How I Fall (42 page)

Cam grins. “Yeah, we did.”

“Considering Laura and I are wearing sweats and hoodies, and that you and Patrick are dressed the same, I feel safe enough. How about you, Laura?” I ask, trying to hide a quick rush of nerves.

Laura shakes her head. “It’s like the wolves leading the lambs to slaughter, if you ask me.”

Patrick laughs. “How about Laura and I work very hard not to kiss each other again?”

“Which will be extra
easy
, since that was a one-time thing!” Laura protests, pulling a face at him.

Patrick goes on, “She and I will watch over you two—
actually dating
—people as chaperones. I don’t really think I can handle you two kissing in front of me so can you please try to keep that at a minimum.” He glares at Cam. “Deal?”

“Patrick, please shut up,” I protest.

Cam’s grinning now. “I promise. None of that. In case my mom wakes up and comes down here—and she probably won’t because she always takes huge sleeping pills every night—I’m going to have to be between both of the girls to be safe. Is that cool?”

Patrick rolls his eyes. “As long as you don’t take selfies and tell lies about how lucky you are, I’ll agree to this madness.”

“Patrick, would you relax? I don’t want to sneak-hold-hands with
your
Laura.”

“I’m nobody’s Laura!”

“Fine.” Cam sighs. “Let’s settle in and do this movie thing because all night long, my own girlfriend has been at my house and I have hardly been able to touch her.” He grins at me. “Ellen, this is the first and last time
that
ever happens.”

I laugh. “I agree. It’s been a strange and terrible torture not to even have held your hand yet.”

“Barfing in my mouth over here,” Patrick adds.

Cam clambers in between me and Laura.

“You’re just jealous because they’re going to hold hands.” Laura sighs, watching Cam take my hand.

Patrick’s staring also while pouting slightly. “Yep. Very. My hand is really cold. The only way it could ever be warm again is if someone from Ireland held it.”

For once, Laura has no comeback, so she flops down and arranges herself into her sleeping bag. I do the same.

Patrick stacks up a bunch of pillows behind all of us and then unzips his sleeping bag so he can get in to it. Cam scoots into his own bag, then grabs the remote controls while Laura and I, now comfortable, share a little smile. Cam switches on the monster-sized flat screen and says, “We’ve got all paid channels as well as Amazon TV. What movie should we watch? Name one.”

“How about…
Ladyhawke?
” Patrick asks. “It’s been such a long time. You guys in?”

“Heck, yes!” I say.

Laura’s eyes get all huge and she smiles dreamily at Patrick. “You know the
Ladyhawke
movie? Did you sneak into my house and read my dairies or something?”

“No.” Patrick shakes his head and settles into his pillow. “It’s like I’ve said all along. Like you’ve said all along. It’s fate.”

“Stop using my words against me.” Laura grimaces.

Cam laughs. “Laura London—she can dish out the fate, but she can’t seem to take it. Will someone tell me what this
Ladyhawke
movie is all about? The title is questionable?” He flips to his side so he can look at all of us.

“I love that title. Says it all.” Patrick laughs, reaching to steal a pillow from Laura, then before she can protest, he moves her whole sleeping bag until his shoulder becomes her pillow. Acting like he hasn’t noticed Laura’s cheeks have turned bright red, he says, “You’ve never seen it? Matthew Broderick from when he was around fifteen? Crazy, synth sounding sound track?”

“Nope.”

Laura leans up on one elbow. “It’s only the
best, most-romantic, most-perfect movie
ever made. Star-crossed lovers.” She wiggles her eyes all big, making all of us smile. “A beautiful woman who’s got a curse that forces her to shape shift into this gorgeous hunting hawk during daylight hours. She sits on the hero’s shoulder, flying over and crying that wee-tragic-little hawk sound.” Laura scrunches up her face and breathes in.

I laugh. “Please don’t try to make the hawk sound. You’ll wake up Mrs. Campbell.”

Laura relaxes her face back to normal. “You know me all, too well.”

“So…the lady is the hawk? What’s the big deal?” Cam asks.

