Chapter 2 STRANGE MORNING

Peeling my eyes open after realization spanks me that life doesn't want to take me to the paradise where my loved ones are dancing with angels, I am greeted by the morning sun rays filling the room. So, I am in my room? But... I reckon I falling asleep outside. I blink a couple of times, straining to summon the memories of what seems to have transpired after I drowned in darkness and sorrows last night.

Despite wiggling my head and blinking countless times, nothing tickles my mind. However, some sort of magic must have surely bechanced last night because, one, today I didn't wake up with my eyes sore and still drenched with tears. Unlike the past one week, I also did not spend the whole night hiccuping my throat and lungs out. I slept. Peacefully, presumably. And my morning doesn't feel terrible like the rest of the past mornings.

And this warmth?

I snuggle closer. Taking it all in in a deep breath, and savoring it all. I feel so fresh. So raw. So new. I am not in that paradise I was crying to the heavens to take me to last night, but I am inclined to think that the heaven realized how mean and cruel it has been to me and brought a paradise here to me instead. It feels like I am in a peaceful haven. Wow! What did I do to appease the heavens? Anyway, whatever it is, I want to sample more of this magic- this warmth, this peace. It is all I crave for. All I desire.

"Good morning!" A voice strokes the dilcaye skin between my ear and neck, arousing my hairs and all the nerves in me.

This gender? On my bed?

Am I dreaming or am I really in paradise?

I try to flip around and confront my unsettling dream, but to more bewilderment, that is when I realize I am tightly draped around strong male arms. This isn't a dream. There is also no doubt at all that there is a man under the sheets with me. A very familiar sense of fear spews in me. I swallow hard, holding my breath. This is strange!

And this feeling? This touch? Why does it feel so, so... familiar?

"Lynn?" His voice strokes through my ears again.

Lynn!?

Only one person used to call me that. Only one voice had the magic to make me melt like this. Only one voice has ever had the magic to make me feel this way. But before I can delude myself further and allow the feelings that I buried long ago take control, I turn around, and this time around, he lets me. He allows me to turn freely turn in his sweet embrace, and in a flicker, I am face-to-face with my ex, Liam Morgan Adams. In my bed. My heart skips several beats, and I feel the adrenaline rush tickle down my spine, erupting a catastrophe of mixed feelings. Old feelings, but they feel so raw.

I should blink. I should release the breath I am holding. It probably would be wise to peel myself off his embrace and better still, spring out of bed. But I don't do any of that. On the contrary, I find our eyes engaged in a dialogue that only they can understand. His beautiful blue eyes are glistering with sparkles of iciness and bleeding dominance like always. The spark is still there, so fresh like it it never lost its power on me.

I know life enjoys fucking with me. I know fate relishes screwing me over and over again and again. But what is this? Haven't I had enough? Here I thought that perhaps finally fate decided to send a ray of peace and compensation for how it has continuously and mercilessly wrecked my peace for the longest time. But it seems I was being delusional.

Of all the people, him? Of all the times, now? Really, God? In the midst of all this catastrophes, at my lowest and darkest point, in this quagmire of pains you have drawn me into, you still want to complicate my life further? Why? Why despite taking everything from me I am still being reminded of the ones that I can not have? What is this other sort of curveball that life is throwing at me? Is this another pain beckoning?

I should probably nudge him away now that I know this bitter reality. I have no right being in his arms, but seeing him again after almost two years is bringing back a flood of memories that I can not curb despite my wish to. Both the good times and the bad times and everything between what we had are all flooding in like a river. I thought I had all of these emotions buried and forgotten, but I guess I was wrong. His presence emphasizes on the phrase I never paid heed to at all - that no feelings stays buried forever.

Then again, I might be wrong on this too. Everyone in my situation would feel the exact overwhelming nostalgia in such a situation. Everything is driving me into the depths of insanity. And everything about his presence right now is bringing back all the emotions I was keeping to myself this past days in streams of tears. The pain of everything I have not been able to share with anyone.

The next thing I know, his fingers are kissing away my tears, and I lean in, seeking solace in him as I let it all out. It's wrong, I know. But I need to let this out somehow before it kills me.

