His fingers are hot and every touch of it against my skin feels like it'll burn. He will burn and he's taking me with him. With every stroke of his lips against mine, a fire inside me I didn't know existed started to ignite.
And what we were doing was wrong in every sense. Kissing Pierce was wrong in a hundred different ways.
"Say you want it Harriett"
He mutters in between our kisses with a shaky breath and my legs feel wobbly as he holds them in place. Right around his waist. My back driven against the walls of my apartment as his hands grasp the exposed skin on my waist. Holding them like it's his tether to reality or maybe insanity.
I gasped when I felt his hands tightening its grip around my waist. His eyes bore into me as he waits for me to release the words he had been waiting to hear since earlier.
His eyes were piercing right through me like his name and it made my words die down right at my throat, afraid to come out.
We had been talking, like how we normally do when it's the weekend and I had decided not to go home. He visited me with food and we watched a movie, our normal routine. Until I brought up Josiah, our date, and what I had concluded about my feelings.
Within seconds Pierce was staring at me seriously, a tension rippling between us for a moment before he stood up and knelt on the sofa, pushing me on the edge of it and back to the wall. I had thought he was fooling around until his fingers found my hair tie untangling my hair from it, pulling my head back before his lips found mine.
And every rational sense inside my mind went haywire. As I felt his lips moving, tasting me. As his hands found my skin and all I could feel was this burning sensation. And I can't deny it, Pierce's kiss was different, satisfying and yet it felt like hunger. Like I was being starved of something that only him could give me.
But a small part of sanity got hold of me.
"Want what?"
I muttered with soft breaths as I stared at his face. At his face that was now flushed red. He's blushing all over and I can't help but stare at it. At his handsome face that had made girls cry before.
"Us"
That made my eyes widened as my hands flew towards his shoulder. I pushed him just enough for both of us to have some space.
"What?"
I asked confusedly, every cell in body going rigid when I saw the defeat in his eyes. In the way his body slackened as he put me back down the sofa.
"Love, Rosie"
He said timidly, for a second I couldn't understand what he meant until I realized what it was. Understood what exactly it was that's happening between us right now.
I pushed him lightly before standing up from the sofa. My legs instantly found some strength to walk far away from him. I heard the rustle and found him standing but not daring to walk towards me.
"What do you mean you're in love with me? Since when? How?"
I asked, my eyes stinging and my whole body agitated from what he had just told me. Because that's what this is. Love, Rosie is about two childhood friends who were torn apart by circumstances. They both realized they loved the other one with a drastically ugly timing.
And that's what we are right now.
Pierce just stood there staring at me like he had never seen me before. I shook my head.
"Pierce answer me!"
I cried out and that seemingly brought him back to his senses as he walked towards me, closing our distance just by an inch.
"Your graduation, when you sat there staring at your dogtag talking about Leonel"
That's why he broke up with his girlfriend. That's why he never had another one eventhough he would normally have a reserved one.
"You were waiting"
I muttered, not a question but a statement to what he had done this past few months. Never leaving me alone, always picking me up, making sure I am okay, worrying about me, bringing me food and caring for me more than he should have. Protecting me from his family and fighting them because he didn't want to stay away from me.
It wasn't because he didn't want me to be alone and not out of guilt. He did all of those things because he loves me.
"So why now?"
I asked as he placed his forehead on mine like how he had always done when he's tired or frustrated.
"Because I can't let you be another man's woman. I want you Harriett, I love you"
The tears that had been threatening my eyes finally fell when I heard the strain in Pierce's voice. I had never heard him sound so defeated. Sound so weak. This was the version of Pierce that I had never seen before. A whole new piece of him that he was laying on my feet.
I want to hug him, to tell him that it's not like that but I can't because I can't lie to myself. I care for Josiah just as much as I care for Pierce.
"Kael, I had just made peace with my feelings for Josh. Please don't do this to me"
He let out a sigh as he stared at my eyes. He placed a kiss in between them before pulling me into a hug.
"Then choose Harriett"
Choose?
"You can love Josh and be with him, but I can't handle seeing you love another man so I'll get out of your life…"
At his words I felt myself panicking. He'll get out of my life? Why? I squirmed inside his embrace but he only tightened it.
"Or, you can choose me and let Josh go. I will love you forever, protect and make you happy."
"Why?"
My tears fell uncontrollably as I felt my lips quiver. I bit my lower lip to stop it before asking.
"Why are you making this hard? Why do I have to choose?"
I cried out as I felt my chest tightening from the emotions slowly wrapping it. Fear, Anxiety, Panic, Anger, all the ugliest emotions morphing into one as Pierce's hug tightened around me.
"You can't always have both. You need to choose"
Choose? But what if I choose wrong? Why do I have to choose? One is my best friend whom I have known half of my life and the other has my heart. Why do I have to choose between the two of them?
What if my love fades and I'm left with the feeling of regret? What if it wasn't the love that I wanted? What if it's not the love that I desperately needed?
What if his love is feeble? What if I choose Josiah and he chooses to leave me? I would really have no one. How would I face those consequences? How would I ever live with myself knowing that I made a mistake?
But what if I choose Pierce and I realized that I really can't live without Josh? Would my heart be able to take another heartbreak like that?
"Harriett"
Pierce called softly and the moment that my eyes locked on his, I knew that whatever choice I make, I'll forever regret it.
I will forever regret this.
"I'm sorry Kael"