Felix's pov
".............was established a long time ago, around World War II, if I'm remembering correctly. Don't know much about its previous owner. Maria's grandfather found it at that time. Abundant. It was a disaster when he..........."
She goes on and on about the history of the library as we walk through the aisle, wall-like shelves standing on both sides of us and gawking at us silently. The air is heavy with the scent of old parchment. I was never a fan of books, libraries, and stuff like that. Maybe that's because I never tried these before. Never even thought of doing so. But this place has a strange tranquillity that is bound to calm you down no matter what.
I look at the enchanting silhouette before me. The way she moves around, the way she talks, and the way her long vintage-style dress is flowing softly surprisingly match the vibe of the library. It feels as if she has always been here in between these ceiling-high shelves and ancient smells, as if she were a mythical character from one of these books that has come alive by some unknown magic.
She turns around and suddenly time goes slow. Is it just me or is she really glowing and emitting an unrealistic light? The ghost of a smile is dancing on her thin lips while her dark eyes are sparkling with interest. She's saying something, her voice carrying a melodious lilt, but I'm too distracted by her radiant beauty.
"So beautiful," I whisper dreamily. I'm pretty sure my eyes have heart emojis in them right now.
"Isn't it? I love this place most in the whole world." Though she says that in a rather normal tone, her expression is screaming otherwise. The way her lips are in a constant upward position and the way her eyes are shining more brightly than I've ever seen them, I can tell there is nowhere else she will be right now other than here.
"Me too," I reply. I'll always love the place where I can be by your side.
"I'm sorry. I'm probably boring you with all these info." She lets out a small laugh waving her hand in the air and I keep staring at her in awe seeing how much she has changed in her favorite and comfortable environment. Where is that hard and rude Maisara? I can only see the happy and animated version of Maisara who can talk all day about books if she's given the chance.
"Why don't you say which genre you prefer most?" Her melodious voice wraps my attention around her. A slow smile spreads on my lips as I shake my head.
"I absolutely suck at this." I gesture my hand around us. "I've read books only when my life depended on them."
"Oh." She nods her head in understanding. She averts her eyes from me and looks at the books on the shelves on her right side. I suddenly feel like her excitement has died down a little. I quickly add, "But you can always talk about them. I would love to hear. In fact, you can tell me what's your favorite genre."
"Why?" A soft whisper leaves her mouth. If the library didn't have a natural environment of pin-drop silence, I would probably miss that. She refuses to look at me. Slowly moving over to the books that she was eyeing before, she starts trailing her delicate fingers over the sides of them. "Why would you love to hear me talk about them when you don't have any interest?"
The corners of my lips lift more this time. Either she's really dumb or she's trying to hear it from me once again. Maisara isn't dumb or anywhere near dumb. Which can only to lead the fact that she wants me to say it again.
This makes me happy and sad at the same time. Happy because of the obvious reason that she wants to hear that from me again. And sad because this means no one has ever said that to her before. How can no one do that? Didn't they ever see the enlightened look on her face when she talks about something she really likes? Isn't that the most beautiful scene to witness? Why is anyone even existing if they don't wanna see that?
"Because that makes you happy." I tilt my head a little leaning my side against the shelf to my left and crossing my arms over my chest. "And seeing you happy makes me happy."
Her only visible reaction is a slow subtle nod. But if I look closely, I can see that faint tint of pink over her cheekbones. I blink to be sure that I'm seeing right. Did I really just make the cold and hard Maisara blush? I did just that, didn't I?
Oh God! Yes, I did make her blush!
"Romance." Her soft feather-like tone carries the word in the air to me. It takes more time than usual for me to process what she has said. Meanwhile, I keep looking at her. She is suddenly finding the books on that particular shelf really interesting.
"What?" I voice out my confusion before my head starts overthinking and makes out some weird meaning of her word. She glances at me once before concentrating on examining those books.
"My favorite genre," she clarifies, her voice much audible this time, still has a soft tone in it. Oh, that's what she meant. Now it makes sense.
"Okay," I say, stretching the y as I shove my hands into my pocket and start walking towards her. She looks at me from the corner of her eyes but still refuses to face me. "So what about-"
"No," she cuts me off abruptly, making me stop on my track as well. I raise my eyebrows in question when she finally turns to face me. Her hands move down from the books and now are crossed over her chest. She pins me with a serious look before saying, "Now I get to ask a question."
