The early dawn sun radiated lackadaisically onto my back, gently lapping its warm rays against my coarse, sunburnt skin.
Cool morning air rushed transiently against my cheeks in sprays. The quickly waning summer breeze kindly lavished its precious remnants upon us.
"I feel like I could float away," I exhaled faintly, tanned, peeling arms wrapped snugly across Chase's neck.
"That'd make things a whole lot easier for me," the strawberry blonde replied jokingly, his own willowy toned arms reaching backwards, wrapped securely around the back of my knees for safety.
"If I'm heavy, I'll get down," I replied carelessly, ready to relinquish the piggyback stance I held on his sturdy back.
"No," he retaliated with certain finality, "I like you just the way you are."
Confusion. "I didn't ask about that," I questioned aloud, eyebrows furrowed, "and I don't care what you think either."
"Good," he purred leisurely, his word drawling out at the o's, "because I don't care."
"Okay. Because I wasn't going to get down anyway." I smiled wickedly, and he smiled that crooked half smile that encapsulated a butterfly metamorphosing in its cocoon. His smile captured the hopefulness of an innocent child on Christmas morning the millisecond they've just woken up.
I rested my chin on his indented shoulder; jaw fitting perfectly into the cavity between his shoulder joint and his neck. Chase smelled like orange-spiced tea; he smelled like vanilla beans and coconut meringue cake. He smelled like comfort and home and fearless adventure.
"I've been thinking a lot about what love means," I told him, chin pressing like feathers against his collarbone, sending vicious tickles through his system. He struggled to suppress them.
"What did you find?" he finally replied languorously; eyebrows raised in interest.
Cobalt blue hair and electrifyingly cat-like amber eyes flashed through my mind like a bright lightning bolt. Haphazard flames rose dangerously, dancing higher and higher in a battle to the death, finally coming to settle on the carpenter's bandana. Luke smiled at me the way he always did, cheerfully lonely eyes crinkling up at the sides. The crinkles: mountains with wide horizons in between. Our previous haunting conversation replayed in the back of my mind like a vinyl player. "I don't know. I've been told it means, 'Don't leave me here alone.'"
"Hm."
The sound of Chase's sandaled feet trudging onward was our only accompaniment for the next minute. Worn leather against sandy gravel. Sandpaper against skin.
"Welcome to the bachelor pad," Chase uttered sarcastically, violet eyes rolling at his own words. I jumped off his back; plopping squarely on the latte coloured wooden flooring that crosshatched his house. I laughed inwardly at how impossibly cozy his house was, and how extremely on the other end of the spectrum it sat from 'bachelor pad.' "This looks more like my grandmother's house," I giggled conclusively, rough fingers settling on my flushed lips in thoughtful admiration.
"Hey." His elbow nudged gently against my side in mock offence, forcefully shifting my weight over to my bent leg.
He sauntered over leisurely to his kitchen counter, tapping his fingers into a rhythmic gallop. He lapsed into pondering silence, feline fingers grazing his angular jawline in heavy thought.
"Bouillabaisse."
Uneven silence coated us, my eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Chase smirked silently. "I'm going to teach you how to cook bouillabaisse," he finally clarified, granting me absolution from my bewilderment.
Minutes were lost in feather-light 'accidental' grazing of hand against hand, skin against skin. Fingers dancing over an arm, an arm reaching over a shoulder. Careless closeness.
"Tell me something," I murmured; commanded.
"Like what?"
"Anything. Anything interesting. But don't waste my time with small talk."
Chase stared intently down on the simmering soup, the angle of his wrist against the wooden ladle he held forming a dainty sight. Forty-five degrees. Cocked where the bone in his wrist jutted out and the tanned skin pulled taut.
"I'm drawn to things that are bad for me."
Visions of him inhaling slowly on snow-white cigarettes sprung to mind. "And what about me then?" I half teased, half asked in genuineness, "So I'm bad for you too?"
"Actually," Chase replied, never relinquishing his critical gaze on the boiling bouillabaisse, "for the first time in a long time, I've found something that's good for me."
My heart was made of porcelain. Chaste white. Intricate powder blue china patterns running alongside where the veins lay. Coated in a sheen of faded gloss. If you asked what lay inside, I couldn't tell you.
Chase took a hardened chisel to it. Slowly, he was cracking the porcelain open.
"And what about you?" He wondered, violet eyes shimmering with flecks of gold – my own amber eyes reflected in his. "Something interesting about you. Although pretty much everything that leaves your lips is interesting." A soft chuckle.
"I think love means enjoying your solitude," I started, calloused fingertips tracing along his pale wooden kitchen counter, thick hair falling into my face – strands of chocolate, "but liking someone's company more than it."
He observed me silently, eyes stony in heavy contemplation. "How romantic," he joked in his trademark sarcasm; like honey dripping down the grooves of a honeycomb.
