(Sequel to 'Deep in Thought')
31. Flowers
She awoke slowly, as usual, tugging the warm blankets close to her, happily dazing in her warm bed. It was strangely light in her room and she kept her eyes closed tightly, trying to stay in that wonderful haze just a little while longer, postponing the inevitable. She moved a little, and something rolled against her face, ticking her nose. She sneezed.
Suddenly wide awake, she sat up in her bed and looked around in the familiar, but totally unexpected, room. Danny's room. Danny's bed. Too shocked to move for a moment, she just sat there, staring at the cluttered desk, crumbled clothes in the corner, and then her coat and her boots lying on the ground near the window. And memory came flushing back to her.
She turned a bright scarlet, and quickly looked beside her in the bed, but he was gone. Where his head had been, was now a single rose. She realized that that was what had woken her.
Slowly, she swung her feet out of the bed and placed them on the cold floor, picked up the rose, and then stood and walked to the door. Another rose was attached to the doorknob.
Curiosity now had her, and she untied the small rope with which the flower was tied and placed it with the other one in her hand, careful to avoid the thorns. Then she opened the door a little and peaked down the hallway. She didn't want to get caught by either Mr or Mrs Fenton, or even Jazz, coming out of Danny's room in her pajamas. It would give them all the wrong impressions.
The hallway was empty though, and the house was strangely quiet. Usually, there would be some TV on in the morning, Mr Fenton would be making noise in the lab, or Mrs Fenton would be singing while either backing cookies or backing ectoplasm samples. Now, a single rose was laying in the middle of the hallway, pointing towards the stairs.
Strangely excited, she stepped out of Danny's room and picked up the rose, then headed for the stairs. Sure enough, there were two roses there, one on top of the stairs, and one at the bottom. She descended, picking them both up. The third step creaked it's familiar creak, sounding strangely loud in the silent house. She had no clue about what was going on, other than that Danny was playing some kind of game.
There was another rose pointing at the kitchen, and she quietly picked it up and added it to the now sizable bundle in her arms. Quietly, she peaked around the door frame, into the kitchen.
The table was set for two, a single rose was standing in a vase next to one of the plates, two glasses of fresh orange juice were standing on the counter next to the toaster, which had two slices of bread in it, ready to be toasted. And a lone figure with messy black hair was sitting in the open window wearing nothing but a t-shirt and faded blue jeans, staring outside at the snow mud on the street in front of his house.
"Danny?" she said questionably.
He started and almost fell out of the window, but he caught himself.
"Oh, hey Sam," he said, after recovering himself and closing the window, "Did, um, did you sleep well?"
She nodded, and looked around.
"Where are your parents?" she asked.
Danny grinned and started rubbing the back of his neck, a sure sign he was nervous.
"Heh. Strange thing. Got called away, some ghost showed up, it seems. So, they're across town, really."
"Oh."
They stood quietly for a while, staring at each other, and then suddenly they both started talking.
"You want some toast?"
"You have a vase or something?"
They grinned at each other, suddenly comfortable again. Danny gestured to the chair, and she sat down on it, laying the roses on the table, while he started rummaging through the cupboards, muttering to himself. Suddenly, he seemed to feel her gaze on him, because he turned, letting the vase he just found slip through his hands. It clattered on the floor, in a thousand pieces. Sam arched an eyebrow.
"What's up, Danny? You're acting kind of weird this morning."
And then she quickly shut up, thinking about her own weirdness, showing up in the middle of the night to crawl into his bed. He blushed, and quickly looked down at the shards at his bare feet. Any normal person would have had a problem now, but he conveniently turned his feet intangible and walked to the cupboard that contained the broom. Then he busied himself with meticulously sweeping the kitchen and getting rid of the shards, before getting out another vase to put the roses in. Another question popped up in Sam's mind.
"Where's Jazz?"
Danny put the broom away, took out the toast from the toaster and sat down across from her.
"She, um, needed to go to the library," he said.
"Is it even open now? I mean, it's Saturday..."
Danny glanced at the clock on the wall, which indicated that it was almost ten o'clock.
"It is now," he said.
The silence of the house was getting on her nerves. For some reason, Danny had gotten rid of his family members, so he could be alone in the house with her. A tiny spark in her head started nagging her, telling her how Tucker had always said he liked her, and a strange hope took possession of her. The flowers. The empty house. His obvious nervousness. She decided to be bold.
"What are you up to, Danny?"
His knife clattered through his hand on his plate, and he stared at his uneaten toast for a moment. Then he looked at her empty plate and glass.
"You finished?" he asked, and she almost giggled when his voice cracked.
He looked into her sparkling eyes for a moment and froze, before turning away from her and picking up both her empty and his full plate to put them on the counter.
"Danny," she said, "Answer the question."
He still had his back to her, and she could see the tension in his shoulders. Then he turned around, and to her surprise he looked scared. This, she decided, was going entirely too far. He was Danny Phantom, a hero, afraid of nothing, recklessly putting himself in danger on a daily basis to save others. He couldn't possibly be afraid of her. She got up, took three big steps around the table until she was right in front of him.
"What are you afraid of," she demanded.
He straightened, and then looked down on her, seemingly reaching some kind of decision, because he stopped fidgeting.
"This," he said, and then he kissed her.
Ha! Who said I can't do romance! Oh wait, that was me...
