Chapter 42

Well, dinner went better than we had thought it would go. And the food was also delicious. Amira did the one thing children didn’t want their parents to do which was basically whipping out the photo albums. She showed me a few photos of Calvin from when he was a baby, and, well, he certainly was a cute baby.

Amira sent us away with some food and mentioned having to do this again, only with my parents involved too. On the way home, we kept talking about how well everything went. As we got to my street, it began to pour down rain. Calvin and I rushed to the front porch, partly wet. He helped me inside and placed the food on the counter for me then walked to the front door to let himself out. It then started thundering as well, which startled us both.

“Calvin, is it safe for you to go out in that?” I said after hearing so much thunder.

“Most definitely not,” Calvin admitted, peeping through the side glass panel of the door. I walked over to the other side and looked outside. The street was slowly flooding already. I sighed and locked the front door and turned to look at Calvin.

“You can wait here till the thunder goes away,” I offered and walked away from him.

“Thank you.” He smiled. We both stared at each other for a moment. “Do you have a hairdryer?” he then asked, pointing to his clothes that were quite soaked compared to mine.

“Uh, yes, follow me.” I led the way to the bathroom. I didn’t want him to get sick. Something told me we’d be spending much more time together, and I didn’t want him to get me sick.

“Thanks.” He turned on the hair dryer then closed the door once I was outside.

While Calvin was in there, I decided to quickly change. I slid on the shorts I wore before he came over, then removed the dress and swiftly put on the shirt. I put the dress in the hamper and went to sit down on the bed to slide back on my socks. It was actually quite cold now, and the heaters of this house needed time to work. It barely warmed us up. I walked over to the thermostat and put it at the highest it would work at, but even then, I knew it wouldn’t do much. The only thing that would help was some tea and thick blankets.

“Hey, where’s Madison? Or is it Ines who owns this house?” Calvin asked as he stepped out of the bathroom. He was busy buttoning his dress shirt. Underneath, he wore a white tank that didn’t hide his muscles. Shit, he looked really good.

“It’s Madison, and she’s out.” I cleared my throat and looked down at my phone, continuing the chat I had going on with my mom.

“Judging by the time and weather, she won’t come home soon?” he then asked, walking to my window and looking past the curtains. It seemed worse than it was before, which made me wonder when it would be safe for him to leave.

“I don’t think so. It’s not safe for her or anyone to drive in this weather,” I replied. I sent my mother a last ‘goodnight’ message then locked the phone and got up.

“Yeah, there’s a storm, that’s why it’s pouring here,” he read from his phone then showed me the news update on his screen.

“Shit, I hope the others are okay.”

“If they’re lucky, the storm will head back to the coast,” he said and put his phone away.

“Are you planning to head into work tomorrow?” Calvin then asked, looking at me with those beautiful eyes that just stood out even more in the night.

“Duh.” I said, walking down the stairs with him next to me.

“Well, if this storm is ongoing, and/or if the aftermath is difficult, you might have to work from home,” he pointed out and stopped at the bottom of the stairs.

“Oh, will I be told which it’s going to be?” I looked over at him, walking backwards into the kitchen.

“Yes, I won’t be overseeing your work anymore. Dima will now,” he said. Dima was a nice lady but also quite strict.

“Sounds good.” I turned around and went to put on the kettle.

“What are you doing?” Calvin asked, leaning over the kitchen island.

“Making tea. Want some?” I offered, taking the teabag from the cabinet and waiting for his answer.

“Depends. What sort of tea?” he asked, raising a brow at me.

“I’m making cherry for myself, but we should have more options.” I looked through what we had. I was personally a fan of the fruit flavors, and Madi didn’t drink tea, so fruit was the only options I had.

“Cherry is perfect,” he decided and sat down.

“Okay,” I said.

After making our tea, I put a bunch of cookies in a platter and carried it to the living room. Calvin followed me around like a lost puppy and sat down next to me. I handed him the remote to let him put on a movie and sat back to enjoy my tea and cookies.

Calvin put on a thriller I hadn't seen before and began to sip his tea as well. We were both tucked under our blankets, eyes focused on the screen, though at certain points during the movie, I could feel his eyes on me. At a certain point, I grew very tired and passed out. The weather was just perfect for sleeping, now that the thundering had stopped.

In the morning, I heard soft giggles and groaned, stretching my arms out further. I pulled closer to my pillow—or what I thought was my pillow. Why did my pillow just groan? My eyes widened as I realized what or who it might be. Just as I opened my eyes, I saw Calvin was also opening his eyes and squinted them as he looked at me. I looked over to see the giggles coming from my friends.

“Are you planning on getting off any moment soon?” Calvin looked over at me, brow in an arch.

“Are you planning on letting go of me any moment soon?” I asked, looking over his hand that rested on the small of my back, stopping me from rolling off from him.

“Right,” he muttered and pulled his hand away then looked over at the three who stared at us like owls. “Um, who are these people?” he then asked.

“Ines, Madison, Andre, meet Calvin,” I said as I sat up and pointed out to them all then Calvin.

“Good morning, sunshine,” Ines teased.

“Good morning, everyone.” Calvin sat up, rubbing his eyes, He then ran his fingers through his messy hair. So this was what he looked like when he just woke up. Absolutely handsome. This wasn’t fair.

“I’ll be going. Thank you for letting me stay,” he said politely and got up.

“You’re not going anywhere.” Andre stopped him.

“I picked up breakfast on the way home from Ines’s, so we’ll all have breakfast together and get to know this baby daddy of yours.” Madison held out the bags of food she had picked up from our favorite cafe shop. Or I thought it was from our favorite place.

“You were at Ines’s?” I frowned. I assumed she was with the man she went on a date with.

“After the date, it started pouring down so much I stopped at Ines’s for a while that turned into overnight,” Madison explained, walking to the kitchen and setting up the table for us with Ines’s help.

“Are you comfortable with me staying for breakfast?” he then asked as we slowly walked to the kitchen. I looked over at him and shrugged. He should know my friends in case people would ever ask anyways.

“Sure, we do need it for our cover after all,” I explained, taking a seat between Andre and Ines.

“Do you have any allergies?” Madison wondered.

“No food allergies here,” he answered, taking a sip of his water.

“Okay, we have scones, breakfast burritos, muffins, donuts, and other pastries.” Madison laid out everything, and it looked like a breakfast feast!

“You bought this much for breakfast alone?” Calvin asked before I could.

“Oh no, my girlfriend made all of this for us. We only bought the drinks,” Andre answered, handing me a cup of tea. “Coffee or tea?” He then looked at Calvin who picked the former. Seems like Renata and Andre were official now!

We soon all started to devour our breakfast, and, of course, my friends invited Calvin for breakfast for a reason—to get to know him, though it seemed more like they were interrogating him, but he answered everything openly.