"Please," I scoffed, lapsing into my philosophizing, "I'm every bit as much a romantic as the next girl. But I'm also a realist."
"A realist, huh?"
"A realist. And you know the difference between a romantic and a realist?" His strawberry blonde hair spun foggy images in my head – it reminded me of strawberries and cream and melting caramel. Saccharine sweetness.
"A romantic hopes that love will last forever," he replied for me, fluid fingers running through his honeyed hair, pushing the three bobby pins holding his fringe back further into place. The fork marks on the surface of peach cobbler. "A realist knows that it won't."
"Exactly," I shot back, heart fluttering, pink lips pulled back to reveal my teeth in all their unabashed glory. A sleepy smile awakening. "I'm tired of soup. Let's make dessert."
His perfect eyebrow raised in amused surprise. He didn't miss a beat. "What would you like to make?"
I eyed his hair openly, observing how the ends grazed lithely against his mint green collar. "Strawberry cream rolls," I mused.
"Alright, princess," Chase laughed lowly, opening his cupboards to draw out his baking utensils, "you'll be in charge of the dessert."
"Your hair reminds of strawberry and cream," I told him as I landed my feet next to his, "and butterscotch too."
"You want to eat my hair?" he asked, eyes crinkling at the sides in wild amusement.
"No, silly," I reprimanded lightly, "but it makes me think of the things that are good in the world." I threw some ripe strawberries into a bowl, along with some flour and eggs. "But even the best things in the world can't last forever."
"You don't believe love lasts?"
"It's a paradox, isn't it? You keep waiting to see if it lasts, but then you don't really know whether you're still in love or you're just waiting it out till the end." I added creamy butter into the mix before proceeding to stir. "What about you?"
"I don't know. I'll need to see it to believe it."
"So you don't, then," I replied, letting my hand fall into his. His fingers clasped around mine, like uncertainty looking for a rock to hold onto.
"I might," he countered, bringing our intertwined hands to his cherry lips. "I'm waiting until I'm sure, though." He pressed a soft kiss on the back of my hand; lingering. "I'll let you know then."
As gradually as summer fades into autumn, so was the porcelain of my heart chipping away.
We lapsed into comfortable silence, hands never breaking apart. Basking in domestic tranquility. In dangerous coziness.
"Ta da," I deadpanned sarcastically, plating up my mediocre looking strawberry cream rolls. The juxtaposition with Chase's perfectly presented bouillabaisse only served to highlight the unevenness of the pale pink dessert.
"Looks great," he joked, one side of his lips tugging up smugly. His svelte hands went to cut a piece of the strawberry cream roll, swiftly bringing it to his lips and completely ignoring his shining bouillabaisse.
"What're you doing?" I asked in confusion, as I heaped a huge spoonful of his aromatic concoction into my mouth. "And this is amazing, by the way."
"What does it look like, silly? I'm eating the food you made."
"But why? Yours probably tastes a lot better," I conceded, eyeballing the velvety pink mess sitting on the coffee table, "Trust me."
"Because," he started, propping his legs over mine where we sat on his ivory couch, one foot tucked in contentedly under my thigh, "I'm starting to think love means... Wanting to cook for someone for the rest of their life, but wanting to eat their cooking for the rest of yours. Even if yours tastes better."
"You know, Chase," I smiled, resting my wrist on his bent knee, glittering night sky gleaming in through the window, "you're iridescent."
He sat up abruptly, face finding mine swiftly in the dim moonlight.
"Dang, Molly," he whispered, landing one hand gently on my cheek, the other lacing its fingers with mine, "I might have to tell you sooner than I thought." He pressed his forehead against mine, fingertips grazing my soft jawline. His breath blew wisps of warmth against my skin.
"Don't say it tonight," I hurried out in hushed tones, praying for the night not to shatter. "Not yet."
"I won't," he promised, fingers caressing the back of my neck.
"You're the best thing I've found in a long time too," I finally confessed in the tinkling quiet, pressing my cheek against his collarbone in bared vulnerability. He ran the back of his fingers along my spine – water droplets traveling deliberately down a windowpane. "You're good for me."
"Good."
I stayed wrapped in his arms, only the sound of our synchronized breathing and the movement our breath created to accompany us. The night covered us in its blanket of deep purple.
It takes years – a lifetime – to let your heart gradually hide itself within coat after coat of fine china; for beautiful etchings to paint themselves onto the final layer.
To let a heart constructed out of first-grade porcelain be slowly chipped away, jagged shard by jagged shard, not knowing what lies underneath.
Not knowing whether you can bear what is underneath.
That is love.
Author's Note: I'm so sorry for the extremely long hiatus! I won't go into the gory details, but I'm trying to get back into the swing of things so please bear with me. Hope you enjoyed this chapter, please review/like/follow and let me know what you think!