Fallen by Jordan Wadley (freenovel24 .TXT) 📕

I smirked. “So it gets your approval?”

“Yeah, sure.” Max shrugged in indifference, I smiled anyways knowing he thought much more than a simply ‘sure’. He murmured a few words before skillfully pushing himself off of the bed frame and back inside the large closet. After a few seconds of awkwardly standing in the middle of the room, yet still admiring the dress on my body, he emerged from the closet with a pair of ballet flats.

“Will these go with the dress?” He asked trying to keep his eyes from traveling below my eyes. I admired his respect for me, but I also didn’t mind the small twinge in the pit of my stomach when he stared at me that way.

I slipped on the shoes and walked a few feet, steadying myself I gave him a dazzling smile, one in which he returned. “Yep, they’re perfect. Shall we go?” I grinned looping my arms through his masculine ones.

Max caught onto the act and bowed, holding the door open while saying. “My lady.”

I laughed in response and before long, we entered the dining room where just his family was waiting, there weren’t any other people there, which was a relief. HIs mom zeroes in on our linked hands and gave her husband ‘the look’. I took a seat between Khione and Max. There was an empty chair next to Max’ mom, I wondered who sat there. Directing my curiousity to Max I looked back and forth between the vacant chair and his grey lit eyes.

Max shook his head and whispered, “She’ll come later.”

I didn’t get a chance to ask who ‘she’ was because a joyous female came bounding into the room five seconds later. She looked a few years younger than me, maybe thirteen or fourteen years at the most. She looked completely opposite from Khione; being as the female had black hair, similar to the raven bird, and sapphire blue eyes that stood out like diamonds in the night sky. Her figure was petite and slender, her hair glided down the center of her back with a simple braid sticking out in random areas. I wondered how everyone in his family looked so cleaned up and good-looking? Guess I figured out where his genes came from…

“Sorry I’m late mum and dad, I was just out in the woods and I couldn’t figure o-” she stopped mid-sentence as her eyes zeroed in on me. “Who’s that?”

Max’s dad scolded her, “Be polite, Acacia, she’s our guest,” At the same time Khione said, “Max’ girlfriend.”

I felt my mouth pop open again at Khione’s assumptions, all the while the sound of Max choking, yet again, but on an ice cube, could be heard clearly next to me. I thumped him on his back and his cough abruptly stopped, turning into an embarrassed yet weak smile. “Sorry” he grinned sheepishly.

Acacia looked at us, confused. “What?”

I waved at her, laughing nervously. “Hey, my name’s Hanna… and I’m Max’ friend.”

She looked at Max teasingly. “Friend with benefits?”

The poor boy choked on his water. Yep, three choked in less than two hours.

“Acacia!” Max’ mom shouted sternly. “Don’t tease your brother!”

“Heh… sorry mum.” She didn’t look like she meant it at all, and instead shot a wink my way as a small gentle lit her perfectly white teeth. Acacia seemed pretty fun.

“Alright, let’s tuck in!” Max’ dad announced. I suddenly realized I had no idea what their last name was.

I nudged Max and mumbled, “I’m really embarrassed to be asking this, but what’s your last name?”

He laughed. “It’s Thomas. Now you made me curious, what’s yours?”

“Moor. Hanna Moore,” I grimaced. “I hate my name.”He made a sound of indignation. “Why? Your name’s great! It means goddess of life in Hebrew, did you know that?”“Really? Huh.. hey, how’d you know that? Do you just use your spare time to search up people’s names?” I teased.

Max had an innocent expression on his face that was contradictory to what he said next, “I wouldn’t be much of a stalker if I didn’t know that kind of stuff.”

I laughed. “Well, I’m already in your house, there’s no need to stalke me anymore.”

“Our house. From now on, you can come here whenever you want, it’s yours too.” Without giving me a chance to protest, he dug into his food.

I heaped some mashed potatoes, poultry gravy, green beans, a roll, and some steak onto my plate all whle pouring myself some apple juice. The food had to be the best I’ve ever had the chance of tasting, I had never had such a good meal in my entire seventeen years of existence. It wasn’t like my mother could cook in her usual drunken stupor.

