And I'm kissing you lying in my room

Holding you until you fall asleep

And it's just as good as I knew it would be

Stay with me, I don't want you to leave…

CHAPTER 10

~ 6:05 AM ~ Station Voltaire, Paris ~

Caleb sat on the subway with the upper part of Hanna's body cradled in his lap. The rattling commotion of the train had lulled her to sleep as they'd passed Oberkampf station; they only had a few more stops before they'd have to get off. The couple had been in luck, catching the very first morning train that would take them back to her host family's home.

His hand kept stroking across her back as he tried hard to stay alert so that they wouldn't miss their stop. He watched the people getting on and off the subway car, normal people who were heading out to their work places. His tired mind thought that there seemed to be no danger around, and that she would have been able to do this on her own, too. But then again, that would have meant he would have had to say goodbye to her twenty minutes ago. No, this was okay. He would have her in his arms for a few more minutes and then walk her home, right up to her front door.

And then, he would get to kiss her one more time. Or twice, maybe...? The prospect kept him going, and kept his eyes from falling shut, too.

Hanna stirred in her sleep when he gently pulled back a strand of her hair that had fallen across her face... her ruffled, blonde mane needed some brushing and taming. But the way her hair was looking after a night like she'd just had was the least of Hanna's worries.

When she didn't show any other signs of waking up, he used his free left hand to take his phone out of his pocket. He had been meaning to reply to Sèb's text message for a while, knowing that he'd probably been worrying about him as it was still his first day in the city. Caleb tried typing his text, but it took him longer than usual because he wasn't that familiar to using only his left hand for it.

Taking Hanna home now. Be back by 7. C.

He hit the key to send the text just as the subway arrived at Nation station. He gently shook Hanna's shoulder and shoved his phone back into his jacket pocket. "Wake up, Han! We have to get off here."

She got up from his lap, stretching a little, and together, they left the train. When they had walked up the stairs, leaving the underground station, they were met with the hustle and bustle of a Friday morning in the city. People were scurrying by, trying to catch their rides, delivery trucks were double-parked, delivering food supplies to bistros and supermarkets, dog owners were outside walking their pets.

Paris on this November fifth was just the same as on every other Friday of the year.

But for the couple that were roaming the streets with eyes for no-one but each other, things had changed that day.

~ 6:09 AM ~ Avenue du Bel Air, Paris ~

Half a mile away, the young man, who was dressed in black from head to toe, ducked behind a tree when he saw an old man walking his dog less than a hundred yards away. He waited for him to pass so that he could leave his secret hiding place and get a clear view again of the gray door across the street, which belonged to house number 28. Very soon, he would have to leave his position as the sun was about to rise in the east. By no means did he want to get exposed as a lurker. He shortly held his breath as the dog came closer in order to take a sniff at the tree trunk that was serving as his cover. When the dog barked three times, the owner hushed his pet and pulled at its leash, bringing it to heel again.

The boy in hiding slowly rounded the tree and watched them both recede. Then, he positioned himself at the other side of the tree and eyed the opposing building suspiciously. Suddenly, a light was switched on in one of the windows upstairs. Someone, who he wasn't able to recognize from afar, closed the window and disappeared from his view again.

Then, he heard the shuffling of two pairs of feet on the other side of the street. From a distance and through the gaps between the trees, he could see the black and white figures of a man and a woman strolling slowly towards the building that he was observing. They were stopping every so often, and he had to squint his eyes in order to see what they were doing. He smiled mildly when he grasped that they were two lovers, pausing to embrace and kiss one another.

When the pair suddenly came to a halt at the gray door, he could hear their voices. His eyes opened wide in shock as the boy realized, with what felt like a stab in the heart, that he knew one of the voices; he had committed it to his memory and engraved into his soul.

Her well-being was the sole purpose for his existence, the reason why he was standing opposite her current home. She had complained to him on the phone about a boy. He had only wanted to keep her safe. After all, she was living with the guy… He could be potentially dangerous. He could hurt her beautiful soul.

His own, infatuated soul could never live to see Hanna Marin getting hurt by another man.

But… who was she talking to? And above all, who was she kissing at this untimely hour? He tried to get a closer look but flinched inwardly as he realized that she might be able to see him. He wanted to be the one waiting in the shadows, the one to come running whenever she was in trouble, no questions asked. He didn't want to be interrogated as to what his motive for observing her was.

He listened very carefully, watching them closely, and finally, the realization hit him. The guy that his girl was kissing was no other than the new kid in class, that Rivers jackass. He clenched his fists and had to turn away in order to calm himself down.

