Sparks Fly

::Alex::

My favorite thing after coming home for the first time after a long tour was being able to sleep late in my own bed. Unfortunately, due to my internal clock being all kinds of messed up, just before ten in the morning, my body decided it had enough sleep and I was wide awake.

My eyes fluttered open slowly and I looked over at the sleeping figure curled up next to me. Memories from the night before came flooding back and I smiled to myself as I gently pushed some of the hair out of my girlfriend's face.

My girlfriend.

Brook was officially my girlfriend and while this made me incredibly happy, it also scared the shit out of me. I was no good at relationships but I'll be dammed if I fuck this up.

Suddenly realization came over me as my eyes focused on the alarm clock next to my bed that read 10:04. Brook was supposed to get up super early to go home and get ready for work. She was really late and it was going to be all my fault for convincing her to stay late night.

"Brook," I whispered softly, nudging her leg gently with my foot. "Brook, it's late."

She shifted a bit in her sleep but not enough to convince me she was awake.

"Shit," I said louder this time. "Brook!"

This time she shot up like a rocket and thankfully I moved back when I did or she would have slammed her head into mine.

"What's wrong?" she asked, sort of looking at me like I was crazy.

I gestured to the clock on the night stand behind her.

"You're late for work! I'm so sorry! It's my fault. I should have let you go home when you wanted to," I panicked.

Immediately the sleep in her eyes turned to something else and a smile spread across her lips.

"I'm not working today," she said.

I felt my face twist into a confused look.

"You're not? But I thought so said last night that-"

She cut me off with a kiss.

"I called in about seven this morning and told them I had a terrible headache and I wasn't going to make it in."

My eyes widened. "You lied?"

She bit her bottom lip, something I was beginning to notice she did when she got nervous or embarrassed, as her cheeks turned slightly pink.

"Not my proudest moment but after going to bed at four in the morning and having my alarm go off at 5:45 to get home and get ready, my head hurt a little from the lack of sleep, so I just went with it."

"Who knew you were such a badass," I smirked before pressing a kiss to her lips.

"Listen, my entire career I've never used a sick day before. Except when I had the surgery but that doesn't count because if you guys would have let me, I would have gone to work."

"You had perfect attendance every year in school, huh?"

"Don't be a jerk,” she said, rolling her eyes and shoving me lightly.

"I'm not being a jerk," I laughed, capturing her tiny hands in my larger ones so she couldn't shove me again. "But I'm right, right?"

She glared at me for a second before a smirk broke on her face and she nodded.

"Every year since Kindergarten except for Third Grade when I was out for a few days because I'd gotten the Chicken Pox."

"Did you get a certificate each year?"

She laughed. "You bet. I'm sure my mom still has every single one of them somewhere. They used to be framed around the house."

"Were you the kid who got a lot of awards like that? Did your parents need a whole room to display your achievements?"

She laughed again. "Not really. I had a few things but my brother was the gold star growing up. He played every sport imaginable and was the star player on each team. Our basement became more of a shrine to him than me."

I tried not to show much emotion on my face but every time Brook spoke about her brother it made me feel a little bit sad. It seemed like they have such a great relationship and makes me wonder if my brother and I would've ever been like that.

"You okay?" she asked, giving my hands a small squeeze from where they were trapped in mine still.

"What?" I cleared my throat, realizing I hadn't said anything in a few seconds. "Yeah. Sorry. I spaced for a second. I was thinking about my dogs," I lied.

"Where are those little guys? I kind of miss them."

I smiled a little. "They're actually at my parents' house now. I'm going to pick them up in a little bit."

She nodded slowly. "I thought they were with your ex-girlfriend's?"

"They were. She dropped them off with my parents a few days ago because she was going up to New York for a few days for work."

"What does she do? It seems like she travels a lot for her job. Is she into music too?"

"No, she's not into music," I said, wishing to change the subject.

This felt awkward and forced and I did not like it.

Brook nodded, realizing I didn't want to talk about Lina anymore.

"So, it's your first official day home. What do you want to do?"

"Well, when I thought you were going to be working all day, my plan was to go visit my parents and pick up the dogs and rot on the couch playing video games until you got home."

"And now that I’m a rebel and called in sick to spend the day with you, what do you want to do?"

I tilted my head to the side and pretended to think.

"Well, the X-Box does have two controls."

She shook her head, that adorable giggle I'd fallen in love with passing through her lips.

"Not a chance, my dear."

"Oh! I know," I said a little too excited. "Pizza! You can teach me how to make pizza."

She looked up at me a little surprised. "Really? I was just kidding that day when I-"

I shook my head. "No. Really. I really want to learn. I think it will be fun."

She smiled, leaning forward and kissing me quickly. "Okay. Sounds like a plan."

"Awesome," I said, dropping her hands from mine and jumping up from the bed. "Let's go!"

