Chapter 34: Chapter 34

Lyric’s P.O.V

I woke up to the sound of birds chirping in the distance.

The morning air was chilly and the bed I was in wasn’t mine but there was no mistaking who I was sleeping next to. I’d recognize her even if I went blind. Lydia was my breath of fresh air; she was my salvation, my home.

It didn’t matter what my brother tells my parents about her, I’d gladly leave it all behind for Lydia. And I don’t think Derek would get away with his emotional blackmail this time, because I just remembered that Lydia’s father knew my dad and once dad found out exactly who Lydia was, he’d never take Derek’s side.

Lydia stirred in her sleep and I grew quiet next to her, closing my eyes so she wouldn’t find me watching her. I didn’t want to run in the opposite direction even before our relationship began.

A few moments later, I felt her moving around a bit before she removed my hand from her waist and got up from bed. I pretended to sleep until I heard her leave the room after she had shuffled around the room for quite some time, probably getting her clothes before she hopped into the shower.

But I must have been tired because I actually fell asleep again, only to be woken up by Lydia who was completely dressed for college with her backpack slung over her shoulder.

“You’re leaving already?” I asked groggily, rubbing the sleep from my eyes.

“I have early classes.” She told me. “I’m leaving my apartment keys on the coffee table so make sure you don’t just goof off when I return home. I’ll get the spare keys from the landlady tomorrow. There’s toast and coffee on the counter, so help yourself.”

“Okay.” I waved at her. “See you at school.”

“Bye.” And with that, she was gone.

Getting up from bed, I finished my morning routine and got my breakfast. Since it was a new house, I did have some difficulty getting adjusted to the new surroundings, but since I had spent a lot of time here already, I kinda knew my way around. Once I was ready, I was about to head out the door when my phone started ringing.

Usually, I wouldn’t check the caller ID before answering, but something made me look at the screen today…and I let out a stream of curses.

It was Derek.

Dropping my phone on the coffee table, I plopped down onto the couch and waited for the ring to stop. But as soon as it stopped, it started once again.

“Why the fuck won’t you leave me alone?” I snapped at the phone after the third ring, but didn’t pick it up. Unfortunately, Derek didn’t seem to get the message as he kept on calling me again and again.

“Damnit!” I picked up the phone to throw it out the window but halted when I remember Lydia’s voice telling me about my anger problems.

So I took a couple deep breaths instead and let myself calm down enough, until the phone stopped ringing. Once the ringing stopped, I simply turned it off and placed it back on the coffee table.

A part of me was curious as to what my dear brother would like to ‘inform’ me now, but I didn’t want his words to ruin the rest of my day. Recently, all he ever did was command me around to get into the ring. Yeah, I liked to fight, I won’t lie about that. It helped me blow off steam when I was pissed at the entire fucking world. But I wasn’t a big fan of going into the ring every single day either. Some days, I felt like I needed an escape. I wanted to run away to some far off place where no one knew me and no one cared.

That’s why going over to Lydia’s parent’s house had been a big help both for my physical and mental well-being. But it was back to reality once again.

Since Derek had sincerely destroyed my good mood, I decided to skip school altogether and stay at home, trying to finish the thousand and one assignments that I had pending. I grabbed some items from the fridge for lunch and then realized that Lydia hardly had anything in here. So a short trip to the grocery store late, the fridge was fully stacked and I was able to grab something for lunch on the way.

Once I was back, I came back from the store, I once again sat down to get my assignments sorted. I hadn’t realized where time flew by but when I was done, it was already seven in the evening.

Realizing that Lydia hadn’t come home yet, I was about to turn my phone back on so I could call her, when I heard the front doorbell ring.

“Why didn’t you show up at school today?” Lydia asked as soon as she came home.

I don’t know what this feeling was inside my chest when I opened the door to her apartment, to welcome her home. Maybe there wasn’t a name for it? But it felt like a tingling inside my chest that spread through my entire body.

“I wasn’t feeling like it.” I answered her question with a shrug.

“Well, you can’t just skip school because you weren’t ‘feeling like it’.” Lydia shook her head at me disapprovingly. “You can’t let your problems with your family interfere with your studies.”

“I know…I just,” I sighed and ran my fingers through my hair, which had gotten longer in the past couple weeks. “I wanted to go but then Derek started calling me non-stop until I had to switch off my phone and just shut everything out.”

Lydia didn’t say anything for a few seconds but then she came into the room and held out a plastic bag for me.

“What’s this?” I asked, taking the bag from her.

“Chow mien noodles and fried dumplings from Matt’s place.” Lydia shrugged. “I was feeling like some Chinese today so I went and got some while coming back from school. Got some for you too.”

“Thanks for bringing me dinner.”I couldn’t help but smile. “You aren’t usually this late…did something happen?”

Lydia gave me a look over her shoulders, as she placed her backpack on her coffee table and the look clearly said that she knew I was snooping around. For an instant I thought that she wouldn’t answer me for crossing a line, but then she turned around to get to her bedroom and spoke to me. “I was working on the project with Ethan.”

I breathed a sigh of relief as she went inside her room. I guess I almost screwed up again. But I couldn’t help but worry about her and that was a first for me. I’ve never had anyone to worry about or fuss over before. Being with Lydia makes me feel like I now have someone to protect, to look after; even though I know Lydia doesn’t need looking after.

But I was glad she answered me about her whereabouts today. I’ll need to be careful about it in the future and make sure I wasn’t being overbearing or controlling. And even though I was feeling a little prickly about her spending time with Ethan, I was also happy that she got us dinner. It felt like we were taking a new, big step towards our future.