Chapter six—Too Close

When I get out of the shower I dry off and put on my pajamas, making sure I look like the teenage boy I'm supposed to be before I step into the bedroom and face Christian. When I open the door he's sitting on the edge of his bed looking at me expectantly. And as if in slow motion I watch as his eyes trail down my body and then back up to my eyes.

I feel my heart drop. Oh my good Lord, is he checking me out? Why would he be checking me out? With eyes I'm sure the size of watermelons, I meet his gaze and am instantly confused when I see a smirk on his face.

"Nice jammies," he teases.

I look down at my pants and t-shirt and look back up at him with a slight blush. So what, I like blue and yellow sea horses, I'm sure I'm not the only girl dressed as a boy that likes sea horses.

I cough nervously. "Thanks."

I move over to my bed, avidly ignoring his gaze but feeling it on me with each movement I make. Getting rather irritated that I can't get into bed without an audience, I turn to look at him with a raised brow.

"What?" I ask.

"What did you think of my plan?" he asks, his voice now sounding more apprehensive. "Do you think it would work?"

I lie down and look up at the ceiling. "Um, it might."

"So you'll help me then?" he asks sounding hopeful, a little too hopeful to my liking.

"I guess so." I turn around facing away from him and close my eyes to block out the image of him and Victoria. "I'm tired now, so I'm going to sleep. Night."

I hear him shuffling around the bed before he turns off his light and gets under his sheets. "Night," he says and then the room plunges into darkness.

I wake up to darkness, and I briefly sit up in bed wondering what caused me to wake before my alarm. I rub my hands against my eyes and right when I'm about to go back to sleep, not even bothering to find out what really woke me up is when I feel something move on the end of my bed.

I slightly lean over to turn on my lamp, but when I hear a distinctive hiss that I know only belongs to one particular reptile, I'm out of bed before I can even muster the brain power to scream my head off. In my haste to get out of bed, I get my sheets tangled around my feet and fall flat on my butt. My sheets find their way on my floor with me, and when I hear a thump and another distinctive hiss, I squeal like a pig and jump on Christian's bed, not even entertaining the idea of getting back onto my bed or staying on the floor.

I'm not watching what I'm doing as I crawl across Christian's bed as I stare out into the darkness and try to find Satan's serpent, and I end up crushing Christian's face under my hand.

He groans, and then pushes me off him, only to sit up and give me what I'm sure is one of his glare's, only a sleep filled one.

"What the hell are you doing on my bed? Get off me!"

He's practically pushing me onto the floor but I hang onto his arms, making him more aggressive.

"There's a snake in here!" I finally screech out, getting a better grip on him.

"What?"

"I woke up and there was something moving on my bed and then I heard something hiss! I rolled off my bed and it came down with me and now it's somewhere on the floor!"

I'm gripping his arms like he's my lifeline, and when my explanation as to why I'm on my bed leaves my mouth he stills and swear I feel him hold onto me too.

"How would a snake have gotten in here?" he demands in a whisper, as if it could hear him.

"Like I would know!"

I see movement behind me, and I scream, pushing Christian out of the way and jumping onto my bed.

"What? What?" he yells, scrambling to get onto my bed with me.

By this point we're huddled together, looking at his bed like it's about to light on fire. If I wasn't so scared out of my mind I would take advantage of the fact that he was so close to me, so close in fact that I could smell his masculine body wash and another scent I don't know how to place. And I would marvel at the way his shirtless body is pressed against mine, his heat seeping into my clothes and warming my skin. And he's so muscular, he feels like hard metal under my grip and I couldn't even imagine what it would feel like to have the chance to feel such power whenever I wanted.

"There!" Christian yells, pulling me out of my brief fantasy. My eyes snap toward the area he's pointing and in the darkness I can see movement that belongs only to one type of slithering reptile.

"It has to be Connor Ronan's snake. He's in the room next door, maybe if I can call him I ca—"

"He's coming back over here!" I squeal and look to another place I can jump to as I tighten my grip on Christian.

Just when I was feeling like all hope was lost, the door swings open and a boy with dark red hair and tired, deep green eyes stands in our doorway with only a t-shirt and pajama pants on.

"What's going on?" comes out a raspy, sleep induced voice. "I heard screaming, are you guys all right?"

"No everything's not all right! Your damn snake's in here, Ronan!" Christian bellows at him.

"What?"

The kid rushes over to Christian's bedside and turns on the lamp and squints in the dull light. I see movement in between my and Christian's bed and point to a scaly looking tail partially hiding underneath Christian's bed.

"It's there!"

Connor comes around the other side of the bed and gets on his hands and knees and lifts up Christian's bed covers to look under the bed. The room is dead silent as Christian and I watch as he tentatively pulls the snake from out under Christian's bed and coils the moderately long and thick snake around his arm.

I look up at him like he's crazy when he stands up and gazes at me and Christian. But before I can berate him for being stupid enough to own the Devil's messenger, he raises his brow at Christian and me and then asks, "Why are you two hugging each other?"

Christian and I turn our heads at the same time, looking at each other and then he yells and pushes me off him so I fall against the bed.

"Dude, what the fuck? Why were you holding me like that?" he asks with a high pitched voice.

I try not to laugh and I honestly can't even deny that I was the one holding him, but he was holding me too, so I point that out.

"You were the one holding onto me!"

"You know what, it doesn't matter, I'm tired, the snake's gone so let's just go back to sleep." He turns away from me and looks at Connor who now has an amused grin plastered on his face. "Keep that demon locked up tighter or I'll tell O'Brien that you have a pet living in the dorms."

He ushers him out of the room as I straighten up my bed again. Christian avoids my gaze as he climbs back into bed and turns off the light. We're plunged back into darkness but now the quiet seems even more deafening. I try to close my eyes and go back to sleep, but I can't, I feel too awake now to fall back into unconsciousness.

I stare up at the ceiling, thinking about the way Christian smelled and felt against my skin. I hear him moving around, but I assume he's just trying to get comfortable, and then his deep voice penetrates through the darkness.

"Andy?"

"Yeah?"

"You scream like a girl."

I can't help but grin, because I know it's true and I even chuckle out loud a little bit. When I think more about the whole situation and how we were jumping from bed to bed and holding on to each other, I find it hilarious and laugh harder.

Christian joins in, and before I know it we're both rolling around on our separate beds, dying with laughter. Despite the ridiculousness of the situation, it was one of the funniest nights of my life.

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