Free Caught Up In You by Kels Barnholdt Page B

and down my sides and underneath my arms tickling me everywhere. I
start to giggle unconditionally and fall to my knees in an effort to protect
myself, but it’s no use. “Okay, okay, I surrender.” I drop the picture as a
show of how serious I am.
    We’re both on the floor now laughing.
    “Did you really just say that you’d like
to thank all your haters?”
    And then we both start laughing all over
again.
    I’m just getting my giggles under control
when Nathan stands up and starts to gather the other pictures and stuff we had
already printed off. “Well, I think we got off to a pretty good start, don’t
you?”
    “Totally,” I say. I stay on the ground
hoping that maybe he’ll take the hint and come back down here, but he doesn’t.
    He adjusts the hood on his sweatshirt and
pulls his phone out of his pocket glancing at the screen for new messages. “I
better go.”
    I don’t want him go anywhere. I want him
to stay right here and keep talking to me. But of course I can’t say any of
this out loud. “Yeah, you better.”
      “Cool.” He starts walking toward the door and swings it open.
“I can show myself out.”
    And just like that he’s gone. That quick.
Almost as if he was never here at all and I’m sad, I’m really sad. Even though
I know I will have to see him again soon for the article, it’s still not
enough. That’s the problem with not being able to have someone in the way that
you want to, it’s never enough.
    Still as I’m sitting there alone I can’t
help but think about how that’s the first time I’ve genuinely laughed since I
got home. But it’s not surprising, after all everything I feel for Nathan is
genuine.

 
    Chapter
Seven

 
    I was beginning to think I was honestly
screwed when it came to catching up with my work in school. It seemed like no
matter how hard I tried, or how much of a dent I made in everything, there was
another pile of papers waiting for me just around the corner. I had been
working on all my homework since Nathan left and after three hours my eyes felt
heavy and I could feel a headache starting to form. Still, I had so much left I
wanted to accomplice before I went to bed.
    I reach over and grab my phone off the
nightstand. 9:03. Ugh, still so much to do. Coffee was needed. I swing my feet
over the side of my bed and start to head toward the kitchen. As I do my phone
goes off in my hand. Eric, Yikes. I had kind of been avoiding his texts and
calls since I had thrown him out of the room on accident earlier today. And by
on accident, I mean, you know, on purpose.
    I wasn’t trying to ignore his text
message’s, I just had no idea what to say to him. I didn’t want to lie to him,
but on the other hand I knew exactly what his reaction would be if I told him
the truth, if I told him the guy I was having over after school was Nathan. I
wasn’t even supposed to be thinking about Nathan, let alone having him over for
social hour without any type of supervision. If only there was a way I could
address the situation without having to tell him the exact whole truth.
    I’m trying to think of how I can do this
when I round the corner toward the kitchen and practically collide with my
aunt. She jumps back at the last minute saving the cup of coffee and piece of
apple pie in her hand from colliding all over the front of my shirt.
    “Whoa.” She tightens the grab on her mug
and a smile immediately creeps over her face. “It was so quite in your room, I
figured you had fell asleep.”
    I grown and make my away around her
perfectly shaped body toward the island in the center of the kitchen. “No,
that’s just the sound of intense concentration.” I grab a clean mug and drain
the rest of the coffee that’s left in the still hot coffee pot. “Trying to
catch up on all my back work might be the death of me.”
    My Aunt Jenna sets her pie and coffee
down gently on the table before pulling out a chair and sitting down. “Going
slow, huh?”
    I dump about eight