"Broken hearts are like an exposed wound. Pour salt on them, the wound will burn even more and the chances of getting fixed lessen considerably." -the Author

Zoey Willow Hunter

“Zoey! Where you at?” cried out Skye, her voice booming from the living room. This was our way of communicating, when one of our phones was charging around the house. My mom purposely bought herself earplugs after a while, as a joke.

“ROOM!” I answered back.

Smoothing down my curls in the mirror, I tried to smile to make myself look less than worried and completely freaked out. Nico and his father were going to be here any second now and I was still contemplating how to approach the kiss subject.

Skye came in my room and let out a whistle when she saw me. “Are you trying to impress someone, Z?”

“I’m trying to impress myself,” I replied, looking down at my white summer dress. Was it really a crime to try to look nice for once? I didn’t dress up because I was going to see the guy I drunkenly kissed and hated might I add as well.

“Riiiiight, and I’m secretly a vampire.” She plopped herself on my bed and raised an eyebrow.

“Oh, shut up,” she and I said at the same time, her mocking me. I glared at her and pointed my arm towards the door. She put her hands up in surrender and walked away.

At that moment, the door bell rang and I jumped. Taking deep breaths to steady myself, I headed downstairs to greet our guests. My mom was wearing an apron and there was flour on her chin. Quickly, I gave her a signal that there was flour on her face and she wiped it. She threw the apron in one of the cabinets.

Julia was the one to open the door, smiling wide. “Hi! You’re tall.”

Mr. Forrest was dressed in a casual suit, his hair perfectly combed. He looked like an older man model who just stepped out of an Armani magazine. He bent down at Julia’s level and stuck his hand out at her.

“Hi, I’m James Forrest.”

Julia grinned and shook her hand in his. “I’m Julia Hunter. I like your eyes.”

“I like your face,” he said, poking her nose. Julia giggled, she, like Skye, loved to be complimented.

I figured that Mr. Forrest, or James, had the same eye color as his son, a bright green. He ruffled her head and stood up again. Nico had a small smile on his face when he saw Julia. He did the same thing as his dad, which made Julia very happy.

Mr. Forrest complimented my mom and placed a kiss on her cheek, which obviously made her blush. If this went on like this, the four girls in this house would become as red as tomatoes.

“You must be Skye,” said Nico, nodding to Skye.

“You must be Nico,” she replied, giving him her famous flirty smile. 

Nico winked at her and turned to my mom, without even paying me a glance. Skye pinched my arm, waving air on her face. I rolled my eyes at her and mumbled: “Get real.”

“You must be Zoey’s other older sister,” said Nico, to my mother. Her face glowed and she shook her head.

Nico was completely aware that she was my mom, but he just wanted to be on her good side. This annoyed me a lot. He was a charmer, like his dad.

“Aren’t you a sweetheart! I’m her mom, actually,” she said.

Mr. Forrest turned to me and shook my hand. “Nico, you never told me your coworker was so beautiful!”

“That’s because she’s not,” I heard Nico mumble. After the attention was averted away from me, I elbowed him in the ribs and he turned to glare at me. His eyes were especially piercing today; they stood out from his outfit, which was a gray short-sleeved button up shirt and blue jeans.

“You’re rude,” I said.

“You’re annoying,” he replied.

“Be nice, you’re in my house. I can kick you out if I want to.”

He smirked. “You don’t kick out people you’ve kissed.”

Damn it.

“The hell? What are you talking about?” I tried to keep myself from blurting out that I knew everything.

“Zoey! I don’t know what you’re doing with Nico at the door, but it’d be nice if you come help me put the food, yeah?”

I blushed and hurried towards my mom. She’d cooked her famous lasagna and chicken wings. The smell of the house was mouthwatering. I even caught Skye, who had impeccable table manners, lick her lips once at the sight of the lasagna.

Once the table was set and the food was placed, everyone dug in. Nico was sitting across form me, Skye at my side and Julia on the other. The parents were sitting at each extremity of the table. Conversation flowed between the two, he was  a joker. Mom laughed more than I’ve seen her do so in  a long time.

“This is delicious, Mrs. Hunter,” said Nico, putting another chicken wing in his plate.

“Thank you!” She turned her eyes to Mr. Forrest. “You have a very polite son.”

Mr. Forrest looked at his son with an amused look. “Indeed, he is. But your girls, they’re all so beautiful!”

For the hundredth time this night, Mom blushed and waved her hand in a way that said stop it you.

“So, where’s their father? Is he out?”

The subject made all three of us, Mom, Skye and I, freeze. I wiped my mouth with a napkin and sipped on my apple juice. Skye looked at Mom and back at her food.