An easy chuckle erupts from me. I look at her in amusement. "And here I thought you didn't have anything to ask."
She rolls her eyes. "I do now."
I shrug. "Whatever. Shoot your question."
She nods looking away. The look in her eyes goes far away as if she's thinking really hard for this question. I lean my back against the shelf on the opposite side of hers. She looks back at me, eyes giving a much softer look than earlier. She has found the question. She opens her mouth and the air again carries her feather-like words to me, "How are you feeling today?"
The smile that was already on my lips spread. I shrug leaning my head against the shelf. "Of course, I'm feeling the best when I'm with you. But if you're asking about how my hangover is, then well, it was how a hangover is supposed to be when I woke up, you know. Headache and stuff. On top of that, I had to deal with that stupid Ian." I skip the part where I had two tablets of aspirin and a cup of coffee as my breakfast.
"But now it's better." That's true. The coffee and that special tea worked like magic.
She nods in understanding. "Glad to hear that." Then she shakes her head at me. "And don't call him stupid. He's a good friend of yours. He helped you a lot last night. And this morning too."
I suddenly feel a strange tightness in my chest and irritation fills inside of me. Even my head starts throbbing again. I rub my temples tearing my gaze away from her. She's only just saying the truth. Then why am I feeling so irritated when she's praising Ian?
"My turn," I say as she opens her mouth, trying my best to shake off that bad feeling. "Why did you and Ryker break up?"
Wait, what? No! That's not what I intended to ask!
Her eyes widen at the same time as mine when the realization of what I had just done hit me. I suppress the urge to cringe. I just don't have the time to cringe. I need to fix it fast. That's exactly what happens when you let your emotion get to your head.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to ask that. After last night-"
"It's fine." Two words from her mouth and she manages to calm me down. When I look back into her eyes, I realize she feels far from being calm. And that's enough to throw my calmness out of the window as well. She turns around and starts walking. I take that as a cue to follow her.
"Mainly we broke up by that last fight where he, you know, accused me of cheating on him and covering it with that false witness of yours. But it probably started six months before we officially broke up," she starts the story and I notice we have entered into another aisle. It's the paranormal section. In bold black letters with a design that resembles dripping blood from beneath the letters, Paranormal is written at the head of the entrance of the aisle.
"That night," she continues. "We went on a date at a fancy restaurant. There we were doing all the things couples do, being goofy and silly as well as random touching and kissing. At one point, I snatched his phone as a joke from him."
She pauses and turns around to face me. Though her posture looks calm and collected like always, her eyes scream the complete opposite. A storm is going on in there, behind her deep set of eyes. A fucking hurricane. It's taking all of my strength to stop myself from walking over to her and engulfing her in a tight hug, wrapping my arms around her so that no harm can ever touch her. But at first, I need to hear what that bastard I share my blood with did to her.
"He got super mad and started yelling at me. I was surprised because he never raised his voice before that. Not with me, not even with anyone else in front of me. He knew it trigger-" she abruptly cuts herself off, her eyes widening at the same time. And I know the look in her eyes. That's the realization that she overshared something with me.
She quickly recovers from it though. Clearing her throat, she continues, "Anyway, so he soon realized what he was doing and stopped. We went home. He was mad at me and wasn't talking. He didn't even apologize. I apologized for invading his privacy. He didn't. Anyway, so, that's the start, I guess. Things started getting worse from there. We started growing apart. Fighting and arguing became a pretty common thing. And one day, we got into that last fight and broke up."
She shrugs as if it was nothing. And I feel it. No, actually I see it in her eyes. It was far from being nothing. There's something more to this story that she's hiding.
My brain starts working. I don't know why I was always sure that Ryker messed something up for them to lead to their breakup, even before I knew the whole lying thing that lead to our own fight last night. I mean it's Ryker we are talking about, the trouble magnet. And I was almost convinced that he cheated on her at one point. Because again, he was he. But the story Maisara said doesn't make much sense to me. I mean it makes sense but I have a strong feeling that there's something more than that.
"Did he cheat on you?" I end up asking her that. She lets out a short humorless laugh, shaking her head. "You weren't supposed to ask the next question, Felix. It was my turn. Anyway, the answer is no. He wasn't cheating."
