Fearless?

Fearless? - Chapter Thirty-Six

‘Fear not; for I am with you’

 - Isaiah 41:10

Chapter Thirty-Six

Cole left early in the morning, choosing to sneak back out her window rather than face Ted, something that Azelie figured was a good idea. Ted probably wouldn’t take too well to a boy sleeping in her room, even if they had just slept in the same bed together - nothing else, not even a kiss. Azelie found it hard in the morning not to kiss him, seeing him with his goofy smirk, his hair sticking up in different directions and his bright green eyes looking at her, holding all the joy in the world. Jesus, she just wanted to kiss him again. Azelie had faced the reality of the situation a few days ago, she loved Cole. She had loved him for a long time, but it took until now for her to realise. 

Azelie didn’t know what to do with her first Saturday of the holidays, Kelly and Alex were busy, and Cole had some family event to go to. Ted was out working at the gallery, but Azelie didn’t feel like working today. Kelly had called her last night to tell her that there was a party tonight, so she had the entire day free until then. She felt like crawling under the covers of her bed, hiding from the outside world and just staying there with her thoughts for company. Just as she crawled back into her bed, she spotted her painting equipment in the corner of her room. With a satisfied smile, she jumped back out of her warm bed and quickly got changed into a t-shirt and a pair of jeans and grabbed her painting stuff, now sure of how she was going to spend her day. 

Azelie could hear the music before she even got to the house, the thumping noise filling the air as drunken teenagers tried to get the most of the first weekend of their two week vacation. She looked over at Cole who was sat beside her in the back seats of the car, Kelly and Alex in the front bickering over what song they wanted to play. Cole spotted Azelie looking at him, sending her a soft smile as he looked back at her. They hadn’t really spoken all since they had picked him up, something that Azelie found to be very strange. It was usually Cole who was the one that was always talking. She had spent the entire day painting, sitting by the river that flowed outside of the Bellingham and just drew whatever popped into her mind. It had been a while since she had a chance to paint, and she hadn’t realised how much she missed it until this morning. 

Alex parked the car, and the group climbed out of his car and walked up to the house, not bothering to knock on the door as they entered. The music was playing so loud that Azelie was sure that she couldn’t hear herself think. She went to follow Kelly and Alex further into her house, but she felt a hand slipping into her own, tugging at her to move the other way. She looked to her right to find Cole smiling over at her, trying to pull her in a different direction. She didn’t even think twice about it, and followed him to wherever he was leading her, not letting go of his hand for a second.

He led her into the busy kitchen, he grabbed two plastic cups full of beer and let go of Azelie’s hand as he passed a cup to her.

“Thanks,” she smiled as she put the cup up to her mouth and took a sip of the warm liquid. She had gotten used to having warm beer; wasn’t it a clique of teen parties? Terrible music; warm beer; drunk girls dancing with hardly any clothes on?

“Kelly and Alex were heading to go dance, and I really can’t be bothered with that right now,” Cole said, explaining why he had dragged her here. She nodded in reply, slightly understanding how he felt, but at the same time, questions began to appear.