But for some reason, he was drawn to look at them again. The girl of his dreams was across the street from him… laughing, kissing, and looking downright… happy? The happiest he had ever seen her, he noted. He had to admit to himself that even the boy she was with looked like he adored the blonde girl and that he was a far cry from the aloof grouch that he appeared to be in school.

His heart was beating a little faster as he mulled over his options. What was she doing out on the streets at night? Had she been with him this whole time? His bruised little soul wanted to hate his guts, but then he started to think. Hanna seemed fine, physically and mentally, she was safely back at her host family's home… and she had a silly grin on her face that never seemed to go away during the whole time that he had been watching her. This guy obviously meant a lot to her, he could tell, even from afar.

He relaxed his fists again and slowly retreated from hideout. Holding the black hoodie of his jacket close to his face, he started walking away quietly, in the opposite direction to that which the couple had come from.

Fifteen minutes later, he emerged from the subway tunnel and stepped out onto the sidewalk. His clouded mind had caused him to experience tunnel vision, and upon reaching the street corner, he didn't notice the girl who was clad in sports gear and running towards him, distracted and lost in the sound of the music that was blaring out from her headphones.

The two moving shapes bumped into each other, causing the girl to fall down onto the ground. She looked up and snapped at him, "Tu dérailles?" [Are you out of your mind?]

"Aurélie?" Said the black-haired boy, taken by surprise.

"Lucas?" She smiled at him. "Que fais-tu ici?" [What are you doing here?]

When he didn't answer, she tried again with a distinctive French accent, "What are you doing here? It's early!"

Lucas helped Aurélie get back onto her feet and stared at her with a shy smile, still too intimidated to talk to her. He hesitated as he tried to figure out what he could tell her in order to make him seem less pathetic. "Uhhh… uhhhh…."

Aurélie naturally linked arms with him and led him back in the direction of the main street. "J'ai faim. Veut-on prendre le petit-déjeuner?" [I'm hungry. Do you want to go and have breakfast with me?]

When he kept staring at her silently, she made a hand gesture, pretending to eat. "Breakfast?"

"Oh, yeah." He finally let out, adding whimsically, "Oui."

The girl gave him the once-over. "You look good in black."

Spurred on by her compliment, Lucas started to smile broadly; he had regained a small portion of his confidence. "On y va?" [Let's go.]

Hanna Marin was alive and happy. And now, it was time for him to get over her and live it up a little, too.

~ 6:15 AM ~ Avenue du Bel Air, Paris ~

Hanna and Caleb were walking slowly, holding hands, stopping every so often to steal a kiss from each other. Distracted by their own infatuation, it took them a while to notice that they had taken a wrong turn at the last corner. By the time they had finally managed to find their way back to her house, it was 6:15am.

"How do you know how to get around in Paris? I mean… you knew exactly which way we had to go to get to the subway station, you found the way back to my house… and, what's more, in the dark. You are one mysterious guy, Caleb Rivers! What other secrets are you keeping from me?" Hanna squeezed his hand a little tighter, clinging to him as he led them past all kinds of obstacles on the scarcely lit sidewalk.

Caleb laughed at her remark. "I had plenty of time to plan this. Sèb hacked into our school's computer and found out your address. He got me a plan of the Mètro system and then, I would like a little cred, please, for my street rat ability to read city maps." They stopped walking as they reached the simple gray door belonging to 28 Avenue du Bel Air, and Caleb pulled her into his arms, engulfing her in his body warmth, not wanting this to be the end of their night.

"Wow, you really put a lot of thought and effort into this for me." She poked at his chest as she leaned into his embrace, dreading the moment she would have to say goodbye. A soft kiss landed on her forehead as Caleb tightened his arms around her, pulling her flush against his body.

"For you, I would do it again and again." Thanks to the dim light of the streetlamp above them, Hanna saw the loving expression on his face and couldn't believe her luck. When was the last time that anybody in her life had made such an effort of their own accord to make her happy?

It was the perfect ending to a crappy first day in her favorite city. The sweet memories of her first sexual experiences with Caleb would now enable her to get through this exchange trip… Heck, she was sure she would even be able to endure Thomas and his irritating behavior.

She tilted her head up and closed her eyes as she pressed her lips onto his for a long moment. "Thank you," she breathed as they broke apart. But Caleb didn't want to let go of her; instead, he removed one of his hands from her back and cupped her face with it, bringing her closer for another lingering kiss, followed by one more.