And I know she's telling the truth with the amount of confidence she said it. Then that leaves me with a choice that both of them are hiding something. Because I knew them and I knew what their relationship was like even from a thousand miles away. It wasn't something to break so easily, not at least the way she described it.
"Did you have breakfast?" Her soft voice once again pulls me out of my head. Shoving away the thoughts for a moment, I look at her first before offering her a smile. "Yes." And I lie to her just like that.
"Okay, cool." She leans against the shelf and waits for my question. I take a few moments to decide what question should I go with. Let's drop the Ryker-Maisara topic for now and focus on other things. I'll figure out that later.
"Why didn't you answer my calls?" I ask the most obvious question at this point leaning my back against one of the bookshelves. She shrugs. "My phone was silent."
It wasn't. I can pretty easily tell that she's lying. I can also tell that she probably was trying to ignore me though I don't know yet why. But that explains the reason why she was ignoring my calls. Also, she doesn't want to admit that to me.
"My turn," she says, mimicking my action of leaning against the bookshelf. "How did you find that I'm here?"
My lips curl into a lopsided grin. I was waiting for this question. Actually, I was dying for her to ask me that question so I can give her the answer. And she finally did.
"Pretty easy." I shrug, shoving my hands into my pockets. "Your interest is in either coffee or books. And you probably would like to spend a Sunday morning either in a coffee shop, in a library or a bookshop, if not in your house. It's better if it's near where you live, well, used to live. So I'm gonna find you in any of those."
I pause and take a deep breath. She takes the opportunity to say, "But there are a lot of bookshops, coffee shops, and libraries in that area."
"Not really. Near your old apartment were 10 altogether. 2 libraries, 5 coffee shops, and 3 bookshops. And you weren't in any one of them."
I pause again to watch her surprised reaction. She's looking at me like she doesn't believe any word coming out of my mouth. Or, to be exact, she doesn't wanna believe that anyone will go to this length to find her out.
Suppressing a grin, I continue, "Then I need to start looking outside of that area. And surprisingly found that there's this vintage library that's somewhere outside of the town. It seemed kinda unusual and that's why I tried to look here at first. And ta-da." I spread both of my arms with a wide grin. "Here we are."
I wait for her reaction and response. She keeps staring at me and I keep staring back. Her eyes have a soft look in them and I feel like they are softening with each passing second. Even at one point, I'm pretty sure they turn glassy. But then she blinks and that look is gone.
"Why would you go to such lengths to find me?" she finally replies with a question. I shrug in reply. "That brings my next question."
She motions me to continue. I clear my throat before starting. "Uhm, so I didn't quite remember what happened last night after..........they left, you know, James, Ian, and Ryker. Can you please enlighten me if you don't mind?"
I try my best to not fidget as she again keeps staring at me. Her eyes, which were the mirror for her emotions until now, completely cover themselves behind dark curtains. Her face doesn't betray any emotion either. I close my eyes and rub my temples as overthinking starts occurring in my mind.
God knows how badly I embraced myself last night!
She still hasn't said a word and to be honest, I feel like taking my words back at this point. Whatever happened is in the past right now. I don't wanna hear about it anymore.
Making up my mind, I open my eyes and look at her. And the scene unfolding before me almost knocks the breath out of me.
Maisara has the back of her hand in front of her mouth, the inside of her palm facing me. The corner of her eyes are crinkled and her eyes are shining brighter than ever. And the next second, I hear the sound, a hollering sound of her letting out a loud and carefree laugh.
A sound so melodious. Any perfectly rhythmic music is bound to fail against the sound of her laughter.
It feels like I'm melting and flowing away with the sound of her laughter. It feels so nice and so soothing that I end up grinning as well.
"Oh." She finally manages to stop laughing and looks at me. Her face still has the happiness vibe on it. "That was something."
"Was it?" I grin, not knowing what it is that we are talking about but am happy that it made her laugh like that.
Her eyes widen in amusement with the eyebrows raising on her forehead. "You seriously don't remember anything?"
"Bits and pieces." I shrug. "It'll help if you help me remember."
Her lips suddenly turn into a lopsided grin. It doesn't look dark like her usual smirk. Rather it makes me feel weirdly excited. Her eyes shine with something that's highly similar to madness when she says, "Well then I've no other choice but to help you remember what happened last night."
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