pretty boy

7.

A special continuation of chapter 6. Also Carson has big mama bear energy.

Kell and Carson immediately dug into their food, but Emilia only took a single fry and studied it thoughtfully.

"Carson?" She asked, tugging on her brother's shirt sleeve.

"Mm?" Carson replied as best as he could with burger stuffed into his mouth. 

"Perche dovresti uscire con Emmie se ami Kell?" (Why would you go out with Emmie if you love Kell?) She questioned, looking slightly betrayed that he would supposedly lie to her. Carson swallowed his mouthful with difficulty and put his burger back on his plate with a sigh.

"Em, non me amera mai cosi tanto che potrei anche superarlo," (Em, he will never love me back so I might as well get over him.) Carson murmured as he avoided Kell's questioning eyes. Emilia looked positively outraged.

"Che cosa? Ma se non lo sposerai mai, non diventara mai mio fratello!" (What? But if you never marry him he'll never become my brother!) She cried, looking like she was seconds from flipping the table, that is if she had the physical capability. Carson snorted bitterly and reminded himself that Emilia was a child with selfish tendencies and it would be quite mean to yell at her in public. Poor Kell looked like he was becoming more and more confused, especially now that Carson and Emilia were glaring daggers at each other.

"Emilia Chiara Rossi, ricorda che questo e il mio cuore di cui stiamo parlando e che non tutto riguarda te." (Emilia Chiara Rossi, remember that this is my heart we are talking about and that not everything is about you.) Carson said coldly. Normally he wouldn't be so harsh, but Emilia had no right to tell him he had to marry someone who only saw him as a friend for her own benefit, especially with her knowing how he felt about that someone. Emilia huffed angrily and whirled around to face the wall, taking her food with her. Carson rolled his eyes and turned back to Kell, who looked both confused and slightly worried. 

Kell leaned across the table to whisper to Carson so as not to annoy Emilia further, and Carson felt his cheeks start to flush as he leaned in as well and could count the freckles splashed carelessly across the bridge of Kell's nose. 

"Everything ok? She seems mad," Kell muttered, glancing at the back of Emilia's head nervously. Carson rolled his eyes again.

"She and I just had a bit of a disagreement about Emmie, don't worry about it." Carson murmured, reaching up to twist a strand of his hair around his finger out of stress. Kell noticed and tugged Carson's hand away before it could tangle his wild hair even further and held it firmly.

"I thought you got over that habit?" Kell whispered, grinning lopsidedly at Carson, who was having trouble breathing (how could he focus on something as trivial as that when Kell was holding his fucking hand so tightly as if he was afraid Carson would be taken away from him). "Hey, how about we take these to go? That park across the street has some pretty nice benches." There was a twinkle of humor in his eyes as he said this, and Carson nodded. He was afraid he would scream if he opened his mouth to let out the emotions that continued to build behind his sternum every second he was with Kell. 

They gathered the food together after they ran the idea by Emilia, who'd seemed to have gotten over her anger and was now only a little annoyed, and then they said goodbye to Zola and Alya and headed out to the car. Carson started to tug at his hair again as Emilia buckled herself in and Kell laughed as he came up behind him.

"There you go again. Here, I have a hair tie somewhere." Kell muttered, fishing a black hairband out of his jacket pocket. Before Carson could turn and take the elastic, he felt fingers tugging his hair out of his eyes and very nearly melted on the spot. While he did avoid melting, he couldn't stop the squeak that escaped his mouth. He absolutely loved it when people played with his hair. Kell chuckled from behind him as he pulled Carson's curls back into a bun and seemed to let his hands linger in Carson's hair for a few seconds after it was fixed in place. Not that Carson minded, of course. 

~~~

The sun was directly overhead when they arrived at the park, a still annoyed Emilia in tow. 

"Why are we here?" Emilia whined, dragging her feet as she followed Carson and Kell to a shaded picnic table at the edge of the sunny meadow crisscrossed with sidewalks. "I wanted to stay in the cafe." Carson sighed and set their food down on the table before turning to Emilia with his hands on his hips.

"We're here because Kell and I want to enjoy the sunshine, and papa wants everyone out of the house until 3," Carson said. Kell frowned at him and plopped down on the bench.

"Why does your dad want everyone out of the house today anyway?" Kell asked, unwrapping his food. Carson considered the question and realized that he wasn't quite sure what his father was doing while the whole family was out. He'd said something about hanging out with his own friends, but Carson wasn't positive. 

"Not sure. I think his siblings and a few of their friends are coming over to watch the latest football match," Carson said, sitting next to Kell and watching as Emilia attempted to feed her fries to a squirrel. 

"Football as in European soccer, right?" Kell joked, leaning back and resting his arms on the table. Carson sighed and crossed his arms over his chest.

"It's still football; you Americans just call it soccer. And soccer doesn't even make sense! Football is much more straightforward. You're using your foot to kick a ball, while in American football you only kick the ball a few times in a whole game!" Carson finally glanced over at Kell to find his grinning amusedly at him, fry hanging out of his mouth like a cigarette.

"I was rambling, wasn't I?" Carson asked timidly, shoulders slumping. He had a habit of lecturing people about random subjects that they were usually wrong about, so of course he had to correct them. Kell smirked and threw the fry to the poor squirrel that Emilia was now chasing with a handful of fries. The poor animal snatched it and scurried up the nearest tree, Emilia shrieking at it along the way. 

"Just a little bit. Didn't your dad use to play soc- football?" 

"Nice catch."

"Thank you. Now as I was saying-" Kell straightened and cleared his throat dramatically. "Before I was so rudely interrupted-" A glare was sent Carson's way. "Why did your dad stop playing? According to him, he was the star player on his team when he was our age." Carson frowned and started to reach for his hair to twist it around his fingers as he usually did when he was thinking, but stopped at Kell's disapproving eyebrow raise. He sighed and let his hand fall back into his lap.

"Normally I'd be a bit skeptical about that 'star player' business, but it's true. He has a whole box of trophies somewhere in the attic. But whenever I ask him why he stopped playing, he'd just laugh and say that he'd tell me when I'm older." Kell frowned. 

"That's kinda sus," Kell announced, and Carson frowned. 

"What's that?" Kell grinned.

"Sometimes I forget that you're not a native English speaker, but it's slang for suspicious. Wait, how come you've never heard that at school?" Carson shrugged.

"You and Carrie are really the only people I talk to. I'm not that up-to-date on slang." Kell nodded.

"Yeah, you are kind of a loner." Kell ducked just in time to avoid Carson swatting the back of his head.

"I'm not a loner, I just don't like people!" Carson exclaimed but forgot his annoyance at Kell's loud laughter, and found himself falling just a little bit deeper.

Oof I honestly can't remember the last time I updated... Sorry I'm a crappy author y'all lol