Smelling the heavy smoke from behind, I rose from the black couch to see Noah at the door. His face hidden behind the thick cloud of fog coming out of his cigarette.

Walking over to him, I felt the numerous questions making their way to my mouth.

Where have you been?

What could you possibly do outside for so long?

Don't you know it's dangerous out there?

My legs could barely keep me standing, but I kept on moving without any hesitation. Once I was close enough, and the carbon particles in the air vanished away, my heart winced in pain.

The sight of his several bleeding cuts along his cheeks and jawline, made me want to cry out for him.

It was a rare feeling.

I am not the biggest fan of crying.

"What happened?" was the last question I thought I would ask him that night.

"Nothing, go back to sleep," his voice was deep and steady, the complete opposite of his bleeding self.

"I wasn't sleeping. I couldn't," was the dumbest thing I managed to say.

"I mean, I had homework to finish."

His expression was blank while he passed me. He barged in the second bedroom in the blink of an eye, leaving me standing next to the abandoned door.

Determined to help him and see how he was doing, I grabbed a significant amount of toilet paper and placed them under the water for what felt like very long seconds.

Before I knew it, I was facing his bedroom's entrance with what seemed like a white monster. I knocked, getting no response from the other side.

The other side.

It felt like we were living in two different worlds that same moment.

Almost like we were two human beings, knowing each other but not quite.

Not at all.

I opened his door without knocking any further. Noah's bedroom was definitely not what I expected it to be. It was a simple room, nothing more and nothing less.

Almost boring.

He laid on the plain bed with his eyes tightly closed, and his still bleeding cuts. I shook him by his shoulder using my free hand. After a couple of times, I figured that he is ignoring my presence.

How nice of him.

A brilliant idea developed in the back of my head in careful stages. Even though I knew the last stage would be immediate death, I couldn't hold back my laughter from the thought of what was about to happen. I held my hand with the wet toilet paper up high and released the big chunk in the count of three.

That white monster landed on Noah's face. I couldn't contain my laughter anymore longer. Tears were starting to form at the sight of Noah's face covered with- with- and my laugh grew even louder than before.

Well, that was just another way of cleaning his cuts with the helpful toilet paper.

In one effortless move, a giant hand pulled me down to the bed. Somehow, Noah successfully positioned himself above me, his face clean of evidence to what happened a minute ago.

My heart was beating fast inside my chest, and I was suddenly out of words. My messy hair began to make my skin etch uncomfortably. So, I kept on laughing, not knowing how else to react to the situation I found myself in.

But my laugh died down when I moved my gaze higher.

His eyes were burning a hole between both of mine.

That should have been the stage when he kills me, not when he is above me with that furious look of his, trying to scare me to death. I had to take a deep breath to calm myself down, but I couldn't.

If I would, my chest would touch his and explode from too many mixed feelings.

He was so close to me.

I wanted- I wanted, I am not exactly sure. However, it was a solid fact that I felt the need to touch my red full parted lips at that exact second.

"That was for the prank with the eggs. I have to say that it was a nasty one," I blurted out with a smile, hypnotized by his fierce eyes.

All of a sudden, Noah was in such a hurry to get down from me. He left his bedroom without a second glance back.

My confused emotions didn't stop me from following him. I wondered why and where he disappeared before the closed bathroom door provided me with a good enough answer.

"Noah, open the door, I just want to help."

I attempted to open the door without any luck.

"Please, Noah, just let me clean your cuts."

Silence.

"I promise to not ask any questions about it."

God, he was so stubborn about not letting me in.

Well then, fine, he is completely capable of cleaning his own cuts.

Heading back to my room, I felt defeated.

~~~~~~~~~

The day after wasn't any better.

"I am dating Marcus."

"You are what?"

"I am dating Marcus."

"Say that again, Viv. I don't think I heard you correctly."

"Shut up, Sky. I am dating him, and I have got no reason to be ashamed of it."

"I didn't mean that. It's just that- like, I mean, how?" I mumbled.

I knew there was something between them, but Marcus is Noah's friend.

So how in the world could it be possible?

I thought their thing was to act tough and mean together.

"He asked me out, I said yes, we are together," she stated with a wide smile.

"That simple?" I wondered out loud.

"Yes."

"Why didn't you tell me about it earlier?"

"I really don't know, Sky. My emotions were all over the place. I guess I didn't want to bother you. I figured you are going through a rough time. I know you well enough to see that."

"Okay, Viv. If you are looking for my approval, although I doubt you are, you have it as long as he makes you happy," I decided to ignore her comment about me being so freaking stupid by showing to the world how depressed I am. I managed to pull a smile for her.

God, was I so obvious all this time?

~~~~~~~~~

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