“Uh, he left us a while back,” said Mom, stuttering slightly. At James’ bewildered and pitiful look, she said: “Not dead, I mean. Just left.”

“But he’s gonna be back! Really soon, he just wanted to see the Fell tower!” exclaimed Julia, grinning at Mr. Forrest. “Right, Mommy?”

Mom nodded. “The Eiffel tower, sweetie.”

Mr. Forrest gave my mom a small sorry smile, “I hope he does come back.”

No one answered him. Nico pointed to the bottle of wine and ushered to my mom.

“Could I have some?”

She opened her red mouth to deny, but she nodded. “Just a little.”

The meal was soon over for everybody, I was cleaning up with Skye. She bumped into my hip while cleaning out the plates.

“Mom’s down, eh?”

I nodded. “The daddy subject wasn’t good.”

Nico came in and helped out as well. He stayed very silent throughout the whole dinner, making comments only when someone was directly addressing to him. I knew I should have been worried, since this was unlike him, but I tried to keep my mind off him for the moment.

When the last plate was dried and in the cupboard, Mom came in the kitchen and cut out a small chocolate cake.

“Take some wine and sit outside with Nico,” she ordered, completely concentrated on placing a cherry on top of each piece.

This threw me off, since Mom never allowed Skye & I to drink wine, except on occasions like Christmas or birthdays. She always said that we were too young for intoxicating drinks, especially too young to drink it around adults. Skye and her got into a fight about it when she was strict a few months ago and ever since, Mom’s been less uptight about the getting drunk issue. Skye’s argument was that Mom, at our age, drank a lot as well. So now, Mom wasn’t totally against getting drunk, but she didn’t love it either.

“But I—”

“No objections. You need to socialize with him and don’t think I didn’t see the glares you gave him during dinner.”

I picked up two glasses and filled half of them with wine. “Can we have cake, then?”

“You want wine and cake?” Mom stared at me as if I was a moron.

I never asked for wine, I mentally grumbled.

Apparently, Nico had already gotten the message from Mom. He was sitting outside on one of the chair and was looking at something on his phone.

“Wine?” I said, handing him a glass.

He silently took it from me and took small sips, looking anywhere but at me.

“I need to talk to you,” he said.

“I know.”

“You know?” He looked surprised at this. “A few hours ago you didn’t know anything.”

“Well I found out.”

“You were drunk. There’s nothing to talk about.” He pursed his lips and turned from me again.

“No, Forrest, I’m sorry. I never get drunk and I would have never done this if I was sober.”

He let out a small scoff. “You wouldn’t kiss me?” There was a hint of darkness in his voice that I voluntarily chose to ignore.

“I wouldn’t.”

He put a hand to his heart and with every ounce of sarcasm he had, he said: “Ouch. You hurt me.”

“Shut up.”

“I shouldn’t shut up because I’m your rebound, aren’t I, Mrs. Oliver Thompson?”

“Shut up,” I repeated, more harshly this time.

“Mrs. Oliver Thompson, or should I say his ex? Oh wait, you never were together!”

I glowered at him and fixed a tighter grip on my glass.

“Forrest, I advise you to shut up before you end up losing your nonexistent balls.”

“You said the same thing last night. Word by word. You going to kiss me now too and cry in my arms?”

The embarrassment was rising in my veins by the second now. The fury too.

I finished my wine glass in one gulp and stood up. A hand was on my wrist, holding me back.

“The hell you going to, Hunter?”

I snatched my arm away from him and looked at him straight in the eyes.

“Listen here, you stuck up little idiot. That kiss last night? It meant nothing to me. And considering the way you’re treating me right now, I know it meant nothing to you too. So why don’t we go back to hating each other?”

“Considering the way you kissed me last night, you stuck up little princess, it meant a lot to you. You’re just lucky I let you kiss me and I didn’t push you away.”

“Why didn’t you push me away?” I replied.

“Because you would have had your little heart broken even more.”

“And you care?”

There was a pause.

“I don’t,” his jaw clenched, “just go back to crying about your girly Oliver. Oh wait,” he smacked his head, “Silly me, I keep on forgetting. he’s not yours.”

Something broke in my hand, it was the wine glass. I had squeezed too hard on it. Blood started to pour from my hand, but Nico just gave me a smile.

“I hate you so much,” I said.

“The feeling’s mutual. Have a nice night, or don’t.

He finished the wine in his glass and left by the backyard.

-

well. I was going to give up and write this chapter tomorrow, but a cup of coffee, favorite pjs, music & determination helped me fullfil my promise for saturday updates.

thoughts on nico?

goal? 300 comments please 

love, yas.