Chapter 21: Chapter 21

XXI

It turns out that he parks his car two houses from mine everytime he comes to watch me. He holds my hand the entire way towards his car, and I must admit that it's a nice feeling.

His hand is way bigger than mine and fits it nicely.

"So where do you want to go?" Axel asks me when he begins driving.

"Maybe we can get something to eat? We haven't eaten today yet." I say and he nods.

"How about we grab take-out and go to my place?" he suggests.

"Yeah, sure." I say and he makes a turn left. There's only one place in this town with good food so there's no arguing about where we want to go.

I look out the window, and feel Axel's right hand take my left hand.

I continue to look out the window, not commenting because I don't want him to pull his hand away, but it makes me really happy that he's slowly opening up to me, he's slowly becoming more fragile around me, letting down his sky high wall.

Sure, it's a microscopically small progress, but it makes me happy.

"I didn't know you smoke." I say after a few moments and look at him.

He looks good, really good but he always does so it's not a big surprise. I'm still not completely used to his good looks, though.

And to think that this man would even give me a second glance, much less spend time with me and want to protect me.

He shrugs. "It's just a habit."

"It's not good for you." I say and he gives me a look and sighs.

"Please don't start with that shit." he replies, his thumb stroking my hand.

"Just saying." I say and look away from him.

He drives into the parking lot then and goes inside to take our food, and twenty minutes later we're in front of his house.

I gulp as I cross the doorstep, thinking how everytime I was here with him ended.

The house is clean and tidy, as usual. You wouldn't expect a man like him to be so organized and clean, but then again there are a lot of things you wouldn't expect about Axel.

He puts his hands on my waist as I stop in his hallway.

"The living room is on the right."

I nod and turn to enter the room.

He walks right behind me and carries the bag with our food. We both decided on tacos.

"We must be the only geniouses that eat tacos for breakfast." he chuckles.

"Well they're good." I say and he nods in agreement.

"You got that right."

He leads me to the couch and brings the coffee table closer to it. "What do you want to drink?" he asks me.

"Water is fine." I reply and he nods, walking to the kitchen.

He comes back with a glass of water and a bottle of beer.

"There you go." he says and plops down on the couch next to me.

It's kind of strange how he can afford all these things; the car and living by himself.

It's also curious about how and why he got involved with those people who beat him up.

It is all so weird.

"Eat, Soph." he demands when I still don't touch my food.

I nod, grabbing my taco and taking a bite.

"How do you keep this place so clean?" I ask him and he shruggs.

"It's not that hard because I usually don't let it get too messy anyway." he replies.

"That's unusual for boys." I tell him.

He smiles. "Yeah?"

I nod. "Yeah. Actually, you're such an unusual boy it makes me wonder if you really are a boy."

He almost spits his food out then and grins.

"Trust me, baby. I'm not a girl."

"I was just thinking out loud is all." I reply.

"Want me to prove to you that I'm a man?" he asks and I snort.

"You're not a man, Axel."

Of course he is a man but I love to tease him too much to let that opportunity go.

He squints his eyes at me and puts down his taco. The look in his eyes makes me stop eating and quickly swallow the food.

"You-" he says, slowly closer to me and making me lean back.

He pushes me down on the couch and grabs my hands in his.

"-are being a bad girl." he finishes and I chuckle, completely ruining the moment.

He frowns at me. "Do you think I'm joking?"

I grin and nod. "Mhm."

His look darkens even more. "That's it." he tries to put his hands on my waist and turn me around, but because I am that small I manage to escape his grip and start running away.

"You can't run away from me!" he shouts behind me and takes off running after me.

I laugh and randomy pick turns; I go upstairs, and go for the first door I see.

Quickly, I shut it behind me and lean on the door with my back.

In the middle of the room there's a big bed, twice the size of mine and there are night stands on each side of the bed.

The bed is nicely made, however there's a pair of boxers by the wardrobe at the left wall.

This must be Axel's bedroom.

To my horror, there is one more piece of clothing in the corner of the room, barely visible.

Red lace women's thongs.

I gulp at the sight.

Suddely, a body from behind me pushes me on the bed.

He turns me around so that my face is facing him. "Goddamnit it, Soph. Don't run away from me."

I turn my head away from him. I really don't want to look at his face right now.

"What's wrong?" he asks and pushes my chin up, stroking my cheek.

I nod my head in the direction of thighs and he stills.

"Fuck." he whispers to himself.

"This was your way of "trying to forget me"?" I ask and he closes his eyes.

"Don't fucking do this." he says and I push him off of me, getting off the bed.

"Do what? Say that you're a man whore?" I ask, pissed at him. "I'm so dumb! Everytime I think you actually care about me something like this happens! This-" I point with my finger between us "-this means nothing to you, does it?" I say, fuming.

I know I am overreacting, he has every right to do stuff like that because we aren't even in a relationship but I am so mad that I don't care. It's unfair of me to act like this, I'm sceaming and yelling and causing a scene when he did nothing wrong. That thought makes me stop.

I put my hands in my hair and groan. "Look, I'm sorry." I apologize and his frown changes into a surprised expression.

"You didn't do anything wrong, you can shag all the women in the world for all I care, because we aren't even together." I say and he remains speechless.

And then, another thought makes me angry again. I frown.

"But that was your plan, wasn't it?" I ask, completely shook by the realization.

"You- we were never going to be together, were we?" I ask and slowly approach his figure, sitting at the end of his bed.

The bed on which he probably had sex about 400 times with 300 different women.

"What the fuck are you saying?" he asks and I cut him off.

"Don't play dumb. You never really cared for me, you just wanted to get in my pants!"

At that the frown returns on his face and he stands up, hovering over me.

"That's what you think!?" he shouts, angry now, too and I nod head.

"You are wrong." he says and I snort.

He continues:"Why the fuck would I watch you every night then? Why would I spend so much time with you? Trust me, I wouldn't do that if I only wanted to fuck you!"

I gulp. "That's true, but tell me now; did you ever plan for us to be in a relationship?"

He rolls his eyes. "That's not the point-"

"Did you?"

He purses his lips and squints his eyes down at me. "You want an honest answer?"

I nod.

"No, I didn't." he admits and I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding.

The words hurt me more than I wanted them to.

"That doesn't mean I don't care about you, though." he says and I roll my eyes.

"You are a hypocrite. You don't want me to hang out with other guys and you want to hold hands and kiss me and do all the other stuff without actually being my boyfriend. That's very selfish of you, you know?"

"It's just a fucking label! It doesn't mean shit!" he shouts.

"It does to me! Why are you so scared of commitment?"

He opens his mouth to reply, but is cut off by the door bell and moments later a high pitched woman's voice fills the house.

"Axel, love, are you home?"

It's that whore Axel was snuggling the whole week.

Perfect.