Riley's POV:

"I know what I heard, Riley, and there is no way I am allowing such immodesty to happen in this household," Mom rambles on to me as I was sat on my bed at seven o'clock in the night. I roll my eyes, crossing my arms over my chest and growing more frustrated by the minute. "Your father might not be home right now, but I'm sure if he was here, he would say the same."

"We were just kissing, Mom!" I answer, exaggerating and stressing my words. "We weren't doing anything anywhere near close to being 'immodest'," I say as I make quotation marks with my fingers to mock what she had just said. "Can I go now? I'm supposed to be meeting at James's for us to go to the movies-"

"No," she says quickly, pushing me back down on the bed the moment I stand up. I groan and sigh with aggression.

"Mom-uh!" I whine again.

"You won't be going anywhere near James for the rest of the week as punishment-"

"Punishment for what . . . !" I argue, raising my eyebrows in vast confusion. 

"For performing sexual activity in your bedroom-"

"We weren't!" I yell. "We were just kissing, what's so bad about that?!"

"The fact that you ignored me when I called you and disobeyed me when I told you to keep your door open."

"But we didn't even do anything wrong."

"You're only seventeen, Riley," she tells me gently, suddenly acting like the soft mother figure she could never be. "I don't want you to waste your life, thinking about boys. Especially boys who aren't very . . ." She pauses when she looks at me, noticing how a vivid frown overtakes my face to bring her to a halt.

"Boys who aren't very what?" I ask. She looks down, telling me to 'never-mind' when she mumbles in response. So I stand up again to look at her as she turns around. "No, Mom. Answer me. Boys who aren't what? What were you going to say about James?"

"Well . . . he's not very meticulous, is he?" she argues. I raise an eyebrow, scoffing. "He's just not the most industrious person in the world now, is he, Riley?"

"So?" I ask back with a snarky look on my face. "Do you have something against my boyfriend?"

"No, after all, you're the one dating him, not me-"

"Exactly. So what's the big deal? I don't care about how intelligent he is, Mom. He's so much more than that."

"I'm sure he is, sweetheart," she says. I roll my eyes at the sweetness-thing again. She only ever calls me those sort of pet-names when she's trying to side with me or get me to understand what she's saying. "It's just that . . . well, you could do better than that, surely."

"What's that supposed to mean?" I spit out. "What's so bad about him, Mom? Say it."

"Nothing's wrong with him, sweetie-"

"You just said there was!" I shout before scoffing for the second time. "You know what, it doesn't matter. Just get out of my room."

"Riley," she says when I grab her phone from off of my bedside drawer to place it in her hands whilst I lay my hand on my shoulder to guide her out. "I'm not done talking to you-"

"Too-bad, 'cause I am," I tell her forcefully, before she eventually makes her way out and I slam the door behind her, pressing my back up against it afterwards as I sigh to myself.

Later on, it had gone past midnight and I lay on my bed in cotton shorts with a tank top tucked into them. I'd thrown my hair into a messy high bun whilst looking up to the ceiling, my arms by my side. My night lamp was still on and Grey's Anatomy was silently playing on the flat screen tv in front of me but I was hardly watching because I couldn't hear it and was far-too tired to read off of subtitles. Mom was sleeping which is why I couldn't put the volume up and I didn't want to have to endure another one of her spiels in the same evening. 

Suddenly, the sound of rustling bushes and hits of rocks being thrown is heard, and I roll my eyes, muttering the words "what the hell?" under my breath as I got up to look out of the window to see who it was. Much to my contradiction, I frown when I see it was James. He immediately drops the rocks the moment he sees me by the window, having wanted to get my attention. He puts a hand out in a sarcastic wave to me before leaving to make his way towards the front door, so I groan and shut my window closed before sliding on my slippers to make my way downstairs. I don't bother wearing a dressing gown on top, considering how hot it was, and I didn't want to risk waking Mom up by creating even more havoc. 

After twisting the door handle when unlocking it, I pull the door back and step aside for James to instantly step inside, not saying a single word to me.

"Nice to see you, too, babe," I say satirically, rolling my eyes. I slowly shut the door and then turn around to face him, noticing how he had done the same.

"Is your mom home?" he asks discreetly, lowering his voice. I nod, shrugging my shoulders.

"What are you even doing here right now?" I ask him, but without answering my question, he firmly grabs my hand and begins to lead me up the stairs. We slowly and carefully creep past my parents room before getting to my own across the hall from theirs. That's when James decides to let go of my hand so I can go by my own merit before closing my bedroom door shut behind me. "Okay, what the hell, Jay?" I whisper, but he shuts me up by pressing his finger to my lips, then gestures for me to sit down on the bed after he does the same.

"Do you not know how to text now?" he asks suddenly. 

"Huh?"

"You ditched me this evening and didn't even say anything about it."

"Wait, what? Is that why you're here?" I ask in disbelief. "You had to come over to my house at twelve in the morning to ask why I ditched you?" 

"Just answer my question, Ri. Why'd you ditch me earlier?"

