(j u s t i n p o v)
"Come on! Please?" she giggled, smirking at you from across the table. "Pretty please with sugar on top?"
"Sugar is really unhealthy," you retort, trying to stop the smile threatening to form on your face. "Why would I want something so unhealthy?"
"Fine," she huffed, her eyes narrowing in a playful glare. Her lips form a petal pink pout as she stares balefully at you, the only thing not innocent about her the calculating gleam in the depths of her eyes. Then, all of a sudden, she leans closer to you. Her left hand lightly rests on yours and her right foot is sliding slowly up your leg. "Pretty please with… me on top?" she purrs, her lips curling into a wicked grin.
You choke on your water when her foot slips higher. A diamond gleams on her left ring finger and cool metal presses to your skin where her hand touches yours. She's still looking at you with that devious glint in her eyes, waiting for your response.
"Justin?" she asks, her voice suddenly deeper. "Justin?"
"Justin? Justin? Justiiiiin?" the last word is sing-songed and you blearily blink your eyes open, murmuring out her name before you can stop yourself.
"Alex?" you mumble, remembering the feeling of silver on your hand and a foot on your leg.
"Dude, I'm not a chick," you hear, jerking awake when you realize what you just said. You fall to the floor in a tangle of limbs and sheets and sweaty pajamas, Max's laughter ringing in your ears. "Come on man, it's time for breakfast," he laughs once more before striding from your room, leaving the door open on his way.
You close your eyes and press your face to the floor; a groan working it's way out of your throat.
You're getting really, really tired of starting your days this way.
Someone once told you that dreams were windows to the soul, glimpses of your inner self. Sometimes, you can't help but hope that they were wrong.
The dreams started three weeks after Juliet and Mason left. You hadn't been sleeping very well, having nightmares about Juliet dying and aging and turning into ash.
But after twenty-one days of nightmares, the dreams changed.
Juliet was there, a ghostly vision with long blonde hair and a vintage pink dress. Her pearly fangs were gleaming and the corner of her mouth was crimson, her eyes wide with desire and pupils blown with bloodlust. Two people lay on the floor in front of her, a boy and a girl.
The boy was tall and lanky, with a head full of barely controlled brunette hair and preppy clothes on. When you see his face, you notice that it's furred and he's got a muzzle where a nose should be. You barely glance at the gaping, bleeding wound on his neck before your gaze locks on the girl lying next to him.
She's got dark brunette hair tumbling in waves around her head, her eyes closed and face peaceful. Red silk is draped over her form, her body gracefully sprawled across the stone floor lying in front of Juliet. The silk near her neck is darker, blood slowly seeping into it from the wound on her collarbone.
You're suddenly filled with such panic and fear and pain that you can't breathe.
You run towards her and drop to your knees beside her head, not even registering the tears dripping down your face until they splash onto her cheeks.
You clutch her close to you and lean down, pressing your pale lips to her ruby ones. For a second, you think that you taste copper and rust and salt, but then your waking up safe in your bed at home.
You gasp for air and try to clear your mind, to calm down.
But it isn't working.
All you can think about is the girl in your dream.
It was Alex.
And she didn't look like your sister; she looked like a beautiful girl, like Juliet did at the beginning of your relationship. She was positively lovely.
Exquisite.
Once, you wrote lovely in cursive. It looked like lonely.
After that, the dreams were constant.
Every night you fell asleep and dreamed of Alex. Sometimes, they were peaceful dreams and others were violent, depressing and wonderful and full of desire.
It got to the point where you dreaded going to sleep at night. The dreams were wonderful and that was absolutely terrible.
She was your sister.
Your little sister.
You remember playing with her when you were little, telling her that there weren't any monsters under her bed and allowing her to sleep in yours when she didn't believe you. You picked up her messes and made sure she was always safe, always happy.
But now this.
When you learned she was dating Dean Moriati, you got so furious that you lost control of your magic for a moment. You knew what type of guy he was, that he would probably want to do much more than kissing and he would want to do it with your baby sister.
And now, now you were having dreams where you were doing much worse things than Dean Moriati ever did.
The dreams where Alex died were awful, the ones where you were married to her were disconcerting and the romantic ones were slightly worrisome. But the worst were the dreams filled with pants and gasps and lips and fingers and skin everywhere.
You woke up from one of those dreams flushed and sweaty, angry with yourself and just furious at the situation in general. And what was even worse was that for the rest of the day, whenever you saw Alex, you couldn't stop yourself from blushing and fleeing the room.
It wasn't like you wanted to broadcast that something was going on, but when you saw her all you would think of was the feel of her body pressed to yours and sliding your lips down her neck.
And that made it hard to be in the same room.
About the time that your voice started cracking, your father gave you the talk. You'd be willing to bet that he would probably regret that right about now.
You should have expected that someone was going to realize that something was going on because, let's face it, you are certainly not the rule-breaking, sneaky, and devious Russo.
About four months after the dreams start, you refuse to sleep for two days. You cast energy spells and down coffee and energy drinks like there is no tomorrow. It turns out that the lack of sleep was actually your downfall, not your salvation.
You slipped up.
You stopped on the stairs when you noticed Alex standing in the kitchen laughing with Harper and simply stared. You stood there, frozen, for who knows how long, a dazed expression marring your features.
