AIDEN


    All the while as I moved around the room, I could feel her gaze following my every move and for some twisted reason, it made me smile. It warmed my heart that she was looking at me and not just outrightly ignoring me.


    As I closed the drawer and started to walk to the door, her words stopped me.


    "You cane sleep here."Text property ? N?vel(D)ra/ma.Org.


    My heart started an instant marathon race. Did I just hear right?


    I turned to her. There was something in those beautiful eyes as they focused on me. Guilt? Pity? I couldn''t ce my finger on it.


    She was seated in the center of the bed, the nket draped over her lower half. She hadn''t gone to bed yet her hair was already a beautiful mess.


    She probably h had a shower, I thought. She looked cleaner and fresher than she did when I left the room and her hair wasn''t bond in that lose ponytail they had been in since the challenge.


    She must have realized that I was staring too much because, she looked away before she turned back to me with her eyes widened a fraction. Then she stammered, "...I don''t mean here.” I followed her movements as she gestured to the bed. Then she pointed at the couch few feet from me. "There,"


    "It''s okay," I said without thinking and I wanted to give myself a good beating for that. It wasn''t okay!! would do anything to get in that bed with her right now. Infact, if I had to remain here and be in the same room with her I would.


    Thankfully, she insisted.


    "No, please," she shook her pretty head before her brows came down in an adorable frown, “I wonder


    that room is."


    She was worried for me, I thought happily even though I was aware that it was just the way Ana was. She would have said the same to someone else but it still mattered that she wasn''t scowling at me or giving me a cold shoulder like the first time we saw again.


    "Since it''s a spare room," she continued, "a dark one at that, it''s probably not been cleaned in a while. It''s not healthy to stay in a dusty room."


    She surprised me when she finished speaking and immediatelyid down on the bed and pulled the nket over her head.


    I gazed at her for a while, a smile slowly forming on my lips.


    “I wanted to yell in utter joy: I returned to the drawer and returned what I had taken from it.


    My body trembled with excitement as I left the room and literally ran through the hallway. With the big smile on my face and the spring in my steps, you''d think I was moving to heaven. Even if there was no couch and the cold floo


    would be what I''d have to manage then so be it. I''d sleep anywhere as long as I


    remain close to her.


    As I pounded down the stairs, I wasn''t aware that I was making any noise. How could I when all the voices in my head where jubting. The lodge keeper peeked out of his door that was after the stairs, and asked, “Who''s there? Oh Aiden. Are you alright? Is there a problem?”


    anything


    "It''s all good," I think I muttered back. Either that or something else. Or maybe I didn''t even say a back. I wasn''t sure. I was too excited and eager to return to Ana that I couldn''t register anything else. Pulled the door to the dark room open. I walked straight to the bed where I had kept them. In truth, the room wasn''t dusty or uncleaned. I assumed that it was always cleanef everyday by the lodge''s cleaners but Ana didn''t need to know any of that. To her, the room was probably dusty and that was it. I wasn''t about to duspite that and lose my chance of being in the same room with her.


    I strongly believed it was a start; a tiny step toward our reconciliation.


    ran down the hallway, almost tripping over the nket I gathered clumsily in my arms.


    I think I took about four steps at a time as I climbed up the stairs. My strides were long, swift and purposeful, on a mission to take me to the ce where I could breathe the same air as Ana


    without any


    interruption or distraction. Just the both of us.


    I slowed down when I approached the room. I took a deep breath. I bundled up the sheets in my hands so they would look a little bit neater.


    Then slowly, I pushed the door open.


    I felt a pang of dissapointment when I saw that the nket was still over her head. She was asleep.


    I resisted the urge to walk over and listen to her soft breathing as she slept or gaze down at her stunning features because that would be creepy so I just made my way to the couch, prepared it to be morefortable and settled in it, content.


    With a smile on my lips, I quickly drifted to sleep.