Taking the Leap

Chapter 15

~Achilles~

"I'm sorry." Xander said when he woke up in my bed.

After Xander had shut down in the parking lot at the recreational centre. I'd done my best, even as a wolf to guide him back to his car, let him drive back to my place and when we got to my apartment he hugged me for a while, scratching that nice spot behind my ears.

Eventually he'd fallen asleep on me and I'd had to extricate myself, shift and then come back to bed. That's when he'd woken up again, saying he was sorry.

"It's okay." I said, crawling into the bed, watching the plains of Xander's face in the near darkness. He was frowning.

"I haven't seen him in years." Xander moved in closer to me, splaying his hand over my chest and dragging his fingers over my skin. It felt electric. "He's with another vampire. They have a kid. Did you know to adopt a vampire child, that you have to be approved through a council? It's an extensive process because there are so few vampire kids who are up for adoption. You basically have to be a saint. And they let him—They let him have a child." Xander's voice broke. "I mean, I never really told anyone, except Elle. But, still."

"Is there someone you can tell now?"

Xander closed his eyes again, leaning away from me, pulling his hands against his chest and smoothing them down his shirt. He didn't say anything. Then, he sat up on the bed, and got up to go to the bathroom. I watched the little light under the door until he came back out.

It looked like he'd splashed water on his face. He sat on the bed. "Can we do over date night?"

I grasped him by the side of the neck, leaned in and gave him a kiss. "Of course we can re-do date night."

#

A few months later.

"I told you. They always kill off the black character first." Xander whispered loudly in the movie theatre. The arm rest separating us was up and he was snug against my side as I wrapped my arm across his shoulders.

I'd been getting better at the public signs of affection thing. And Xander seemed to glow whenever I did do things.

My blossoming relationship with Xander was... still blossoming. I now knew he had seven freckles across the bridge of his nose, and that his laugh was my favourite sound in the world, and of course, that he was beautiful, inside and out. I had even almost said I love you a few times. Once when I hung up after our nightly chats, another time after date night and even last night when Xander had finally shown me his hair routine, which was decidedly intricate.

Another jump scare popped up on the screen and I flinched, but Xander squeezed my thigh.

And fucking hell was I frustrated. I'd spent all this time with Xander and we still hadn't done the God damned deed. The longer I spent with him the more attracted to him I became. Suddenly, every look and every touch from Xander made my body buzz with an excitement that only built every time we saw each other.

I was shifting more often and going for runs just to get the energy out. But it wasn't really satisfying in the way I needed it to be.

After Xander had bumped into Corey our relationship had cooled a bit while he looked for a new support group. He wasn't willing to go back to the old place and I didn't push him. Every time I mentioned that maybe he should look into a therapist he just shook his head, curls bouncing and changed the subject  Some days though, Xander got really quiet, and  I still didn't push him. I hoped that was the right thing to do.