After Hours ➳ Dinah Jane

twenty-nine

Dinah hurried me out of the state and back to our humble abode in Seattle as fast as she could. We decided that California wasn't the place for us. It never was and I guess we it took us a while to figure it out. We were just ready to continue our lives together because even though we had both been through so much, we needed to get back to normal. Normality was all that mattered to me at this point.

As soon as we got home, we headed straight to the bedroom because the jet lag exhaustion was quickly picking up inside of us. Neither of us are big travelers unless we have to do it so, we take jet lag very seriously. Plus, we both have work tomorrow even though we are completely worn out that it seems like a crime to go to work feeling like this.

Dinah let me use the bathroom first to do my business, brush my teeth, and clean my face since I was barely dragging along. After I came out of the bathroom, I noticed Dinah who was waiting at the end of the bed, staring at the floor idly. I walked up to nudge her shoulder, "Babe, I'm out."

She yawned and nodded to me, rubbing her eyes as if she was a little baby who needed a nap as soon as possible. While she went to the bathroom, I started peeling off my layers of clothes so I could get comfortable enough to crawl underneath the covers. Shortly after I found my comfy spot, Dinah came out of the bathroom and began stripping off her clothes in the middle of the room. I may have been tired before, but that was all over now because Dinah had my complete attention.

Dinah turned her head and caught me staring, "What?" She asked me.

I shook my head as if I wasn't doing anything.

"No. Seriously."

I scooted up to lean my back against the head board, and continued to deny that I did anything, even though I was smirking. "It's stupid. Don't worry about it."

Dinah slipped on a pair of shorts and a big t-shirt and rolled her eyes at me as she started heading towards the bed. She crawled into bed next to me and my body heated up within seconds. "C'mon, babe. I don't care if it's stupid. I promise that I won't laugh even if it is actually stupid."

I rolled my eyes at Dinah's 'late-night humor' and responded, "It's just so surreal, I guess. For a whole month, I hoped and prayed that I would get to see you in this room again. That everything would go back to normal."

It seemed as though Dinah was completely caught off guard that I actually was speaking my mind. She grabbed my hand and interlocked our fingers, looking into my eyes. "I would be lying if I said I hadn't thought the same thing." She decided that it would be more comfortable to pull me under her arm so that I could lay my head on her chest. "But I also prayed to thank God that you were even in my life for a moment, and that I'd be happy to spend more time with you or if he'd want me to, I'd let you go. It's whatever he decided."

I got a little more curious about her faith, "Then what made you know for sure that it was time for us to be an 'us' again?"

"Well, I asked for a sign." Dinah admitted, "So, when Normani called me about that frat party, saying that you needed me back, I didn't even hesitate for a second about saying yes. I needed you back just as bad as you did. Listen, I may joke around a lot, but I was never joking around when I said 'I love you' the first time or any other time after that."

Her honesty made me feel so warm inside and I was so thankful that I had her back.

"Anyways," Dinah said in a sing-song voice to try and keep us from thinking serious like this when we are this exhausted. It would just get make us more emotional. "We should get some sleep because I have to teach those little annoyings again starting tomorrow." She kissed my lips and reached over me to my lamp on the bed side table to flick the light off.

Dinah and I got comfortable against each other and I whispered to her within the pitch darkness, "I love you, D." I just felt like now would be a perfect time to just remind her that I care.

She yawned before responding, "I love you, too, babe. Now go to sleep."

+

a/n:

should I do a double update for this?

- agf