Laura goes on, “Well…of course the hawk doesn’t know the warrior at all. Not really. And the guy—the sexy warrior guy—I should add.” She sighs, clutching her chest and falling back on to Patrick. “He’s devastatingly handsome and he’s got a spell on him, too. He’s this giant, dangerous black wolf—of course only at night. He watches over the woman, keeping her safe. But like the hawk, he’s only a wolf right? So he’s wild and they can’t be together or recognize each other—because before the curse they were very much in love. So
,
” Laura breathes in dramatically, “at the very rise of the sun and the very instant of twilight they can see but not touch each other before they change.”

I grin. “Laura, it sounds so good when it’s told with your accent.”

“I second that. Trigonometry would sound like fun if you called out the equations,” agrees Patrick, tugging at the edges of Laura’s curling hair which makes Laura blush again.

Cam blinks at all of us like we’re mental. “This movie sounds so bad I’m going to die from holding back buckets of vomit. As for you, Patrick? Dude.
Really?
”

I giggle when Patrick shrugs, releases Laura’s hair, and says, “What? It’s not really about the love story. It’s about this thief. Matthew Broderick at his best. I swear.”

Laura goes on, “Cam, you’ll love it. There’s this wicked-gorgeous war horse, and sword fights, and crumbling castles and sweeping landscapes. And the boy-thief that Patrick talked about gets caught in the middle of it all and winds up watching over and speaking for both of them—even though he only wants to escape and be free—he gets caught in the love story as well. You’ll see. It’s great.”

“Don’t make me,” Cam groans, meeting my gaze.

“It’s a perfect movie. I swear.”

“Okay. Okay. I’m only doing this so I can hold your hand, though.”

He holds up the Amazon remote and says, “Ladyhawke.” The voice activated search feature brings up the film right away and he hits ‘play’.

Patrick picks up Laura’s hand and holds it high so we can all see it. “If Cam doesn’t have to hide while he’s holding Ellen’s hand, then I’d like to state my intention is to hold this pretty little hand during the film. With permission?” Patrick asks, lacing his fingers into Laura’s without waiting for an answer. She shakes her head ‘no’ but doesn’t pull her hand away.

This makes Patrick grin over at us and wink, pulling Laura’s hand close to his heart.

As the movie music starts, Cam pulls me next to him and we are cuddling as close as possible! Possibly closer which is simply awesome!

I’m thankful for the darkened room because no one can see just how much I’m blushing. Cam’s got my hands in his, and it’s the middle of the night, and the whole world has suddenly become a mixture of castles, and heartbeats, and pounding horse hooves, and music and soft pillows and this sensation of tingling elation that is the four of us being best friends.

It’s so cool how despite the fact that he and I came from different worlds only days ago, that we are so easy around each other. Like we’ve been close friends for a very long time. For example, I’ve never been snuggled up on a couch with anyone like this in my life! Ever. But it suddenly feels like I’ve already done this thousands of times, and I can’t wait to do it thousands more times.

I’m beginning to believe what Cam always says to me about us.

Maybe this—he and I— are simply meant to be.

He whispers in my ear, raining caramel-scented goose bumps against my temple and down the back of my neck. “Please tell me this crazy-sounding movie has a happy ending at least?”

I sigh, loving how his arms wrap me so safely under his chin and next to his heart.

“It has a very happy ending.”

cam

When I wake, I’m disoriented because I’m not in my bed. Without moving an inch, I glance around. I’m still in the basement—
we’re
all still in the basement
—and I’m still in my jeans and T-shirt from the night before. The storm that raged well past midnight is now completely silent. I wonder if it even happened—if I dreamed last night. But the lump of breathing warmth snuggled against me in a sleeping bag is not part of a dream!

It’s Ellen—
Ellen—
and she’s lying flat on her stomach across my whole chest as though I’m some sort of human mattress. She’s got her cheek pressed against my collarbone, her head is snug up under my chin and she’s angled to the side in a way that has our hearts literally beating within inches of each other through our sleeping bags. She’s breathing deeply like she’s not going to wake up any time soon, so I risk moving my head to stare down at her. From the peaceful expression she’s sporting, I think I must make a comfortable pillow, and wow, she’s so cute with her mouth hanging slightly open.