"Anytime." His voice sounded hoarse as the word fell from his lips in between even more languid kisses. The sizzling heat that had formed between them whenever they had kissed that night, was now gone, making room for deliberately slow kisses. They were trying to stall for time. It was the bittersweet moment of having to say goodbye.

Caleb released her from his arms, and they parted for a moment, only to come back together again for another series of caresses.

"I have to go now. I don't know when the family will be up, but they said it would be early," Hanna said with regret. But instead of stepping away from Caleb and walking over to her door, she clasped her arms behind his neck and brought their mouths together again.

At long last, Hanna pulled back and let her eyes wander to the windows above her. "Everything's still dark up there. Maybe, if I'm lucky, I can just sneak in, and no one will ever know I was gone in the first place." She tried to stifle a yawn and failed. Her inner body clock was still on Rosewood time and because it was midnight over there, it was now telling her to go to sleep. She flinched inwardly at the idea that she would probably not get any more sleep before breakfast time, with all the turmoil going on in her mind about losing her virginity, having Caleb declare his love for her, and being absolutely impatient to tell her friends about all of it.

"I'm gonna look like crap all day long with what little sleep I got tonight," she said wistfully as she turned back around to see Caleb's face again.

"No, you're not," he told her before his lips came crashing down on hers one final time.

After a moment, she receded again and gasped at the way he had taken her breath away. "Yes, I am." Her arms slid down over his chest as she gazed into his equally tired looking eyes. His smile was unwavering, and she felt bad about the fact that he would have to travel all the way back to his own bed, knowing that he wouldn't be getting any sleep before school either. "But it was worth it," she tried to voice what had been playing upon both of their minds.

"Yeah, absolutely." Caleb finally let go of her and watched as she walked to the front door. She stood with her back turned to him as she entered the security code in order to get access to the building.

It was then that Caleb saw the surveillance camera mounted on the exterior wall of the house, directed at its entrance. He hoped more than anything that the Girards wouldn't get around to watching their surveillance tape during the day, and made a mental note to ask Sèb whether there was any magic that he could do in order to make the recording disappear. If Hanna had gotten caught by the camera outside of the building in the middle of the night, or now, as she was returning home very early in the morning, he knew it would set off a series of unpleasant events, including phone calls to Mr. Gilbert and Mrs. Marin, Hanna's mother. Above all else, it was her reaction that Caleb feared the most. Once, after she had caught him and Hanna kissing in the hallway of her house, she had kicked him out, thinking he was some kind of bad influence on her daughter.

To be fair, he had used her toiletries, her spare couch and her cereal, too, without her knowledge.

The fact that Mrs. Marin had eventually allowed Hanna to go out with him again was tantamount to a miracle, and he would forever be grateful for her change of heart. He wanted to be on good terms with her. If she found out that he was actually a bad influence, a guy who slept with her daughter after kidnapping her in the middle of the night, then she'd probably forbid her daughter from ever seeing him again.

Remembering that Hanna had told him she was never one to stick to the rules, he knew that she wouldn't let her mom keep her from continuing to date him. They'd find ways to be together, he was sure of that. There were other things which were more important than the goodwill and blessing of his girlfriend's mother, like his own mending heart. He had spent most of his life with people who resented him; he'd get by. They'd had this one night together, which was a fulfillment of a dream that he'd had ever since he had met Hanna. They'd had this one, shared midnight in Paris, filled with love and a new-found level of passion. Nobody could ever take that away from them.

Hanna, however, seemingly hadn't noticed the camera, and Caleb decided not to broach the subject so she wouldn't have to end their date with a worried feeling in the pit of her stomach.

As the mechanism clicked, and the door opened to reveal the corridor, Hanna hesitated and turned around to him, whispering, "Goodnight!"

Caleb stood on the sidewalk, his hands back in the pockets of his, once again, painfully tight pants.

To hell with that surveillance camera, he thought as he quickly crossed the distance between them and stole another kiss from her lips, wishing that they didn't have to be separated and that they could spend every night with each other. "Goodnight!"

"I love you," Hanna felt the overwhelming need to tell him again.

"I love you, too." Caleb replied hoarsely and planted a firm kiss on her lips. "Sleep tight!"

He immediately turned on his heel and started walking away without looking back, knowing that otherwise, she would not get back upstairs in time for her family to wake her so she could get ready for her first day of school in Paris.

Hanna closed the front door behind her after she had watched Caleb disappear into the darkness.

A mere minute later, the door of the Girards' apartment softly clicked shut, and Hanna stood in the dark hallway, where she quietly took off her shoes. All of a sudden, a door on the other end of the hallway was opened, and the lights above her were turned on.

