The layout of Rei's house that I made, took me so longggg. But I needed to see it clearly in my head. ^

9. Sunday Week Three (pt2.)

Anticipation about training made my shift fly by and when Eli sauntered up to the counter at half twelve wearing plain black jeans, a plain black t-shirt and combat boots, I couldn't keep the smile off my face and from the looks of it, Eli appeared to be in a good mood also as he gave me a kinda smile back.

I waved goodbye to my co-workers and gave Sarah, who was working the next shift my apron, "careful of table 14, he's a little handsy." She gave me a grateful smile and a questioning look, presumably about Eli, but I ignored it; the best way to deal with things.

When I turned to face Eli he was frowning at me, okay so I guess the good mood wasn't going to last, "already? Okay, so what's up with you now?"

He grunted at me and we began walking out the diner, "what did you mean by 'handsy'?"

"What do you think I meant? It's not a complicated word Eli," I nudged him with my shoulder and gave him a small smile but he didn't seem to notice my teasing as he held the door open for me.

"Funny," he grunted in reply. I rolled my eyes as I settled on the conclusion that the Eli that had come to pick me up was in fact, drumroll, please...Grumpy Eli!!!

See in the two weeks I had known Eli I had learnt that he had four different versions of himself, we had:

Grumpy Eli - who only communicated in grunts and groans.

Angry Eli - who only communicated in roars and yells.

Fighter Eli - who only communicated with facial expressions and swear words.

And Cheeky/Cocky Eli - who made an appearance this morning and communicated normally...or as normally as Eli could manage.

He held open the door to his Black Dodge Challenger SR8 and motioned impatiently with his hand for me to get in; Eli was an odd mix of chivalrous and rude. Gently, he shut the door before jogging around the car to get into the driver's seat.

"Um, is it okay if we stop by my house on the way, I need to change." I motioned down my body with my hands and Eli's eyes tracked the movement, scanning me up and down, but unlike the perv at table 14; I didn't mind Eli's look.

"Yeah," then he mumbled under his breath, "that's definitely too distracting." Huh?

"Um, what?" okay, confusion.

"Nothing tigru," he started the car and pulled out of the car park.

"Do you know where I live?" His answer could possibly identify him as a creep.

"You live near Noah Baker right?" Phew, he was stalking Noah not me.

"His old house, actually." Noah had moved to a much more lavish neighbourhood but we had met when his parents were neighbours with my Nan and Nana used to babysit for them.

I looked over at him and noticed that he looked really good behind the wheel of his car. He had his right hand on the top of the steering wheel and his left elbow was resting on the windowpane; gorgeous bloody specimen.

He nodded, "then yeah, I know where you live."

"How do you know where Noah used to live? I didn't realise you two were friends."

"We aren't, he's had a few parties at his house and I've heard him talk about how much he loved it there." Ah, of course, Noah's infamous parties. His parents went away a lot so Noah held some of the best parties our high school had ever seen, I'd been to a few of them but since last year, house parties weren't really my scene.

"So," he started, "what's with the boots?"

Questioningly, I looked over at him, "the boots?"

"Yeah you know," he nodded down at my legs, "the long ones you wear so much."

"I don't wear them that much." Do I?

He let out a soft chuckle, "Yes you do tigru. You had them on the first time you yelled at me in that classroom. Then you had them on when you demanded I teach you how to fight in my house. And you also had them on when you shouted at me in the hallway at school."

Okay, so maybe I did wear them a lot. And apparently I yelled at him a lot too.

The trees blurred as I peered at them from inside the car.

"They were my mum's," Eli didn't say anything and I assumed it was because he knew about my parents; everyone did.

