Elizabeth Liang felt like a lamb to the slaughter as she stepped into James Lu's room with a heavy heart and a depressed face.
"Urn..." Elizabeth bit her lip. "Are we really staying here?"
James was just as frustrated. "You think I want to?" He couldn't help but shout at her in anger.
"Keep your voice down!" She didn't want his mom and dad to hear him.
"No one ever disobeys my dad... Whatever, it's just for a night." James kicked the closest coffee table leg in irritation, but his anger made him go a bit too hard. He hissed in pain as he recoiled.
"Are you okay?" Elizabeth looked at him and frowned. "Did you hurt your foot?"
James took two deep breaths and tried to keep calm. "Are you kidding me? What is a table leg gonna do to m—" He hissed again. What's this god damn coffee table made of, how the hell could it hurt so much?!
That's what he got for choosing to save his face instead of his foot.
Elizabeth stifled a laugh and pretended to not see his clearly uncomfortable expression.
"Are you going to take a shower?" James sat on the armchair and waited for the pain on his foot to dissipate. "Can I?" It's hard to go a day without a shower in this increasingly hot weather.
"There's a bathroom in here. You can use it first." He needed a few more minutes to recover before he could stand up and walk.
"Can you lend me some clean clothes?" Elizabeth didn't want to go to sleep in the same clothes she's been wearing the entire day...
"There's a bathrobe in the closet. I GUESS...I'll let you wear one for the night." Then he added with even more arrogance, "Not just anyone can have the honor of wearing my clothes. You will be the first one after Ben and Isaac."
Elizabeth smiled and walked over to the closet, then took out the bathrobe hanging inside. But she could tell just by looking at it that it was way too long and oversized.
When she measured it against her body, it literally dragged across the floor!
"Can I have another one? This one's... too long..."
Hearing this, James glanced at her scornfully. "Can you be any shorter?"
"..." Can you be any taller?
He waved impatiently. "Whatever, figure something out yourself!"
After looking for a while, Elizabeth finally pulled out one of James's shirts. As she held the shirt, she could feel her own heart beating faster inside her chest. Elizabeth had no idea why she was acting like a little girl who had done something wrong, but she felt abashed yet inexplicably excited. She headed to the bathroom with the clothes in her arms and shut the door with a "bang".
After a while, the sound of running water came from inside—
Splish, splash, splish, splash...
The pain on James's feet had gradually faded. He was sitting there, bored to death and waiting for his turn to shower, but he could hear the sound of running water and vaguely see Elizabeth's silhouette as she showered through the frosted glass...
He could feel himself becoming increasingly breathless.
Was the air conditioner broken? Why else was the room so warm? The heat was driving him crazy!
James looked at the air vent of the central air-conditioner, and saw that wind was whirring and blowing vigorously out from it.
He irritably grabbed his cigarettes and went to the balcony. He couldn't stand this room any longer!
For some reason, James smoked his cigarette with a fierce urgency. In less than ten minutes, he had finished his third one.
"Do you wanna go now?" Elizabeth looked around the room and finally found him at the balcony. "I finished my shower."
Hearing her, James turned around—
Elizabeth was standing by the sliding door of the balcony, wearing nothing but James's white shirt. His shirt was definitely big enough for her, since the hem even reached her knees! Her straight and fair-toned legs stuck out from underneath, and were almost dazzlingly attention-grabbing.
Comments
The readers' comments on the novel: I Only Want You