She looked at me confused from where she sat in the middle of my bed.

"Where?"

"To get my dogs, silly," I said, digging through my drawers for any kind of clean clothes to change in to until I did laundry.

"At your parents' house?" she asked, looking about five seconds away from throwing up.

"Well, yeah? You don't have to come in. I was just going to run in, say hi, grab the dogs and split."

"Alex!" she gasped. "You haven't seen your parents in a month. You can't just run in, say hi and grab the dogs and split."

"Well, I sure as shit can't leave you in the car while I visit with them for a while."

"No. Of course not."

"And judging by the extra paleness to your face, I'm thinking you're not coming in with me..."

She nodded. "I've been your girlfriend for less than twenty-four hours. I am so not ready to meet the parents yet."

I let out a sign of relief. I certainly wasn’t ready for her to meet my parents yet either.

"So what's the plan?"

She climbed off my bed and walked towards me.

"How about you go see your parents and I'll go home to shower, change and get everything we need to make the pizza and then just call me when you're on your way back here and I'll meet you."

"Perfect," I said. "But there's one thing I have to do first."

"What's tha-"

Before she could get the entire question out, I lightly grabbed her face between my hands and crashed my lips against hers.

She seemed surprised by it for a second before she reacted and began to kiss me back. She leaned up on her toes and wrapped her arms tightly around my neck.

I'd gotten lost somewhere in the kiss and almost lost all sense of time. At some point I began backing Brook towards my bed and before I knew it I was holding my body over hers and it seemed like we never once broke from our kiss.

My hands gripped her waist and eventually made their way under my sweatshirt and the t-shirt she was wearing and I felt her shudder underneath me when my hands came into contact with her bare skin.

"Cold hands," she managed to mumble into the kiss and I smiled a little.

"Sorry," I said, removing my lips from hers, earning a soft moan of protest from Brook.

A second later I replaced my lips on her neck and this time I got a soft moan of something else from her.

Her fingers tangled in the hair at the back of my head and she tilted her head all the way to one side to give me all the access to her neck that I needed.

"A-Alex," she breathed my name, sending me into a frenzy.

"Hmm?" I replied, my lips and tongue working her neck.

"D-Don't leave a mark," she said, a strangled moan escaping her throat as I moved my attention behind her ear.

"What?" I asked confused.

She held my head a little tighter and pulled me away from her neck so we were making eye contact.

"I can't walk into work with a bunch of marks on my neck," she said.

I nodded slowly as I began to realize what she was getting at.

Hickeys.

"Right. Okay. You got it," I nodded, before bringing my lips back down to hers.

She giggled a bit into the kiss and wrapped her arms tightly around my neck, pushing her entire body up against mine.

Some time passed as our lips and tongues continued to move in sync with each other’s. Brook kept pushing her body up into mine and about when she tangled her legs around mine, it felt like my entire body was on fire.

Suddenly things down south began to stir and I jumped back.

"What's wrong?" she asked quickly.

Her cheeks were a little flushed and her lips a little swollen.

"N-Nothing," I shook my head, moving to sit next to her and playing with my comforter a bit so it ended up over my lap.

"Okay," she said slowly, eyeing me.

"I'm sorry," I said giving her knee a squeeze. "I just uh- didn't want to get distracted. We have things to do."

"Right," she nodded slowly and she looked like she was holding back laughter.

"What?" I asked, raising my eyebrow.

She bit her lip. "Did you want to go take a cold shower or..."

My eyes practically popped out of my head and my cheeks were fire from how hard they flamed.

"I uh- what?"

She didn't say anything. She just let her eyes slowly shift to my lap where I was tightly gripping the blanket. By the time her eyes moved back to mine, she was biting back more laughs.

"I'm sorry," was all I could say when I realized she knew what was going on.

"It's okay." She said and I could tell she was really struggling not to laugh.

"For fucks sake, Brook, just laugh. I don't want you to explode."

She laughed a little and shook her head.

"I'm sorry. Really. It's okay. It's flattering actually."

“I feel like I’m fourteen,” I grumbled, holding my face in my hands as I shook my head

"It's really not a big deal, Alex," she said, getting serious and pulling my hands away from my face. "I actually really appreciate the fact that you stopped instead of trying to go further."

"Yeah..." I nodded. "I'm still really sorry."

"Don't be silly, Alex. If we're going to do this whole boyfriend and girlfriend thing, we're going to have to become one-hundred percent comfortable with either other, right?"

"I guess you're right," I shrugged.

“I’m always right,” she said, leaning forward and kissing me lightly.

I smiled a little. "Thank you for not running scared."

"Believe me, if I was going to run scared, I would have already."
***

Notes

Story title: Taylor Swift - Sparks Fly
Chapter title: Ashlee Simpson - Better Off

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