Chapter Ten

Nick looked down at her, smiling into her eyes. He didn’t have to look too far down; since she was pretty tall, but short enough that he had to lean down just a little to kiss her on the lips. Not that he was going to kiss her on the lips. Standing there, looking at her, he really wanted to, but he knew he had to draw the line somewhere. And seeing here standing there, in nothing but a towel while she was soak and wet, was getting close to that line.

“Just so beautiful,” Nick said as he ran his fingertips over her shoulders, looking at them before cutting his eyes back up to hers, “Don’t you ever wonder?”

“Wonder what?”

“What it would be like, to be together for real, all of the time. What it would be like for us to make love all night long on a hot rainy night? To be able to walk in a room, where everybody knows who we are, and that we’re in love, and that we’re together for always?” Nick asked as Elisabeth tilted her head, looking at him intriguingly. Nick just shrugged his shoulders and smiled in return, “I think about things like that.”

“It’s nice things to think about,” Elisabeth said as Nick looked down and over at her clock to see that it was after eleven o’clock, “I think about those things sometimes too.”

“You do?” Nick asked, looking back at her with a surprised look on her face.

“Yeah, I do,” Elisabeth said as she smiled and wrapped her arms around his neck, “I wonder what it would be like to be with someone intimately. I’ve waited so long while almost everybody else my age has done it. I’m scared it’s going to hurt or that I wouldn’t do something right,”

“I wouldn’t hurt you.”

“I know you wouldn’t.”

“Go downstairs, I’m going to get dressed and be down in a minute,” Elisabeth said as Nick smiled, pressing his lips together. Elisabeth moved her arms from around his neck as he started to walk downstairs slowly and Elisabeth walked over to the door watching him.

Nick reached the bottom of the stairs and ran his fingers through his hair while walking over to the sofa and flounced down on the sofa, keeping one foot on the ground and the other on the sofa, stretched out. He leaned back, looking at the ceiling, wondering if he was actually getting through to her. He didn’t know if he was or if she was just testing and teasing him.

Then again she was always good at teasing him, no matter if she was actually trying to or not.

He looked down at his hands, at a ring that he was wearing. It was some ring that Elisabeth had given him for their second Christmas together in 2001. It was really ugly and Nick hated to wear it, but he wore it most of the time despise how it looked. He only wore it because she gave it to him. She told him it had some sort of meaning and that she bought it at some weird shop in New York City and that it stood for destiny. He didn’t understand how exactly it stood for destiny but he was going to take her word for it.

“Falling asleep?” Elisabeth as Nick lifted his head up, looking at her, standing there in a little white nightgown, with her hair down and looking a little wild.

“No, just thinking,” Nick said as he smiled, moving his leg off of the sofa. Elisabeth smiled, walking over to the sofa and climbed up on it, sitting down beside him. Nick just stared at her, looking down at her little nightgown, and then back up to her eyes just as she looked over at him.

“So what did you plan for tomorrow night?” Elisabeth asked as Nick gave her a little smirk. She should have known better than to ask him that, “Come on tell me. Are we going anywhere? Doing anything special?”

“Hmm,” Nick hummed as he reached his hand up, rubbing his chin and smiled even more at her, “I can’t tell you.”

“Nick..”

“Don’t try that.”

“Come on, tell me,” Elisabeth said as she scooted closer to him, and reached over, holding his right hand with her left, entwining their fingers together, “Tell me. Please. I’ll give you something.”

Nick raised his eyebrow, looking at her.

“Not that,”

“Damn.” Nick muttered as he sighed. Elisabeth just laughed in return, “A kiss.”

“Okay,” Elisabeth said as she started to kiss him on the cheek, and moved her lips over, kissing his lips softly. She began to press her lips against his a little harder, causing them to kiss just a tad bit stronger. After a few seconds, Nick backed away from her lips slowly, opening his eyes, looking at her, “Now tell me.”

“No,” Nick said as he stuck his tongue out at her while smiling and looked back at the TV. Elisabeth opened her mouth in shock and moved her hand from his, crossing her arms, “What? I never agreed to it.”

“Whatever,” Elisabeth whispered as she stared at the TV, not even cutting her eyes over to Nick.

“Beth, come on,” Nick said as he took her arms, uncrossing them. She tried to fight with him, smirking a little to herself and trying her hardest not to laugh at him, “Elisabeth, don’t be mad. Come on man. I’ll tell you one thing.”

“Okay,” Elisabeth said as she turned around on the sofa, moving so that she was sitting on her knees, smiling at him, “Tell me, and don’t say that it’s at nine o’clock tomorrow night, here at my apartment, just me and you with a romantic evening. I know all of that.”

“Damn,” Nick muttered as Elisabeth smiled even more, “Okay,” he said as he turned around, looking at her, “You’re going to fall in love with me all over again.”

“Oh really?” Elisabeth asked, looking surprised. Nick just smiled this cheesy grin at her in return.

“Yes ma’am.”

“Confident much?”

“Very,” Nick said as he smiled, leaning up to kiss her on her lips again. He moved his hand up to the side of her face, cupping it as Elisabeth started to kiss him back slowly and then stopped, “Sorry,”

“It’s okay,” Elisabeth said as she turned around on the sofa and looked around, taking a deep breath. She pressed her lips together, licking them lightly as she looked down at her hand. She took another deep breath, looking over to her left to see Nick sitting there, looking at her, “Maybe I should go to sleep. I’m going to have a long day tomorrow.”

