The Arrow Sisters

Chapter Fifty Seven-Addison

It had felt like I hadn't been to schools in years. Time in the shifter's realms made time seem nonexistent. What was weird was we were gone for several days and no time passed back at home. It didn't make sense, which is why I needed the book.

For my free period, I went out in the courtyard. I was the only one outside. I liked being alone. It gave me a chance to think and collect myself. But I was soon joined by someone.

"May I sit?" Blake.

"Sure." There was silence, no exchange of words. Then I spoke up.

"If you're here to lecture me about leaving the bunker, I-"

"I'm not." There was no defense in his tone. Just the statement of the truth.

"Then why are you here?"

"I go to school here."

"No, I mean here-with me. And well you don't need to be going to school. You can live in Shifters Valley. Must be nice."

"There's a lot about our world you haven't learned yet. I did go to school there."

I cocked my head, "There's a school in your world?"

"Yes, you aren't just born knowing how to use your powers. If we had no guidance, we wouldn't know how to do anything."

"Zoey and I didn't have guidance," I defended, slightly offended, "We learned everything on our own."

Blake glared at me, "I taught you how to shapeshift. Scarlet taught Zoey."

"Yeah, but you didn't show me how to control my strength."

"You're right. I just cleaned up the messes you made along the way." We were sitting on a stone wall. He rocked his feet back and forth while his hands were set in his lap as if he did nothing wrong.

"I was protecting myself, Blake. And my sister."

"There are better ways to manage anger, Addison." He said calmly.

"Stop turning this around, why are you here?" I tried to keep my voice level but my face was trapping heat in my pores.

"I wanted to make sure you were ok."

"Well, I'm, here aren't I?" The wind gently blew my hair out of my face. Blake glanced up at me. I looked away.

"Let me see your eyes." His voice was barely audible. Without hesitation I gazed into his golden eyes. They were nothing like Sable's. Her eyes demanded everything. His gently pleaded. If anything, that's what fascinated me the most about these creatures, "Where are we?" He asked.

"What do you mean? In the courtyard."

He almost smiled, I was disappointed.

"What are we? You've been avoiding me."

I turned my head away breaking eye contact, "You can't claim me as your own. It doesn't work like that here."

"Then tell me how it works. Let me make it work." He pleaded.

"You'd be my boyfriend; I'd be your girlfriend. People date when they like each other. Then if all goes well, they get engaged to be married."

"Married?" He rolled the word around in his mouth trying to figure out its meaning.

"Husband and wife."

"But you just said-"

"It grows, Blake. It just means they promise to love each other and never leave each other's sides; til death do we part." I quoted what I remembered seeing in the movies. I had only seen movies of weddings. I had yet to see a bride walk down the isle decorated in a white vale as her soon-to-be husband smiles and tries not to tear up from her beauty.

"Death do we part? I can't die."

"Well, I will one day. I'm human.

"Not completely."

"I age at the normal rate of a human. How old are you Blake?"

"Two-hundred-something."

I sighed, "That's my point, I won't be here in eighty years or so. I will die and you will still be here. But aren't you not allowed to be with humans?"

"You may be half-human. But there's no rule against who we are with. That is Sable's law. She believes our worlds should remain separated. She can't control you."

"Yeah, but she really can." I tapped my head.

"What are you talking about?"

"Sable has mind control. That's how she got Mom to leave us."

"Oh." He didn't know how to respond.

"I have to get going. I'll see you later." I began to hop off the wall, but he grabbed my hand. He held his grasp, then softened it, "W-what are you-" My sentence was cut off by his lips crashing down on mine. I couldn't refuse and let him kiss me. He let go of my hand and it moved to my waist. He pulled me closer. I felt safe. The static buzzing in my head shut off and so did the rest of the world. His lips were surprisingly soft.

Once our lips parted I frowned slightly at the loss of contact.

"Did I do it right?" He asked.

I blushed, and my eyes widened, "Do what right?"

"I kissed you, didn't I? Isn't that what that it's called?"

"Yes," I chuckled, "But I wouldn't be the one to ask."

"Why?" He acted like I disappointed him.

"That was my first kiss." I said quietly.

"Really?" He hesitated his next sentence, smirked, and said, "Me too."