Runaway Pt. 01

Noah frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Well, you know, I mean I know I'm pretty plain-looking and she had that, like... dark, sultry kind of look."

"You think you look plain?"

I shrugged, looking away from him. "I look like me. Nothing special. It's no big deal."

Noah was quiet. A strange sort of tension filled the room until I couldn't stand it any longer and looked back at him. He was studying me, a line creased between his eyebrows.

"What?"

"You don't know how you look, do you?" he said quietly. "You're not just saying that to be modest or something. You really got no idea?"

I couldn't respond. I didn't know how to respond. The strange little flutter in my stomach had returned, stirring up something that I didn't know how to handle.

"I should take a shower," I whispered, and strode past Noah into the bathroom.

The door closed quietly behind me as I tried to make sense of what was happening. The bathroom was warm, thick with humidity from Noah's shower. He had washed some of his clothing in the sink and let it hang on the towel rack to dry. I refused to imagine what he must have looked like in that room just minutes earlier, standing under the running water and washing himself while I ate an apple just a few meters away in the next room.

I absolutely refused to picture that.

Shivering slightly despite the warm, damp air, I undressed. The mirror was slightly fogged, and I ran a towel over it, looking at myself in the mirror.

I didn't know what Noah was talking about. The girl that stared back at me couldn't be described as anything better than plain. Eyes that were too big stuck out from underneath long, straight, boring hair. She was covered in freckles, head to toe, splotches of brown that stuck out against her pale skin. Where Noah's body had been hard and toned, mine was soft. I didn't run, didn't work out. Not that I ever showed them off, but my breasts weren't anything special. They were average sized and usually hidden behind a reasonably baggy top. My hips were curvy. My backside was normal, not small but not large. I would never go so far as to say I was ugly, but I wasn't anything special.

I was average. Just an average girl, with an average face hidden beneath layer upon layer of freckles.

Maybe both Noah and Pauline needed their eyes checked.

The thought of Pauline and Noah together made me cringe. I hadn't expected that Noah was celibate or something. I was a virgin, and I knew that made me the weird one, but the thought of him with her, their mouths pressed together as their bodies entwined, made me angry and aroused and uncomfortable all at the same time.

I didn't want to admit it was because I wanted my mouth pressed to Noah's as he did unspeakable, nearly sinful things to me. Why would Noah even want to do those things to me?

There had been that look in his eyes, though. That look as he asked me if I knew what I looked like. It wasn't a look of pity or of concern. It was something else, something like... longing.

Maybe he did want to do those things to me.

It felt wrong to admit, but maybe I wanted him to.

I didn't come out of the bathroom for a very, very long time.

**