When we finished, it was about eight thirty. I found it surprisingly easy to get along with the Thomas family, their incredible humor and caring personality gave me a small taste of what a family really was. A small smile graced my lips at the memory of what I would be returning to when I got home, I honestly didn’t want to leave.

Max pushed his chair back and held a hand out to me, “Wanna go?”

I stood up, latching my small hands into his large warm palms. “Go where?”

“Somewhere...it’s a surprise,” he winked.

Rolling my eyes, I push my chair beneath the table and follow him anyways. We headed up to the purple room and I changed out of my dress after looking around the closet, I let out a sound of dismay. Max knocked on the door immediately.

“Is something wrong?”

“Yeah,” I called back, “I don’t have anything else to wear, my yellow dress is…actually, I couldn’t find it, and everything in here’s too...fancy.”

“Hold on a sec.”

Not a minute later, he knocked again. “I’ve got some clothes for you, can I open the door?”

I twisted the knob open and he stood there with his arm outstretched with a pile of clothes in his hand. His other hand was courteously covering his eyes and his head was turned away. Aw, bless him.

“Thanks,” I took the bundle and slipped into the large T-shirt that went down to my knees. I frowned. Wouldn’t it give his parents the wrong impression if I walked around in their son’s shirt?

I opened the door and when he caught the sight of me, a grin spread across his face. “I like you wearing my clothes.””

I turned pink. “But what about your parents?”

“Eh, it’s okay, but I was wonder...wanna go swimming with me? That way, you have an excuse to wear my shirt over a bathing suit.”

“It’s October, the water will be freezing. You’re practically asking me to commit suicide.

“No, not swimming outside, the indoor pool,” he flicked my nose playfully.

Holy crap, they had an indoor pool too? They were really loaded. “I don’t have a-”

Max held out a handful of yellow fabric. “Here’s a bathing suit.”

Why was he always one step ahead of me? “But...fine, okay.” I sighed.

The first thing I noticed when I put the bikini on was the lack of coverage. I didn’t even own a bikini for God’s sake. The color suited me just fine, but the tiny thing was mostly made of string.

“Max!” I shouted, getting out of the closet.

“Hmm?” He was sitting on the bed with just his swimming trunks on and oh my God, he had a freaking six pack. I saw that while I was checking him out, he was doing the same to me.

I crossed my arms. “Did you choose the bathing suit? Actually, lack of bathing suit would be a better name for it.”

He held his hands up in surrender. “I swear, I didn’t, I justed asked Acacia if she had something that might fit you and she threw it at me so...I didn’t know it was like that… should I be concerned that my little sister owns something like this?”

I threw my hands up. “I don’t know, that’s up to you, but I might as well just go swimming naked! I mean, this barely covers anything!”

He smirked, “I wouldn’t mind if you wanted to go skinny-dipping.”

My cheeks heated up. “Er...I’ve never been skinny-dipping.” The lyrics of Katy Perry’s ‘Last Friday Night’ were bouncing around in my head.

“There’s a first time for everything,” he pulled me out of the room, but not before yanking his wonderful-smelling T-shirt back over my head. I looked at him curiously for a moment.

“I don’t want any other guys checking out my girl.” I could feel my insides turning with those simply words leavin his mouth, but then again I also felt a similar dread. I didn’t know if he’s ever taking anyone else to his house and introduced her to his family. And being almost one hundred percent positive, I was sure that he may have went skinny-dipping with plenty of more interesting girls than myself. Dread and hope continued to battle for who would come out on top. I clasped my small fingers into his hands and let him drag me down the stairs, smiling like a school girl. For today, hope was going to win.

Text: Jordan Wadley
Images: https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&docid=n9mDPxk5RPVAKM&tbnid=jfK6KuN_S1Ge9M:&ved=0CAQQjB0&url=http%3A%2F%2Fkelihasablog.wordpress.com%2Ftag%2Fpoetry%2F&ei=u8xVUqPZCIqqigKnn4GIBA&bvm=bv.53760139,d.cGE&psig=AFQjC
Editing: Rachelle Donaway
Translation: No translation needed
Publication Date: 10-09-2013

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