“Yeah you are,” Nick whispered as Elisabeth stood up, off of the sofa, straightening her night gown and looked down at him. She leaned over, kissing him on the cheek and stood back up, crossing her arms, “Night.”

“Sweet dreams,” Elisabeth said as she turned around and started walking towards the stairs. She reached the staircase and looked back at Nick who blew her a kiss and she laughed in return. She blew him a kiss and started to walk upstairs slowly moving out of his site.

“You’re going to fall in love with me all over again.”

That’s what he said, telling me about tomorrow night. Now suddenly, I’m petrified of coming home after work. Eh, maybe I should just go out with Lance? No, he’s shorter than I am and it’s a rule that I have. Never ever date or go out with a guy that is shorter than you. That’s a rule and I’m sticking to it.

Nick is something else. I can’t describe him in just one word. He’s so much more. Actually, there is one word that I could use to describe him. Love. Love describes him very well. He cares so about the people that’s important to him and he would do anything for them.

I don’t know why I’m really fighting it. I love him more than anything. I do think that he’s my ‘one’ but I just don’t know for sure yet. What if I agree to get back together, sleep, and marry him, and then a year later, meet the real ‘one’ that I’m supposed to be with? I guess that’s just something I’ve got to risk. I just don’t know if I want to risk it or not.

I keep thinking about what Nick said earlier about how can I know what real love is, if I’ve never experienced the act of making real love. I was sitting there with him earlier and my mind kept drifting back to that. I couldn’t sleep last night. I don’t think I slept a wink. Every time I would start to get sleepy, I would think back about that kiss and what he said and wake up all over again.

I have either two things that I can do.

Plan number one would be to ignore everything Nick does and just let him know that I can’t be back together. I can’t be married to him and that he’s not the person I’m supposed to be with. I could be mean and harsh, and that would probably ruin our friendship, and hurt him in the process. I don’t want to loose his friendship and I definitely do not want to hurt him. I’d kill myself if I ever hurt him.

Plan number two would be to tell him that I love him, that I want to marry him and spend the rest of my life with him, and to make love to him. It doesn’t sound that bad, but it scares me. Because once I know for sure that he is the one, which I think he is, my life is going to move so fast. I know that I won’t want to wait and just stay boyfriend and girlfriend. He’s already asked me to marry him for God’s sake.

I’m just really scared.

Elisabeth sat there at the table in the mall where she sat the day before. There was only one difference. It was only 9:30 in the morning.

She couldn’t sleep the whole night before. She tossed and turned, thinking about Nick and everything else that had been going on with her. She didn’t even know if she could see him this morning so she got ready to leave her apartment early. Really early in fact, because Nick wasn’t even awake yet.

When she left her apartment, Nick was lying there in bed, in the guestroom, cuddled up to a pillow. He looked so peaceful, with a smile on his face as if he were having a good dream. She stood there for a few minutes, looking at him, wondering what he was smiling about. Maybe he was dreaming of what he was planning for that night. She wished she could just inside of his brain, seeing it all but she knew she couldn’t.

So instead of waiting until he woke up, she left while he was still in bed, asleep.

She sat there, with her elbow propped up on the table, and her chin resting in the palm of her hand, watching people walk by. Granted, not many people were walking by this early in the morning. Mr. and Mrs. Washington where there walking, just like they did everyday. They stopped for a moment to ask her why she was there that early and she told them that she couldn’t sleep, and there was no use in wasting the day so she decided to come early.

But it didn’t help her from thinking about Nick.

She sat there, wondering what he must have thought when he woke up and found her gone. She hoped she didn’t hurt him by doing that. She just thought it would be best that they only see each other when she came home from work to their ‘date’.

She reached over in her bag, taking out her cell phone. She looked at it for a minute until she dialed her number at the apartment, listening to it ring

“Hello?”

“Nick, it’s me,” Elisabeth said as she sat there, biting on her nails and then looked at her fingers.

“Hey,” Nick said as he sat up on the sofa, “Where’d you go? I woke up late and you were already gone.”

“Yeah I know,” Elisabeth whispered as she looked over to see Mr. and Mrs. Washington walk by and wave at her. She smiled and waved back, but just didn’t know what to say to Nick, “I’m sorry about that. I have some work I have to do before going in that I didn’t do last night and I thought maybe it would be better if we didn’t see each other until tonight, you know, for our date.”

“Yeah,” Nick said as he smiled a little, “If it’s about me kissing you late night, I’m sorry and -”

“No,” Elisabeth said as she interrupted him, “It wasn’t that Nick. It wasn’t that at all. I just couldn’t sleep and I knew I had things to do and if I just layed around the apartment I wouldn’t want to get up and get ready and everything. So it’s still on tonight at 9?”

“At 9,” Nick said as he smiled, taking a deep breath, “Be ready.”

“I will,” Elisabeth said as she smiled into the phone, “I love you.”

“Love you too,” Nick said as Elisabeth turned her cell phone off and smiled even more. She slipped it back in her bag and almost giggled to herself, while putting both elbows on the table and propped her chin in the palms of her hands.