Maisara's pov
"Okay, let's start with something simple," Felix says, pulling both of his legs down and placing his feet on the ground. He leans forward placing his forearms on his thighs and intertwining the fingers together in between his knees. His eyes focus on me, a hidden challenging look is dancing behind the look of interest he has in them.
"What's your favorite opening scene?" He easily throws his first question. I shrug in reply, turning to face the shelves.
"Well, that was easy," I say, my eyes searching for the book I think has a good starting scene. I easily catch sight of the familiar bluish cover of the book. One thought crosses my mind before I grab that book. I look at Felix over my shoulder.
"One question. Do all these scenes you are gonna ask need to be from romantic novels only?"
He thinks for a second before replying, "Eh, not really. But as you said romance is your favorite genre, it will be better to have recommendations on that."
"Alright." I nod, turning around and grabbing the book from the shelf before facing him again. "Now before starting, I wanna say a few things. I'm not some scholar who loves literature and will find some poetic words with deep meanings as the best opening line of a book. I mean, I do find them interesting but not that much interesting that I'll call them the best. Iconic maybe but not the best, at least in my opinion. I think a simple and catchy opening suits me more. So if you think-"
The chuckling sound coming from Felix stops me. He shakes his head all the while saying, "Maisara, you don't need to explain anything. I'm not judging you. I'm barely even in a position to judge you."
"Yeah, fine." I nod awkwardly before looking down at the book. I hold it in front of my chest showing him the cover. "So my favorite starting scene is from this book which literally made me finish this book in one sitting."
"Shatter me," he reads out the title loud before his eyes meet mine again. "Sounds interesting." Suddenly, his eyes widen as if he just caught on something. "Wait, did you just say in one sitting you finished this?"
As a proud grin forms on my lips, I nod walking over to the sofa and sitting beside him. "I did."
"No way," he says, amusement and disbelief dripping from his tone as he takes the book from my hand. "How many pages-THREE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-TWO PAGES? ARE YOU SERIOUS?"
Loud laughter blooms from me, a carefree and wholehearted one, that kind of laugh that makes you feel like a main character and just want to enjoy life. And I realize I haven't laughed like that in a while. Not after that laughter was snatched away from me forcefully.
"Your smile looks ethereal."
As the laughter dies down, I stare at the person who for the first time after everything has shown me the beauty of my own laughter. The look of disbelief in his light-colored orbs slowly turns into a look of admiration. And somehow, I know that I'm the reason behind that. And that makes me flash him a wide grin.
"That's no big deal seriously," I say returning back to the topic. But I don't think he still has returned back there because his voice is almost breathless when he says, "What?"
"Reading three hundred and twenty-two pages in one setting," I explain, suppressing the urge to laugh again at his condition. Instead, I gesture to the book in his hands with my eyes. He follows my gaze and his eyes widen slightly as if he had just noticed the book in his hands.
"Oh, yeah, got it," His reply comes out awkwardly. I decide to save him from the uneasiness. Extending my hand, I say, "May I read it for you?"
"Of course." His constant smile returns as he hands me the book. I flip the pages to the start of the story. Clearing my throat, I start, "I've been locked up for 264 days. I have nothing but........"
I feel him going still as I continue reading through the lines. His undivided attention is only on me and my words right now. He's barely even breathing. I try my best to not let this fact get to my head as I take him with me and travel back to my favorite dystopian world.
".............. I wait too long and fall asleep." I close the book as I finish reading the starting scene and slowly, very slowly, turn my head around to look at Felix. I try my best to keep my heart steady as I take in the look on his face.
He is staring at me with wide and unblinking eyes. There is no doubt that his sole attention is on me right now. I can even see the black outlines of his golden orbs if I look closely and we aren't even sitting that close to each other. Also there is no doubt that he's much more than only interested in it for me, as he said earlier. He looks interested for himself, right now, as if he actually enjoyed it.
I suddenly notice his eyes have turned glassy. And the next thing, I notice is a single tear that falls out of his eyes and rolls down his cheek. Of course, that makes me jump into action. "Oh my God, Felix. Are you okay? Why are you crying? What happened?"
Moving closer to him and placing a hand on the side of his face, I gently wipe the tear away. I keep feeling a painful squeeze in my chest for seeing him like this and start hating myself for reading that scene in the first place. I don't know what exactly caused him to shed tears but I'm pretty sure it has to do something with my reading that goddamn scene. Why the hell did I read that? Why did I-
"It-It's nothing. I was just-Well, I-I......" he keeps stuttering and looks a little distorted. I think he needs time to pull himself together. So I proceed to move my hand away.
But then suddenly, his hand comes over mine securing its place back on his jaw. Feeling the heat seeping from his palm through his skin to mine, I stare into his dazzled eyes and listen to his soft whispering, "Don't let go, please."
I don't know what comes over me but I end up responding, "I won't." And that ends up sounding more like a promise than a simple statement.
"Now can you tell me why you are crying?" I ask him slowly and gently as if I was talking to a toddler.
He sniffs once before taking my hand from his cheek in between his own two hands and looking down at it. "I wasn't crying. I was just..... Your reading is so good. And it felt so real. That scene was so depressing. And it just felt like you were the one feeling that. So, I-I mean I don't even know how I-"
I nod squeezing his hand. "I understand."
I notice the corners of his ears have turned slightly red. He sniffs again before mumbling, "I'm sorry for losing myself like that."
"Hey, it's fine. Don't be sorry." I say, patting his hand. Then to change the topic to take him out of the awkward situation, I ask, "Should I move on to the next scene?"
He looks up at me and I see the look of appreciation in them. He looks grateful that I have changed the topic. Sniffing again, he grins at me. I watch warily at a weird-looking Felix with red-rimmed eyes, a runny nose, and a wide grin. And to add to that weirdness, his voice comes out full of excitement as he says, "Sure. Let's go with something light." He pauses and thinks for a second before saying, "Like the first meeting of hero and heroine? Your most favorite one, of course."
Furrowing eyebrows, I start searching in my mind which book has the best first meeting scene. "First meet? Okay." When I finally manage to decide which book it should be, I look at the shelves to see if that book is on there. Again, easily my eyes catch sight of the colorful series of five books.
"I think it's from the Acotar series by Sarah J. Maas, the first meeting of Feysand, Feyre, and Rhysand. Hero and heroine, in your words." I say as I walk over to the books and point them to him.
"Okay?" His curious glance jumps from me to the books and then back to me, patiently waiting for me to continue.
"I think it would be kind of confusing to you if I just straight start reading the scene." As my mind goes back to that fictional world and remembers how the events turned out. "So first, let me tell you what happened here. Then, I can read that exact scene for you."
He nods, looking extremely focused all over again. "Mhm, I'm all ears."
"So it's an enemies to lovers romance." I start explaining as I grab the first book of the series which contained the desired scene and walk over to the sofa. "The male lead, Rhysand is like a villain in the first book of the series. And female lead is named Feyre. As it's a fantasy romance there are a lot of terms you need to understand first. First of all......."
I keep telling him every detail and describing every term just like I dreamed of doing one day with someone who truly has an interest in books like me. And I realize it feels so much better than I assumed it would be. Having someone showing interest to the things you are interested in is probably the best feeling in the world.
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