"It hurts so much, Liam. I am all alone. I want to die." I whimper between sobs.

"Ssshhh! don't say that, Lynn! I am here, right? You are not alone. You will never be alone!" He assures me in a soothing tone that threatens to lure me into its mockery.

But how cliche can that ever sound? He is here? Why is he even here? How did he even get here?

"I have lost everyone and everything. I am such an unfortunate soul. I just want to..."

Before I can force words past the chuck that is blocking them at the throat, his lips unexpectedly finds mine. I flinch, trying to comprehend what he is thinking right now or what is happening. But my mind is so blank, and the sentiments of his suggestive gesture bleeds what I yearn the most right now.

Once again, I am tickled from my sound sleep by the savage rays of the summer sun scorching my face. I coerce my orbs to peel, though unwillingly. If I could, I would choose to bask in this peace forever. I feel reborn. Totally reborn.

My plump lips were curving up, a beautiful smile urging its way out to add more light to this room, but the screeching sound of the door blocks it up at the throat as the reminder of what has brought about all this sudden glee in the last couple of hours saunters in.

My ex.

I jerk up slowly to avoid irritating my muscles further, and curl up under the duvet.

All the memories of what we just did this morning flows in, tickling my head with a rhapsodic bang of all sorts of sentiments. It was a moment of weakness, but it brought about all the old feelings and cravings like we never stopped loving each other. It pulled us off a cliff of the rapture of emotions and tossed us into a heap of unquenchable desires. The spades were so strong, threatening to consume us into ashes if we dared to curb them. We submitted our all. It was a moment of pure euphoric pleasure. We swam to the moon and explored cloud nine. It was surreal. It was magical. It was terrific. A beautiful sweet sin!

That thought alone hangs a very heavy curtain of flown on my face, kicking aside this basket of glee aside, and diving into an ocean of knocking sentiments, and so many questions. I am not really justifying myself, but maybe I can, and say that given my situation, it was alright for me to forget about my morals and dignity for a short moment. It was alright for me to feel all that strong desire; the burning heat of affection in the midst of this quagmire might have lured me to drown it all. It was okay for me to surrender myself like that, especially because I had been in dry land ever since he left, and him showing up at the exact moment of confusion and hopelessness topped it all.

But him? Why did he succumb to that temptation? Why did he let that happen? Why did it feel like he was lost in that sin with me? Why did he ignite that fire to start with? I understand that temptations such as that could be hard to resist sometimes, but he is married for crying out loud! That alone should have knocked his sixth sense!

Gawking intently at him, I browse the layers of his eyes one by one, searching through them, hoping to try and understand why he allowed himself to fall into that clustered rapture of sinful pleasures with me-searching for any tinge of remorse, or regrets about what we have done. I try to read his eyes, like I did back then. He doesn't object my mission, and I dive into his beautiful pools, dancing through their intense sparks that threaten to cage me into them forever.

A decade of pure lull and scrutiny goes down, but I still can't find what I am searching for. Nothing close to regrets. If there is anything I decipher from his glue-some orbs, it's the unfamiliar curtain that has cloaked that magical glitter they always had. And his face... that signature charming smirk he always wore isn't there anymore. I haven't seen it since I woke up to his strange presence this morning, but maybe he is saddened by the state he found me in. But... back then, he had it on despite anything. Does my situation worry him this much, or did something change over the time?

"I made breakfast." He utters, his eyes still holding mine.

I discharge a breath, breaking the stare challenge, or so I thought, because I find myself gazing back into them again.

"I don't recall knowing you as someone who could set foot in the kitchen." I state, and it's the truth.

He urges a slight grin as he speaks, shifting in his posture.

"Well. That was back then. I am different now." He says in a tone that doesn't sound so good to me. And him evading my gaze tops my curiosity.

Of course, he is different. He is married. But shouldn't that be more reason as to why he hates the kitchen? Or maybe I am getting it all wrong.

"What changed?" My sincere intent was to mind my own business, but the curiosity is itching me in a way I can not explain