Read Take Me Away :: Lizzie: Permission

His brows furrowed unhappily over his narrowed eyes.

“Do you still think I’m some kind of hero?”

What?

“You’re more than…”

The second those words started to come out of my mouth, I noticed the way his gaze seemed to grow sadder. I turned away, trying to puzzle everything together silently. He was upset about being a hero?

I stepped past him, shaking my head a bit, my gaze drawn to the window, until the next step I took gave me a reflected glare of something on the bookcase.

It was then that I realized what he had been looking at earlier. There was a photo sitting there, in plain sight. It was of us when we were little. Flying. It was when I’d gone flying with him all those years ago…

A hero…

I’d called him a hero then, hadn’t I?

It was as true then as it was now, maybe more. Just how many times had just the simple thought of him being happy, or his smile, the joy I’d gotten from flying… how many times had those thoughts and memories gotten me through sad and miserable days?

To me…

He was always going to be my hero, whether or not I was the person at his side in the future.

Fallyn didn’t move from his spot, but I felt his eyes on me.

“I’m not a hero,” he said quietly. “I haven’t done anything worthy of that title.”

I found myself turning to look at him before I could even think it over. One glance at his face told me he was serious. He believed those words he’d just said. I stormed over to him and poked a finger at his chest.

“You’re my hero. You can’t tell me otherwise. Believe it.”

His features smoothed out as he searched my face. I wasn’t sure what he was looking for, but I stared back all the same, trying to show him just how serious I was too. Slowly, his hands landed on my waist. He was warm at my sides and front, and it was just then that I realized how close together we were. I was staring up into his face, mere inches between us.

Could he hear my heart right now?

Or was his just as loud as mine?

I was lost in the moment, my arms and legs forgetting their own existence as I looked into those eyes – his eyes.

Nothing had ever hit me so strongly before, but there was only one thing my mind settled on in this lack of distance between us–

“I would kiss you,” he whispered just loud enough over the rush of my own heartbeat in my ears, “but a hero shouldn’t kiss anyone without permission.” His gaze dipped away from my eyes and my breath caught. He – he just… “If I truly am your hero, Elizabeth… that means I should leave before I can’t stop myself.”

How could it be?

How could we have the same thought, and his just took a wrong turn somewhere? Why wasn’t he just asking for permission? Why couldn't he just ask?

It was such a roundabout way to follow that thought, all without actually asking or just outright saying he didn’t want to be my hero.

And he almost sounded bitter about it.

The question of why that might be was immediately drowned out by another as he turned, his warmth leaving me so quickly as he reached for the doorknob. He was going to leave. I said nothing, having been rendered speechless, and quite nearly thoughtless, and he moved away.

He was leaving me?

But…

“What if I gave you permission?” I murmured in the silence we stood in.

Here and gone was another second, his hand hovering in the air by the door, not quite touching it. I forgot to breathe.

“What?”

His voice was almost as quiet as mine had been, only his was filled with disbelief, his eyes wide as he faced me again. I took a breath I’d been missing, my gaze drawn to the floor in a moment of hesitancy and uncertainty.

Would he take this the wrong way?

Was there even a wrong way to hear it?

Gosh, what was I even thinking right now?

This was all fairly obvious, so how could he misinterpret it? I was more likely to be one to misunderstand something he said, rather than him not understanding my words.

I swallowed hard and looked back up at him, holding his gaze, daring myself to look right at him, to not let my gaze drift.

“You have permission.”

His response was immediate and restrained.

“I shouldn’t.”

“You should.”

His gaze snapped away from mine, and there was a dread that flooded me.

Oh my gosh, what did I just do?

I just… to Fallyn…

Wasn’t this a form of pressure? If he didn’t want to, I shouldn’t force him to. How could I? What kind of person would I be if I did?

Shaking my head a bit, I tried to reason with myself that it was fine. Everything – it was all just fine. There was nothing wrong. Sure it was really quiet right now, again, but it wasn’t like, you know, everything was crumbling down around me right now.

Like, uh… an earthquake taking out buildings, or something like that.

Volcano erupting and destroying places.

Tsunami crushing everything in a giant wave and washing it away.

Or even like a dragon set fire to my house made of straw, with me still in it.

Nope.

It wasn’t like … that.

It was exactly that.

How foolish.

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid!

Of all the things I could’ve done…

Faintly, I remembered that I wasn’t actually up in his face, forcing it upon him. He could still choose. He could still say no… even if… even if it…

Hurt.

And just then, just as Fallyn was about to leave me to my miserable state, knowing the defined edge of my feelings for him, something terrible happened.

My stomach growled.

Loud.

It was really loud.

How embarrassing.

My cheeks flushed and I saw him flinch or twitch, or something? I saw him move, just the slightest bit. And then, he was moving a lot.

But he wasn’t leaving.

He was… coming back to me?

The distance between us was cut short and his hands were on my cheeks and in the span of a very short amount of time, our lips collided. Or, I guess, his collided with mine.

Having had no idea it was coming, having been bracing for the opposite this whole time, I froze.

Gosh, my first kiss… AND I FROZE!? This couldn’t be happening! And it was with Fallyn, no less! UGH!

I couldn’t control anything as he leaned back away from me. I felt my jaw drop slowly down, one hundred percent from shock. All of it.

I stared at him.

That – that just – that happened?!

Now.

Just now.

Fallyn kissed me.

Fallyn kissed me?!

Yes, a brief connection of lips, a simple and short kiss, but that was definitely not… something we would ever do as friends. No. It wasn’t.

So what was that?

Why–

He gave me a lopsided grin and my eyes widened.

Oh goodness it was warm in here. It was… whew. Yeah. Warm. Warmer than normal.

But before I could unfreeze or come out of this sudden shock, he did the unthinkable. He shoved a cookie in my mouth.

“Eat.”

It was the only thing he said before the door closed behind him and left me to my silent room once more.

I didn’t even need to reach up to grab the cookie and take a bite of it. I just started eating it, staring at the space he’d occupied just moments earlier.

Fallyn…

He was here.

He was just in here.

He gave me a cookie.

I am eating the cookie.

Surprised happy tears ran down my face as I stared at the door.

It was real.

All of it actually just happened.

That meant…

That…

That meant he…

I didn’t need a mirror to see the flush on my cheeks as I brought my hand up to my lips.