Victor Girard stepped into the hall and spotted Hanna by the door of her guest room.

"Bonjour," she said quickly, putting on the merriest morning face that Hanna Marin had ever managed to work up. [Good morning!]

"Bonjour, Hanna. Tu es déjà éveillé?" Victor smiled at her, not realizing that anything was off. [Good morning, Hanna. You're up already?]

Hanna smiled back at him, apologetically. Carefully picking her words, she gave him the first explanation that popped into her head. "Je ne pas pouvoir dormer… parce que le difference de temps…" She pushed the handle on her door down, hoping that he'd buy her ridiculous white lie. [I couldn't sleep… because of the jet lag.]

"Oh. D'accord." [Oh, alright.]

He did. Again, Hanna couldn't believe her luck. She stepped into her room, but suddenly felt Mr. Girard's hand on her shoulder. She jerked and turned around to face him.

"Alors, j'espère que tu pourras maintenant bien dormer. Je dois me preparer pour aller au travail. Marielle te réveillera dans une heure." He let go of her and proceeded to walk to the bathroom. [Alright, I hope that you can sleep well now. I have to get ready for work now. Marielle is going to wake you up in an hour.]

Hanna quickly slipped into her room and closed the door. Inside, she leaned back against the wall and took a deep breath. She had actually managed to spend an entire night away from home without raising any suspicions. Allowing her eyes to close, she thought about everything that had happened that night; the amazing talks they had shared, and then, how gentle Caleb had been when he had made love to her for the first time, and how amazing it had felt.

Opening her eyes with a huge smile on her face, she pushed herself away from the wall and started to undress herself. Once she was only in her underwear, she looked at herself in the mirror, searching for evidence that she was no longer a virgin, but all she saw were tiny patches of skin that reminded her of where his lips had kissed her. It had made her feel so worshipped, so precious… and it didn't help at all with winding down in order to catch a few more minutes of sleep.

She took off her bra and slipped into a gray t-shirt. It was Caleb's favorite t-shirt - with 'OK' written on it backwards - that she had snatched from him when they were getting dressed again in the tent. They had been in such a hurry, that Caleb had only put on his black sweater and had left his t-shirt behind when he had crawled out of the tent.

Hanna brought the material to her nose and closed her eyes, deeply inhaling Caleb's scent, which still clung to it, before she collapsed onto her bed. She had wanted to take a shower but remembered that Victor was probably still using the bathroom.

Lying on the bed, she shifted and got under the covers. However, she was too alert to even think about catching some sleep. Her thoughts were clouded with Caleb and all the new feelings he had stirred up inside of her. God, she missed him already, and they had only been apart for ten minutes.

As Hanna looked up at the ceiling, she realized that tonight had changed everything between them. They were closer than ever and they had realized that they had more in common than they'd previously thought. She sighed loudly as she thought about how the girls would react when they found out and about the amount of questions she would get from them.

For a second, she considered not telling them and keeping this special evening just between her and Caleb. But she quickly dismissed that idea when she realized that she wouldn't be able to hide anything from them, and that her friends would know something had changed as soon as they saw the satisfied grin that was plastered to her face. She just couldn't stop smiling.

Hanna shifted around a little to try and get comfortable, but it was useless. She got up again and emptied the contents of her tote sack onto the carpet, plucking her phone out of the pile of bills. She saw that she had missed a couple of messages from the girls and opened up the group chat. They were the usual goodnight texts, no signs of a crisis or –A. having meddled with their lives again.

Her fingers tapped on the keys as she typed a good morning message out to her friends. Then, she left the chat and started a new text, to Spencer only.

Somebody has to wipe this silly grin off my face or Thomas will totally get the wrong impression today.

The arrival of a new incoming message caused her to hit 'send' quickly before she opened her inbox. If there was any possibility, the smirk on her face got even bigger. Caleb had texted her.

Keep me awake plz

Hanna figured that he was still on the subway, fighting the urge to fall asleep right then and there. She thought about ways to entertain him so that he wouldn't doze off and miss his exit. Finally, she came up with an idea, knowing that it would definitely keep him on his toes for the rest of their time in the city.

You still haven't taught me how to say 'I wanna fall asleep in your arms and wake up next to you tomorrow morning' in French. I need to know!

Caleb quickly sent back his reply.

Why?

Hanna's heart started pounding a little faster as she typed out her new message.

Because that's exactly what I wanna tell you on our last night in Paris. We're still on for our date, right?

THE END

And that was that. I hope you liked this story. At any rate, I liked writing it. :-)

Thanks for reading and for all the beautiful reviews or tweets I got.

Zip