One Minute Too Late

Slippery Slope

Trying to regain her posture – and as much distance as possible between her and Billy – Jamie pushed herself up from her kneeling position, stumbling over her own two feet and slipping in said puddle that his clothes had left on the floor. Thankfully, she hadn't managed to fully stand just yet, which limited the height from which she was about to fall on her head. She could practically already hear the bone shattering sound of her skull hitting the floor, when she was caught mid-flight unexpectedly. Billy was above her, his hand in her neck holding her in position, that only her butt made the unfortunate acquaintance with the floor. Her head remained unbashed, so to say.

"One person with spotty memory due to head injury is enough, don't you think?", Jamie's opponent asked, dragging her in an upright position.

Actually no. Jamie wasn't thinking that at all. Instead she was thinking about the feeling of his fingers slipping down the side of her neck, leaving a tingling sensation. Her eyes fixed on his. With some relief, Jamie realized his pupils had gone back to a normal size. Well normal-ish. She still felt like something about the way he was looking at her was off, but she played that down to the fact that he was just the average neighborhood psychopath. A psychopath who had just caught her, helped her and remained surprisingly nice, but still.

Billy was  helping her get back into a save sitting position, but his fingers lingered on her afterwards, his hand remained in her neck. Jamie's body reacted with a shiver up and down her spine starting from the spot, where he touched her.

"Thanks, I guess", she mumbled, not sure what to make of this.

Slowly his fingers slid from her neck, down her skin following the path from the back of her head over her neck, her collarbone, all the way to the front where a loose strain of her blonde hair was dangling around her face. With a sligh smile he tugged it beneath her ear.

"No problem, I guess."

Her heart was pounding in her ears from that simple gesture. A weird tension was about to fill the room, as she could almost hear a crackling in the air. 

Oh heeeell no, buddy. 

The way he looked at her, she should most definitely cut it out right now. She swallowed hard. When he leaned in ever so slowly the move scared her enough to jumpstart her brain again. Jamie got back up on her feet (-more slow this time, to not end up in his arms again) and patted down her clothing. Billy did the same. His clothes were still dripping. And he was still looking at her that way!

In order to fill the awkward silence, a side effect from the sexual tension, that kept surrounding them, she said the first thing that popped into her mind which ended up being: "Did someone shove you in a pool or something?"

The way his clothes were flooding her kitchen didn't just happen from walking around in the rain. She grew up in Seattle and she knew a thing or two about rain-drenched clothes. Billy on the other hand ran around like someone had just entered a bucket of water over him... which could be another explanation! Maybe someone had caught him and ... whoever and wanted to cool him down a bit. Billy looked down on himself laughing. Then he pointed towards his head injury.

"Possible I guess."

Jamie's lines on her forehead grew deeper. Why was he so freakishly nice and ... cute? She didn't like that one bit. That meant, she had to be nice too. Only with Billy clearing his throat she realised her staring at him - well checking him out again to be honest. But she would NOT turn crimson because of that. Not at all. Not one tiny bit... Her face didn't seem to get the memo, as she could feel her face prickle and sting with the blood rushing to her cheeks. Damn it!

Billy started frowning when Jamie turned her head to avoid looking at him with her cheeks all flushed. She was all so busy playing with her hands.

"What was my name again?", he asked and started fumbling at his jeans jacket. She still wasn't sure if she believed his whole amnesia-story. Maybe that was some new weird trick he liked to pull? Get into girls houses, playing up the innocent act and then... bam! He had them on their back... or something. Except there didn't seem to be a shortage of girls for him to choose from already, so why go after others that didn't care for him. Or that he never cared for before to be more precise. Unreasonable anger colored her voice, pitching higher answering his question, sounding more like a question itself than an answer "Billy?"