"I didn't ditch you, James," I sigh, taking hold of his hands when I see the betrayed look on his face. "My mom got angry because of our make-out earlier on. She thought we were having sex. So she stopped me from going out with you tonight. She also took my phone away from me before I got the chance to text you," I tell him. He lets out an exhale as his fingers find their way to my hair where he starts to comb them through my hair, stopping to lightly detangle the strands where a knot had taken place. "I love you, you know. I wouldn't just ditch you like that."

"It's okay," he says. "I didn't know. I thought I'd done something wrong to upset you and wanted to talk to you in person instead of by text. Why'd your mom get so angry, though, anyway?" he questions, our noses just millimetres away from the other as I bowed my head against his, curling up into his touch. I shuffle and bring my legs to rest up by my side whilst I bury my head in his chest.

"Don't take it personally, but she doesn't exactly want me dating you," I say slowly. I change my position again, trying to find a comfortable spot which happened to be resting the side of my head on James's lap with my legs curled up in front of me. I face him and place my hand on his chest, tugging the collar of his t-shirt down to stroke his hairs with my fingertips, loving the feel of the soft bristles that detail his torso. "She doesn't think you're worthy enough," I say quietly. "I think she just sees you as someone who doesn't have it in them to love anyone."

James's POV:

"But I do," I protest in a gentle voice, rubbing my thumb over Ri's hip as I caressed her body in my arms. "I love you, babe."

"I know you do," she responds with a soft smile. She lightly closes her eyes and removes her hands from the upper part of my chest to my lower, where she habitually succumbs to the urge of wrapping her arms around me, like a baby clinging onto its mother; or a joey cuddling a kangaroo; or even a sloth wrestling a branch. "She doesn't know that yet, but it's okay. Because we both know how much we love each other. And if you ask me, then I'd say you're the one." 

She yawns cutely afterwards. I will never understand how she can do everything so perfectly adorably. Even her biggest yawns come out like a soft breeze of wind, with her eyelashes fluttering over her lids. I smile to myself, holding her perfect body in my arms and reminiscing over the line she had just spoken.

"You think I'm the one?" I ponder quietly, watching as she began to slowly fall asleep. She nods a little, silent but truthful.

"Of course I do," she whispers. "And I'm hoping you love me enough to ask me to marry you someday."

"Oh really?" I chuckle jocosely, taking advantage of her gradual somniloquy. "You want to get married, huh?"

"Yeah. And have three children. Maybe four. With you."

"I'm happy with four," I tell her, grinning. She smiles even wider at that, despite her eyes being closed.

"Four 'Jiley' babies," she acquires. "And their names will be . . ." She drifts off, deciphering over her thoughts before I come up with one for her.

"Violet for a girl."

"Asher for a boy," she replies. "Maybe Charlotte for another girl."

"And we can call her Charli."

"Or maybe Lilliah. I like that name."

"It's pretty," I say. "But why doesn't it start with 'R', like you? What about Remi or Ruby?"

"I like Remi. But if a boy has to begin with a 'J' then we can go with Jayden."

We spend the next few hours discussing names for our hypothetical future children, agreeing and disagreeing with some, sometimes even mocking them or having me correct Riley when she got so confused that she thought Bryce was a girl's name. "Who's to say it's not a girl's name?" she argued for that. I laughed a little and kissed the tip of her nose, listening to her every word as she fought for reasons as to why it was a unisex name.

It wasn't until around three or four in the morning that Riley had eventually drifted off into a proper sleep, no longer talking or fidgeting every five seconds. I hadn't managed to fall asleep with her, and instead carefully rocked her in my arms as I sat in bed with my back against the headrest and my girlfriend's head rested on my lap whilst I played with her hair, plaiting it and then taking it out of the braid again.

Riley's mom, Lauren, came into the room at around 8 am in the morning but was startled to see me sat there with her daughter on top of me. She's about to say something as she folds her arms, so then I shake my head and begin to slowly and gently push Riley away from me.

"Sorry, I can leave if you want," I say quickly, but the moment Riley whimpers and her forehead creases, Lauren shakes her head at me.

"No," she says quietly. "It's okay. I think Riley sleeps better when she's next to you," she tells me. I smile and then resume my position of being Riley's comforter for the time-being whilst her mom walks towards the windowsill to open the curtains the slightest bit. "I'll be at work from now till seven. Bryson should be back by ten," she tells me, citing Riley's dad. "Let Ri know for me, when she wakes up."

"Okay, I will," I tell her. She smiles at me softly and then walks past the bed to walk out of the room, but the moment her hand touches the doorknob, I instantly call out her name.

"Mrs. Montgomery?" I say. She turns around swiftly and I nod to bring myself to say what I wanted. "I really do love her, you know." Her face softens into another sweet smile.

"I know," she tells me. "And it's Lauren. You should know that by now," she adds before turning around, but then she hesitates again to peer through the door and say, "I also think Violet and Asher are lovely names," before walking out, slowly and lightly closing the door behind her.

I smile to myself and lean down to kiss my girlfriend's forehead where the creases remained. 

"It's just a bad dream, baby," I whisper to her. "You're okay. You're safe with me." Then I kiss her for the second time, except this time over her blond-brown hair as I cradled her in my arms.

. . . 

a/n: not too-sure how I feel about this.