"She gave them to me on my twelfth birthday, my dad was mortified," a soft smile graced my face as I remembered, "they were way too big but she said to me that next year I would turn thirteen and that they had lived with her through her teenage years so she wanted them to live with me through mine. My dad had a fit, said there was no reason to give them to me now then, demanded they be taken off me, at least until I actually turned thirteen but my mum was adamant I had them at twelve." I shook my head gently as I recalled them arguing, "I asked her why when she was tucking me into bed that night and she said that when I do turn thirteen I'm going to have other things going on and that if I got my boots this year they would help me get through them."

She had no idea.

I wiped my eyes as I realised they had started to tear up and I let out a soft chuckle, "of course they didn't actually fit me until I was 16 but it was the principle of it I guess. It sounds stupid but having them with me is like having her with me." I shrugged and laughed a little at how ridiculous it sounded.

Eli pulled up outside my house but neither of us made a move to leave the car yet.

"Tigru," he spoke soothingly and I turned to see him looking at me with a soft smile on his face, "it's not stupid."

His hand reached down to pull his necklace with a pendant out from under his shirt. It was the outline of a four-leaf clover in silver, hung on a leather cord. He looked down at it and played with the pendant with his fingers as he spoke, "it was my grandmas, she gave it to my grandad before he left for war, then he gave it to me. He's from my dad's side, he's the one who taught me Romanian," his eyes flickered up to me and our gazes locked.

"So, tigru is Romanian?" I questioned, he looked amused by my pronunciation of 'tigru'.

He nodded and the hand playing with his pendant stopped and instead reached up to tuck some of my loose curls behind my ear, "Mm-hm, a little tiger," his eyes flickered to my lips.

"It's not stupid Rei," he leaned towards me, eyes locked on my lips, "not stupid at all," he murmured before leaning towards me further.

"Shamrock!" I yelled as I bolted back in my seat away from Eli. His hand that had been cupping my face fell and he leant back with a puzzled look on his face.

"What?"

"Shamrock, you know? Another word for the clover," dear god stop me now, "it was used to explain the holy trinity. Each leaf represented the Father, Son and Holy Spirit," what the actual fuck was I talking about? "The three leaves are also said to stand for faith, hope and love. A fourth leaf symbolises luck. So you know, four leaves are lucky. Get it?" I questioned lamely.

Eli was now sat fully in his seat peering at me with amusement, "you done tigru?"

"Yup, I think so." I popped the 'p' as I said it because I wasn't already acting like enough of an idiot. I rubbed my hands up and down my thighs to calm my anxiety and then decided to say something else stupid. "Do you wanna come inside?" My eyes flickered over to Eli to gauge his reaction, his eyebrow was lifted off course.

"Your house?"

I rolled my eyes, "no, my dog kennel."

He gave me an unimpressed look so I explained, "my Nan borrowed my car for the day and it's not in the drive so she's not home and if she's not home, Ty's not home so empty house. I mean, not that I mean it like that, it's just I'm saying you won't have to meet anyone, you know, cause the house is empty," I shook my head, "not that that matters though. Oh god," I turned to him," I just mean that it's going to take me a while to find all my stuff, my room's kinda a mess and the house is better than the car." I gave him a sheepish smile and a shrug.

He looked way too amused as he opened his door and got out the car, I followed suit and tried and succeeded, thankfully, to get out the car without falling. It was kinda awkward as we walked up the pathway to the house and I did everything in my power to not think about the almost kiss because then I would overthink and then that would create a whole other mess.

Digging my keys out from my bag we stepped through the door and the first thing I noticed was the intense smell of smoke which burnt my nostrils and made my eyes water. Since the front of the house was open-plan I instantly noticed my Nan in the kitchen at the stove.

"Nan, what the fuck are you doing?"

Nan jumped at the sound of my voice and turned to face me, coughing and wafting a tea towel in the air, "stop swearing in my bloody house girl."

"You can't tell me off for swearing and swear at me in the same sentence and I'm pretty sure whatever is going on here warrants swearing." My Nan went about opening the windows and I took a moment to assess what she was doing, that looked suspiciously like bacon in the pan. "What did you do Nan?"