Her arms are out of the sleeping bag and tangled around either side of me and her long braid has come partially undone. Strands of her silky hair tangle all around both of us, with some of it lying across my face and neck, torturing me with its softness and that flowery shampoo smell I’ve grown to love. As my eyes adjust to the morning a bit more, I note that Patrick and Laura are each wrapped up in their own giant sleeping bags like individual sausages, but snuggled up how Ellen and I are, and seemingly very much together as well.

I breathe in slowly and lower my head back onto the pillow afraid to disturb her.

I know I’ve said it to myself, and even to Patrick once…but right now I feel it…feel it to my core that I’m truly
in love
with this girl. It’s possible I’ve always been in love with her, because this is no insta-love feeling. This is something deeper. Something that has changed me completely because I feel like if I suddenly couldn’t have this feeling anymore, I might actually slowly die.

That has to be why no other girl has ever come close to capturing my attention. Not because I was too busy, and not because I didn’t want them to meet my crap, messed up, endlessly fighting parents, but because the other girls simply weren’t Ellen Foster.

I smooth my cheek against her hair and sigh, thinking how this girl—this kind being—this artistic force—is actually my girlfriend.

Right now, I know I could easily introduce her to my dad and it doesn’t feel scary, or impossible. It feels exactly right and it feels like it might be easy. This is because that conversation is going to be about me and her. Us.

The rest of the world and the obstacles that were keeping us apart seem small and stupid compared to how strong I feel with my arms around her just like this.

I place a soft kiss on the top of her head, and as though the universe wants to play a joke on me, or wants to test my resolve, just as I’m smoothing hair away from her gently flushed cheek and placing a whisper-quick kiss against that mouth twist at the edge of her lip that makes me insane, I look up and my mom is standing in front of the couch, arms crossed, her expression completely pissed off and of course, bewildered!

I put my finger over my lips and shake my head, hoping she doesn’t start shouting and freaking everyone out.

“You—you’re with—why are you with Ellen Foster?”

“She’s my girlfriend, Mom.”

Her eyes go to Patrick and Laura, widening with shock and now anger. Her voice gets louder as she keeps staring at the four of us. “You will meet me upstairs in five minutes. All of you. Five minutes.”

She turns on her heel and stalks out of the basement. Everyone’s moving and waking up now.

“What-who was that?” Ellen mutters.

I hop up and away from Ellen and the others, heading toward the window to check the status of the storm. “Wake up and snow-suit up, you guys! Wait until you see the ice! It’s perfect!”

Ellen opens her eyes, then like me, realizes where she is and who she’s with and what we’re all doing here.

“So you know, I stole the smallest kiss,” I admit, walking back across the room. Her cheeks go completely red.

“Give it back.”

“Later. We have work to do.”

“Stop.” Patrick groans. “I refuse to hear this disgusting cute chatter. It’s killing my manliness.”

Laura laughs, but I can’t see her because Patrick piled five pillows on her as he stood.

Ellen sits up and rubs the sleep from her eyes, breathing out just as she sees the view. “It’s perfect out there. And it’s already melting!”

I grin, glancing at Patrick and Laura who are acting all awkward because unlike us, they’re pretending they
do not
want to kiss each other, but to me it seems pretty obvious that they do.

I head to the stairs. “Come upstairs in exactly five minutes and make a lot of noise.”

“What for?” Laura blinks twice, then shoves her hands into her eyes, rubbing them like a little kid.

“My mom came down here and saw us all paired up—she’s pissed—and by the look on her face she’s not happy we slept together.”

“We didn’t
sleep
together.” Ellen shakes her head.

I smile. “I’ve never slept in the same room with a girl before, but technically—and based on my mom’s freaked out expression—we kind of did. The way she’s acting I have a lot of explaining to do.”

“Yeah but we were just sleeping—not doing anything else!” She flushes double bright. “Right?”