We sat across each other, eyes stuck on one another, both anticipating what was to come next. Slowly he kept his napkin aside before standing up and violently kicking his chair down. I flinched out of reflex and stood up from the table cradling my handbag in my arms. I had relentlessly poked the bear and now it was ready to pounce on me.
"Ian.." I drew it out, feeling the air leave my lungs as I put one arm in front of me in a defensive form. "Let's talk about this."
He rounded the table, studying me with his blue orbs.
"Oh we will talk but we'll get to that later." He said with a mischievous glint in his eyes.
He approached me at a fast pace and all I wanted to do in that moment was bolt for the door but his penetrating gaze had me glued to my spot. When he was inches away, I screwed my eyes shut and mistook my bag for a stress ball, hoping it would give me some sort of relief.
Everything went deadly silent and all I could feel, well actually, all I could concentrate on was Ian's icy breath on my collarbone. Then I felt it, his arm wrapped around my waist and in an instant he lifted me up, I opened my eyes then and he stared down at me as he walked us backwards to the table. I gasped as he used his other hand to clear everything on the table and cringed at the image of shattered glass and splattered food on the tiled floor. In response to my reaction he chuckled meticulously
Gently he placed me on the table, my back against the table. I didn't know where all my reasoning and judgement went, as I laid back on table with my mouth running dry with every passing second.
He crouched in front of me, looking up at me as he took the heel of my foot and placed a feather kiss on my ankle.
"Ian.." I breathed out trying to jerk my foot away from him but he had a firm grip.
"Do you know what happens to people that piss off, Ian Thompson?"
I gulped at him. "No and I'm hoping I don't have to."
I was trying my best to keep my tears at bay, this Ian scared the hell out of me and if I had my way, I would have been out the door in a heartbeat.
His hand left my foot and began it's journey up my thigh and stopped right above my collar bone. He let his fingers linger there for a moment, trying to get a pulse.
"That's right, love." He spoke as his hand travelled up further, encircling around my neck. "You should be scared of me, you should be very scared."
His eyes twinkled with delight at the sight of me in such a vulnerable place, begging for mercy with my eyes.
Then his hand dropped from my neck and he pulled away but not before offering a hand to help me up. I acquiesced, not wanting to give him a reason to follow through on his recent threats.
He had shaken me to the core and I didn't know if I was going to be able to recover.
*
The car ride back was quiet and for the most obvious reasons—I was terrified of the man sitting next to me but most of all I was cross with him. I kept a good amount of distance between us and I was glad he didn't pay any heed to it; too busy handling business on the phone.
As soon as we reached, I didn't give Ian a chance to say any parting words or open the door for me. I slammed the car door shut behind me and sped- walk my way to the dorms. I heard Ian following right behind me so I just walked faster.
"Adalia, what is the meaning of this?"
As soon I got in my dorm room, I shut the door and locked it. Ian banged against the door demanding I let him in and threatening to come back with campus security if I didn't. I stood facing the door wincing at every pumelling sound of the impact of his fist against the door. If I let him in, I'd have the same fate the door.
"Adalia, whatever it is.. just let me in, we'll talk about it."
My voice croaked as I let the tears slide down. "No.. go away Ian. I don't want to see you."
Eventually he gave up and I let out a sigh of relief as I heard his footsteps get fainter. I climbed into my bed and cradled up into a ball, cried the remainder of the night.
I knew if I was going to have a sound mind and sleep peacefully through the night, I had to pull away from the deal so I decided to text my mom before sleeping.
To mom: I'm sorry mom, I can't follow through with the deal but I promise I'll find a way to get us through this even if it means taking a break from school for a year to work instead. After careful consideration, one thing's for sure.. I can't marry Ian Thompson.
-Sent at 10:07 pm
The next morning I had one agenda for the day. I had to fix things with Kyson, so that's where I was headed 7:30 in the morning with his favorite snacks in a bag. My phone buzzed from inside the pocket of my jeans but one look at who was calling and I shoved it back in. I hadn't replied to any of Ian's texts or calls from the previous night and I wasn't planning to anytime soon. I had pushed him and any thoughts of him to the furthest part of my subconscious.
I hadn't given Ian my number so I was positive he had gotten it from my mom. She had probably filled him in on the text I had sent her last night and that's probably why he kept blowing my phone up.
With the snacks carefully placed on the floor outside of Kyson's appartment door I was going to knock but then I heard the yelling voice of Gianna.
"—that's bullshit and you know it! can you honestly say that you don't love her?" Gianna shouted, the vulnerability in her voice clear.
I heard the sound of glass shattering and was about to turn back and come back at a better time but then I heard my name make it's way into the conversation.
"Adalia is my best friend of course I love her!"
"In what way Kyson..?" She urged him to answer. "And don't give me that crap on the 'way a brother loves a sister' because I know what you feel for her is definitely not brotherly."
I heard Kyson grunt in frustration and another glass shattering. "Fuuck! what do you want from me, Gianna? I'm with you and not her aren't I? Isn't that enough?"
"No it's not. I've gotten my answer. Goodbye Kyson."
Seconds later the door clicked open but I couldn't seem to move as a red eyed Gianna walked out. She didn't seem fazed by my presence as she scoffed and laughed bitterly.
"Congratulations, Adalia. You won, he's all yours." She said and pushed past me.
Then I was face to face with Kyson. When he saw me his mouth fell agape. His lips were moving but no sound was coming.
So I took the liberty of picking up the snacks and inviting myself into his appartment.
"You have a lot of explaining to do." I said as he nodded in response and shut the door close behind us.
His appartment was just as I had remembered it; neat and spacious although now there was shattered glass on his hardwood floors. I gave him a disapproving look before picking up a broom and dustpan from his kitchen.
"Ky, we talked about this. When you get angry that doesn't give you the right to go around breaking things."
He ran a hand through his hair and threw himself head first onto the nearest sofa. "You don't have to do that, the maid's coming over later today."
I paused, straightening up to look at him. "It's not about the mess and you know it. It's about how you deal with your anger."
He put a hand up signalling for me to stop. "Can we please not go there I already fought with Gianna and I don't want to fight with you too."
I overlapped my hands over the broom. "What did you guys fight about?"
"Let it go Adalia." He placed a pillow onto his face.
I sucked in a breath, silently asking the entities to give me strength. He knew me better than that, I wasn't just going to let it go not when I was involved in this. If there was a chance that Kyson had feelings for me than I had to know.
"Kyson." I walked over to the sofa he was on and crouched beside him. "Do you have feelings for me?"
The pillow fell off his face from the sudden movement he made, sitting up. His eyes aligned with mine and I was maybe finally going to the get the answer I always hoped for but then the door bell rang.
When I opened it and saw who was behind it, I knew hell was bound to break loose so in those split seconds I had already formulated a plan to get Kyson and I out of this, alive...