it at their concert when he was around my age, and I used to steal it and wear it periodically to his great annoyance. Once he understood that I wasn't doing it ironically, but that I genuinely enjoyed the band's music, he eased up a bit and even started to buy me my own shirts. His annoyance of course returned when I still preferred to wear his instead.

After his death, my mom gave me a box filled with his collection of band and music t-shirts. The night of his funeral, I slept in a pile of them on my bed and not a single shirt escaped my tears. Since then, I wore them pretty much every chance I got.