She looked over at me with a look of offence on her face that you could tell was fake from a mile away, "what makes you think I've done something?"

My shoulders lifted in a shrug as I shifted my weight to lean casually onto my right leg, "oh, I don't know, maybe because you are evidently trying really hard to make bacon when you are a vegetarian." I pronounced the word vegetarian slowly to drive my point home.

Nan chose that moment to notice Eli stood behind me, "oh. We have a guest." She placed her tea towel down on the island and put her hand out, "my name's Mary, I'm Rei's Nana."

"Ryker, ma'am," he shook her outstretched hand as he introduced himself, "and I've always thought crispy bacon tasted better personally." He gave her a wink causing her to chuckle and give me a pointed look. I suddenly felt ganged up on. Who knew Eli could be charming?

Swiftly, I turned to face Eli, "that is not crispy," I pointed at the burnt bacon in the frying pan, "that is black. Burnt. Charred. Ruined. Nada."

He raised his eyebrow with a shrug, "I'd eat it."

"Well then, help yourself, love!" My Nan encouraged enthusiastically. Love?? What was this? "There's plenty" she dished it out on a plate as Eli took a seat at one of the stools around the island but just before she could place it in front of him, I intercepted her and snatched the plate from her grasp.

"You cannot and will not feed him this," I looked down at the pile of bacon ashes, RIP meaty goodness, "he will die."

She gasped as if my statement shocked her, puh-lease, no one could survive eating this shit. The bacon got tossed in the bin and I found Eli looking at me with a smirk, "what?" I asked him.

"Nothing," he unhelpfully responded, weirdo.

"Anyway, back to my point Nan. What's going on, what did you do? And where's Tyler?"

"Tyler's at a friends house" she went about cleaning up her mess purposefully avoiding my first two questions.

My body stepped in front of her and I grabbed her shoulders, "Nan, why are you cooking your mortal enemy of the food world?"

She smiled a little at my joke and then begrudgingly answered my question, "your car may or may not be wrecked."

I took a step back and my Nan was looking everywhere except at me, I didn't really know what to say, my dad had left me that car and there was no way we could afford to fix any form of damage to it.

"I mean, I was driving out of the supermarket and it just came out of nowhere. Just popped up, right in the way. I'm so sorry monkey, we'll find a way to get it fixed."

I nodded my head at her and offered her a smile, "it's not your fault, it was an accident. Don't worry about it," she let out a sigh of relief, "what popped up in your way though Nan?"

"Um, it was a-um, um, a lamppost," she muttered really quietly.

"A lamppost?" I closed my eyes and breathed in and out, "like the immovable object?"

When she nodded I had to try to calm myself down; do not get mad, do not get angry. Fredericks breathing exercises came in handy at times like this and I used them to keep myself calm.

"I am going to go and grab my stuff," I told them, desperate to get out of there.

When I came back out of my room 10 minutes later, Eli and my Nan were sat at the island chatting and laughing, it was a pleasant sight to see for some reason. Eli stood up when he saw me and nodded towards the door telling me he'd meet me in the car, he said goodbye to my Nan before grabbing my gym bag from me and walking out of the house.

"I'm really sorry about your car Rei," grabbing her and pulling her into my arms for a hug did miles in making me feel better.

I kissed the top of her head and released her, "I won't be late, promise."

She nodded at me and then a sly smile graced her face, "I mean, I wouldn't blame you if you were, that Ryker is mighty fine to look at."

Oh my god. No. I'm gonna be sick.

"Gross Nan, no, stop, please," I fake gagged, "that's disgusting"

She gave me an innocent look, "What? I'm old and alone. Have to give appreciation where appreciation is due."

"Good god make it stop," I rushed out as fast as I could but just before I shut the door I heard her state,

"And damn, his tushy was mighty fine."

My grandma ladies and gentlemen.

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3459 words

Edited ✅

Bit of a deeper chapter, insight into both of them, as they become closer. 🥰