Page 57 of Unwritten Rules

The exchange between us at Walden-Forbes earlier today had opened a floodgate in my mind.

I’ve come to the conclusion that I am fighting a battle I’m not altogether sure that I want to win.

Even the idea of being cut from the same cloth as my father doesn’t seem so bad. And the thought of betraying my best friend doesn’t seem as unforgivable in the face of what I would gain if I allowed myself to follow my heart.

Time becomes inconsequential, and I’m entirely unaware of how long has passed since I entered the room until the space begins to lighten as the darkness of tonight is chased away by the promise of tomorrow.

Much like how she brightens everyone and everything she touches.

The light to my dark. The calm in my chaos. My happiness.

Screwing my eyes shut tight, I rest my cheek on her forehead and inhale her inebriating scent in deep lungfuls. I fill my body with as much of her sweetness as I can gather before slowly and excruciatingly disentangling our bodies from each other.

Rising to stand, I delicately place the bedsheet over my Hellcat, my eyes roaming over her face, drinking in her perfection one final time before my shoulders slump in disappointed regret.

As I tiptoe silently from the room, my mood drops as I can’t help but think what a cruel hand fate has dealt me.

The whole world is made up of billions of people, but it just takes one – this one – to make my world whole.

* * *

Every evening after that, once I’m sure she’s turned in for the night, I steal into Hawthorne House like that thief in the night I so clearly am. Both hungry to steal a moment and desperate to ensure her nightmares are kept at bay in my absence.

Each night over the coming week and a half, I stay until the sun begins to lighten the sky. Some nights, I doze off beside her, not touching, just drinking in her presence.

I’m well aware of what could happen if she were to wake whilst I’m beside her. It would go one of two ways – she’d either tear me a new one, or she’d kiss me, and crazily, I’m open to both options.

Because the more moments I steal, the more my resolve fades.

I want Mila DeMarco. I want every inch of her – all her perfects and all her flaws, each and every piece of her that makes up my favourite human being ever to walk the earth.

And with each moment spent pretending that I could have her and all she so willingly offers, the line between right and wrong blurs and threatens to fade to nothing.

She’s in my class two days a week. Tuesdays and Fridays.

The second Friday following the incident where she’d stormed out in a blaze of glory, I’m about to start my lesson, absolutely intent on ignoring her as I have done every class since. Still, a sweet giggle from the nosebleed demands my attention.

There she is. Wearing cut-off denim shorts that I know, despite her being currently seated, show an obscene amount of flesh, with a t-shirt that reads That’s What He Said, and a pristine pair of white Converse, her go-to footwear, she’s snapping a selfie. It’s undoubtedly for Eliza Harper, her usual partner in crime who’s currently at a school for the arts in New York.

Her lips are turned up. Her smile is fake as fuck, and those idiots surrounding her have no clue.

Eliza will call her on her shit, but I want to be the one who makes her wake up. All she’s needed to do this past week is look at me.

Look me in the eyes, and she’ll know that I’m sorry, that I want to – no, I need to – make amends.

For everything. For pushing her away in Devon. For running away to Surrey. For choosing my friendship with her brother over how she makes me feel.

For being too shit scared to own my feelings following the debate last week. Instead, proceeding to blame her for my shortcomings.

I ascend the steps to her usual haunt as the Leto wannabe nudges her with his foot.

She raises her face to mine, utterly nonplussed, that damn mask still firmly in place.

It gives me ire. She’s pushed my buttons with a mere fucking look.

Christ’s sake, Hawthorne. Don’t rise to it. Don’t do it!

“Mila, I was calling on you. You’ve not handed in your assignments for the last two weeks since you started. I’m going to need them on my desk by this evening. No excuses.”