Eighty Five

Sleep didn’t come to her that night, and all she could do was toss and turn until she had to stand up and walk to the window. She couldn’t believe herself in all these chaos, she was thinking about Tyler, and the heart-wrenching kiss he had given her. 

Right now, she wasn’t sure whether to be grateful to Cain for showing up at the burger place when he did that day because that was the only reason Tyler had kissed her. 

The tension between them had been so thick and heavy, like it could be sliced through with a knife, but Tyler had never done anything to it until then, because of that. He had kissed her just to make him jealous, and she loved every bit of it.

That made her realize that if she ever wanted something to happen between them, maybe she would have to initiate it, maybe that was the only way. 

“Don’t be stupid, Raina. He’s probably going to push you away.” One of her said, maybe it was her heart or brain, she wasn’t sure. 

“You don’t know that, and you’ll never know until you try.” Another of her said. 

Raina adjusted the strap of the camisole she was wearing and rubbed her arm as she stood there by her window, looking out into the clear sky. It was a bit chilly, but she didn’t feel it enough to hide under the blanket. 

Locking her dry lips, she walked back to her bed and sat on the edge of it. She grabbed her phone from the bedside table to see it was eleven twenty eight, and she sighed, rubbing her temple. 

Soon, she decided to text her sister and see if she was still up. If she was, they would talk about this thing bothering her, and if not, they would talk tomorrow. She started to type out her message, doing that first so that she would pick out her sister’s name from the contact list when she was ready to send. 

She was doing a normal text because that was what Dena preferred. Dena was weird that way, and she was the only one she knew who preferred a particular type of message to the normal chat everyone preferred. 

Everyone had what they liked and preferred anyway, so she never complained about it. She started to him a song as she typed the message and she must have been so distracted when she wanted to pick out the name that she typed in Tyler instead of Dena. 

She had just clicked on the send button when her brain told her what she had just done, and she gasped. This wasn’t funny. This was bad. 

She stared down at the message with her mouth wide open, and her eyes huge in her face. “Oh shit!” she whispered, reading what she had just sent out loud. 

“SOS, D. I think my heart and body all together have gone rogue, and are now acting on their own without listening to my brain. Why does he have to be so yummy, especially that butt of his? Right now, I can’t even sleep because I’m thinking about him, and that kiss he gave me that day at the burger place. I know I haven’t told you about it, but I couldn’t because of all the nonsense that happened with Mr. Fletcher. Have I gone mad? I mean, what happened should be enough to keep me from thinking about all the things I want him to do to me, but here I am…” 

Oh God!

Somebody better shoot her right now. 

She dropped the phone on the bed and used both her hands to cover her face. She had just sent the message that was meant for Dena to Tyler, something she could have avoided if she hadn't been so dazed by the thoughts of him.

Raina sat frozen, her hands still covering her face as her mind raced. “What have I done?” she thought, her stomach twisting into knots. She peeked through her fingers at the phone, as if it might somehow undo what she had sent.

Her heart pounded so loudly she was sure it could be heard from outside. 

Dena’s name was four lettered words, and it starts with a D, while his name was five lettered words, with a letter T. They couldn’t have been more distinct from each other, could they?

“What should I do now? What if he sees that?” she asked herself. 

“For sure, he’s going to know the message is about him, isn’t he?” she asked herself but she had no answer. What was she going to do now? It was late so he was probably asleep, so it was possible that he wouldn’t see the message until morning, and she could come up with a decent excuse by then, but she just couldn’t be too sure. 

What if she snuck into his room and get to his phone, delete the message before he could see it? But she knew Tyler was a light sleeper. At least, a lot of veterans were, so he would probably catch her. But what were the odds that she would be caught? Plus, she wouldn’t even know if she didn’t try. 

But, she couldn’t move. 

She sat there just looking at her phone on the bed, unable to think of something else to do. 

Raina sat there for what felt like forever, staring at the phone as if it might explode anytime from now. Her thoughts were a tangled mess and they seemed to be all over the place. She couldn’t let him read that message. There had to be something she could do. But nothing made sense right now. 

Every plan she thought of ended with Tyler knowing, and that was the last thing she wanted.

Finally, she took a deep breath and whispered to herself, “Okay, I’ll sneak into his room. I’ll delete it before he even knows it’s there.” It wasn’t the smartest idea, but it was the only one that didn’t involve her dying of embarrassment if he saw that message.

Oh God! She grimaced as she thought of going there, but there was no other choice now. She knew she had to stick with this one if she wanted to get rid of that text. 

She stood up and glanced down at what she was wearing; her camisole and a pair of loose shorts. Definitely not decent for sneaking into someone’s room in the middle of the night. If she got caught, she would look ridiculous. 

She sighed and walked to her closet, rummaging around until she found her two-piece pajamas. They were soft, plain, and thankfully modest enough.

As she changed, she hesitated when it came to her underwear. “Should I wear the cotton granny panties?” she muttered, asking herself as she pulled them out of the drawer. Then she rolled her eyes at herself. “It’s not like he’s going to see it, anyway. This isn’t some rom-com where I fall over and… no, just stop thinking about that.” 

She put the pajamas on just as she was, smoothing down the top and adjusting the waistband of the pants. Standing in front of the mirror, she gave herself one last look. “You’re just going in, deleting the message, and getting out. Easy.” 

Thankfully, her hair was in a bun so it wasn’t going to get in the way, so yeah, easy. 

But her stomach churned as she said it. It didn’t feel easy at all.