A tanned hand slapped down on to your shoulder and made you jump before you slowly turned to face your brother.
He was looking at you suspiciously, more serious than you can remember ever seeing him before, and when he saw the guilt on your face his hand clamped down harder and he dragged you with him to his room.
"All right. Enough. You've been acting so weird for months, man. You've been acting weird enough that even I noticed. Does something about that seem strange to you?" he crosses his arms after he finishes speaking, glaring at you expectantly.
For a moment, you're so shocked that you can't think of anything to say. You realize that you don't know when this changed occurred, when Max went from airhead little brother to observant young man.
And the guilt is what makes you speak without thought of consequences.
You spill the entire story in about three minutes, speaking too quickly and muttering your way through some of the more salacious details.
When you finish, Max just blinks at you. Then he smiles.
"Dude. That's why you've been freaking out? Look, Justin, I've known you loved her since the family trip when she made mom and dad forget each other. And us," he adds as an afterthought. "I thought that you knew too and that you were just not doing anything about it for some lame moral reason or something. But seriously. You didn't realize you love her?"
"L-l-lo-love?" you choke out, denial swirling through your mind. You haven't even dared to think of the word love yet, and here was Max implying that you were an idiot for not realizing that this happened way before the dreams started.
He just laughs and shoves you out of his room, telling you to pull your head out of your ass and talk to her.
You lock yourself up in your room instead.
You told her that you couldn't remember what happened on that family trip, that you didn't remember those few seconds between her winning the competition and getting sucked into a magical tornado. But you did. And forgetting her is the worst memory you have.
You know that you should have spoken to her, that this wasn't the kind of thing that would stay buried. But you never did because, honestly, you weren't sure that you were okay with it. Sure, you loved her. And yes, you did think that love was more than enough reason to pursue someone, to stay with them no matter the repercussions. In theory, at least.
But she was your sister.
And you had spent your entire life protecting her, making sure that she was okay and teasing her and mocking every single embarressment she ever experienced. You grew up with her, went to school with her, and learned magic with her.
So if for some reason this didn't last, you wouldn't be able to live with yourself. If you ever hurt her, even something indirect like Harper cutting off their friendship when she found out about the two of you, you couldn't deal with it.
It turns out that none of your decisions about morals and protection really mattered.
She figured it out all by herself.
You really should have seen it coming, if Max had discovered your secret then there was no way you could ever keep it from her.
It was weeks after the conversation with Max, who actually wasn't speaking to you out of outrage at the fact that you didn't take his advice, and she barged into your room with no regard for your personal space.
And when you say that, you mean that she slammed her way into your bedroom while you were changing and refused to leave, no matter that you were dressed in no more than a pair of socks and basketball shorts.
She stared at you for a few moments, mindlessly locking the door behind her and setting her wand on your bookshelves.
Then she kicked off her shoes and slid off her sweater, striding towards your bed in no more than a tank top and a pair of cutoffs. She sprawled out on the left side of your bed, looking up at you impatiently.
"Well? Are you coming?" she demands, her eyes narrowing at your lack of movement. "Justiiin. I left the right side of the bed for you!"
You wince slightly at the glare on her face and decide not to ask how she knows what side of the bed you sleep on, instead slipping on an old t-shirt and then gingerly lying down next to her. "Soo… what're we doing?"
"Well. I'm here, lying in your bed, because you wouldn't grow a pair and come lay down in mine," she bites out and you can practically feel the burn from her glare.
The growl in her voice makes you want to move away but before you can stand she throws a leg over yours and wraps her arm around your waist. Everywhere her skin touched yours felt like it was on fire and you gulp before responding. "Ex-excuse me?"
"You're definitely not excused," she mumbles into your neck. Sometime, you honestly can't remember when, her head ended up lodged in the space between your shoulder and neck and you can feel her breath tickling your collarbone.
"Alex, this really isn't appropiate-" you try to say, but the words get cut off when you feel her soft lips press against your skin.
"I don't give a fuck. I was waiting for you to make the first move because I figured that it would make you feel more macho or whatever, but you made me wait way too long. You know how I bore so easily," she sits up as she speaks, her eyes locking on to yours.
And everyone will say it's wrong and you're terrified and out of your comfort zone but it's Alex and you've loved her since you forgot who she was.
So you nod and reach up to wrap your arm around her shoulders, pulling her back into your side and reaching down to twine your fingers with the hand that was splayed across your right hip.
The two of you fall asleep curled around each other like those kittens Alex always wanted to adopt when she was little. When you wake up, she's on the left side of the bed, her hair pulled back in a ponytail that's tickling your nose and lying on her back covered by the sheet.
For a moment, her hair is down and tangled in waves on a stone floor and red silk that is slowly being darkened by her blood is draped over her graceful frame. But then you blink and it's back to normal, a blue sheet and a ponytail and no blood anywhere.
And this time, when you kiss her, it tastes like strawberries, not blood.
And she kisses back.
Occasionally, you hate yourself. You hate your emotions for betraying you, for allowing you to put yourself in a position where you're capable of hurting her. But then you see her. And all the hate is overshadowed by love that you no longer try to fight.
Yayy! I haven't done a Justin POV in way too long. Hopefully it was okay. I disclaim WOWP and the characters. I do not expect money for reading this.
Hope you guys liked it. Review. Please.