Above All

-Eighteen-

All sleep in silence

Quiet noise as echoes pass

Ending in my mind

Layton:

My eyes opened slowly, the first thing catching my eyes was the crystal chandelier hanging directly above where I was resting. I gradually took in my surroundings, not fully registering where I was at the moment; it was slightly dark, the full curtains closed in, a small stream of light seemed to make its way through the slight crack separating the large windows from one another. I only knew two things as I attempted to come to, one, I was not in my usual bedroom and two, my body ached from the couch I had decided to rest on for the night.

Underneath me, my phone buzzed with incoming messages.

Make that three, I had no idea who was contacting me at the moment.

How long had I slept?

I groaned lightly hearing the creaking of my bones adjusting to my sudden movement after being still for so long. My hands subconsciously went to my face and rubbed away any remaining sleep I had left; I realized all took quickly that I was in Amani's suite remembering my constant pleas for her to allow me to rest here long enough for Tinashe to finally leave my bedroom.

I groaned to myself.

I hadn't even slept with her yesterday, she had found her way to my room and I stupidly allowed her in. This time she had just wanted to talk, but the conversation quickly went sour when she spoke of how she didn't like me showing Oleo Inyene attention.

She mentioned speaking to Amani about her potentially pairing us together and I instantly freaked out—no way in hell was I going to end up with her again, even for a fake relationship. I tried to kick her out of my apartment suite and she had refused again, in an attempt to persuade me to spend the night with her, she tried to seduce me; it wasn't long before I bolted out of the room and roamed the empty halls of the palace.

That's when the idea struck me to stay with Amani for the time being.

I thought for sure she would be welcoming of me, after all it was her job to keep a watchful gaze over my brother and I. I contemplated maybe staying in Amory's place, but I had already reached the staff area by the, too late to turn back now I remember telling myself.

I stood up and heard another series of cracks got through me and as I stretched the remainder of my body out; I yawned and pulled out my cellphone quickly glancing through the text messages from all my party friends wondering where I had been for the past couple of weeks, apparently there was a party last night that I had missed out on.

I doubt I would have been necessarily interested in going yesterday, especially with all the royal festivities rearing its head around the corner. My mother was finally being lax with our brother, allowing us to do as we pleased again but under discretion; she was pleased with the magazine shoot we had done earlier and the bakery job we had taken on people were starting to look at us a bit differently.

On my phone I could see a few text messages from Tinashe asking me where I had gone off to, a few calls and voicemails that I deleted before even hearing. Eventually, her persistence stopped and I could only hope once I returned to my room she would be gone; I was going to have a serious chat with her about how we needed to cut our "relationship" off, she wasn't going to be happy about it but I didn't care.

I shoved my phone into my back pocket and walked around Amani's quiet suite. Had she awoken already? I didn't hear or see any inklings that she had stepped out of her room, she shut the lights off on me last night and they were still off so I assumed she was still asleep. My feet stopped right at her bedroom door and I lightly knocked.