My ears were still glued to the door five minutes later as he went on playing. Once in a while, he'd stop and groan heavily. Probably frustrated that he'd made a mistake.
So whenever he groaned, I giggled a little.
Though his mistakes, he still played beautifully. I wondered many things as he played, like how long he'd been practicing the guitar. And who taught him to play.
And after a few seconds, he abruptly stops. I lean heavily in on the door to decipher why he'd stopped
"Um, hello?" I heard him say through the door.
He couldn't possibly be talking to me, maybe he was on the phone.
"Is somebody out there?" He asked.
I hold my breath and seized to move, just in the hope that he'd ignore the sounds outside his door and carry on playing. It was simple to do so, all I had to do was imagine that Ms Salem was on the hunt for me.
Not too long after that, I hear slow footsteps towards the door. Cheese and crackers, he's coming!
My mind rushed. This is my queue to run, so I turn around and attempt to race to my door.
Key word being attempt.
My foot gets caught in a rug which causes me to stumble all the way into my door.
My face collides with the door and the after effect left me butt down in on ground, shrieking and rubbing my throbbing nose in pain.
"Clumsy--" he questions after the door opens.
He quickly came to my aid as swooped down, places a piece of my hair behind my ears, grabs my chin and forces me to look at him. He looks at my face and just stares.
He's eyes are breathtaking. The hazel is much more intense up close like this. It's hard not to get lost in them. Just looking at them dissolves a tiny fraction of the pain away. Just a tiny fraction.
If I wasn't in hysterical pain, I would have blushed blood red.
"Blood," He just says.
"What?" I replied confused, a little agigated from the pain. I couldn't be blushing, I was in too much pain for that.
"Clumsy, you're bleeding." He explained.
I look down at my grey hoodie. It had maroon droplets tainted on it, and I held my fingers up to my face.
Red.
I think I'm going to pass out...
×××
"I think that will do." He said, as he takes the ice pack that has gone liquid from me.
"Thanks." I mumbled.
There I sat on the kitchen table while he nursed me. That would have been the most shocking thing that had happened today. But the fact that he'd carried me bridal style into his apartment just took the flipping bloody cake.
He dumped the ice pack into the sink. "But my nose kinda hurts." I whine.
"Yeah... Looks like it has swelled up a bit. I think I saw some band aids lying around somewhere here."
He rumages around his cabinets and a white box emerges with his hand. And he pulls out a band aid. A pink one.
"Is that the only colour you've got?" I ask indignantly.
He digs into the box and he pulls out a purple one with the disney princesses, Anna and Elsa. It was written 'sisters forever'.
What kind of grown-ass man has a disney princess franchise in his apartment? What if he was the one with the bloody nose?
I rolled my eyes and settled for the pink one instead.
His ripped it open and delicately placed it on my nose. Once it was on, I looked to Shawn for a reaction.
"I'm no doctor, but I'm pretty sure I did a bang up job. It really isn't that bad, you look a little like a bunny."
"Was that meant to be a compliment ladykiller?" I lightly assessed my nose with my fingers.
"Unfortunately, yes. My mouth tends to run a little dry when I talk to pretty..." The velocity of his speech dimmed. "To pretty..."
Pretty? Was he about to categorise me as pretty? Me, the girl in a bloody hoodie and an nose three times larger than my face?
"Pretty?" I urge him to go on.
"I can't speak to um, pretty... demanding people?"
"Are you asking me or telling me?"
"Telling you?"
I raised my eyebrows.
"Telling you." He asserts himself before giving his version of an authoritative cough.
Wow, this guy is really a celebrity.
"So," He crossed his toned arms. "You wanna explain what went down out there, I mean, besides you of course." He smirked, his body now parallel from mine.
"Woah, woah, woah. Slow down with the questions. I just went through trauma and I'm still recovering. Wasn't it embarrassing enough that I fell and gushed my brains out through my nose? You know, I suspect you enjoy my suffering too much, Shawn." I crossed my arms too and smiled, despite the fact that my pregnant nose restricted the broad of my smile.
"Fine, don't tell me." He laughed. "But it looks a lot to me that you are pretty much a stalker now."
"Stalker? I'm not a stalker, what gave you that impression?" I tried my best to look innocent and clueless. Though I didn't have to struggle much to 'seem clueless'.
"Clumsy. I could see your shadow under my door."
"Yeah, but I wasn't technically stalking. People's shadows are everywhere, doesn't make them a stalker, does it?"
"Just admit that you were stalking me, that's the least you can do after I helped you. And I won't judge you for it because if I were you, I would stalk me too."
"Please, I have nothing to admit to. And if you don't watch yourself, I'll personally help you and wipe that ego out of your tone."
"You know, for a person who's life I just single handedly saved, you are very ungrateful."
"You know, for a human being, you're really annoying."
"Annoying? Ouch. No one's ever called me that before." He gasped, acting like a horrible actor in those melodramic sitcoms. "That's definitely the worst thing you can call a person. How could you be so awfully cruel? Oh, how will I carry on living after you've just called me annoying?" He said, placing his hand over his forehead.
"Okay, okay, stop. Your mediocre attempt at sarcasm has been noted."
"So, are you going to suck it in and tell me what were you doing outside my door?"
"Okay." I gave in. He was going to find out eventually so why not just tell him now to avoid the prolonged version of my embarrassment. "I was listening to you play the guitar." I murmured with a side of eyeroll.
"You listened through the door. Why didn't you just come inside?"
"Oh, what did you expect me to do? Knock on your door and say 'Oh hey, I was just passing by and I don't wanna be a stalker, so can you let me in so I can watch you play the guitar.' Nothing creepy about that huh?"
"Last time I remember, that's how you do it."
"Really, that's how people are doing it these days? That means I'm much more rusty with this talking-to-a-human thing than I thought."
"Yeah, you really need to brush up your communication skills." He said. "But, since you came here to hear me play a guitar, that's what you're gonna get."
"You're–"
"I'm going to play the guitar for you, free of charge. Live from the parlour, you in?" He offered his hand.
I looked at his him for a few seconds before placing my hand in his.
"I'm in."