Page 56 of One Lovely Lie

It’s been the best fucking month of my life.

Daniel and I still spend all our time together, but now we get to be sappy and in love. I tell him I love him all the time. I show him I love him even more. I never thought it possible to find someone you’d want to revolve your entire world around.

If Daniel thought I was clingy before, there’s no topping me now.

He is so fucking cute when he sleeps. We’ve taken to alternating where we spend our nights because I can’t fucking bear to be apart from him. Today, we’re waking up in my room behind a makeshift privacy curtain I put up. They’re really just old sheets taped to the ceiling, but it’s good enough.

He stirs on top of me when I kiss his adorably pouty lips. Even in his sleep, he meets me brush for brush, and I don’t even care that he has morning breath.

“Mm, good morning,” he mumbles against my lips, trailing his fingers up and down my chest as he fully wakes up. “You sleep well?”

“You were here, weren’t you?” I kiss him again and again and again until my lips are swollen. “Good morning.”

“Yes, it is a good morning,” another voice says.

Both of us freeze, our lips still pressed together and I groan as I pull away. I rip our little privacy curtain open and stare at Carter. He’s lying on his bed, still in his pajamas, and his nose is buried in a textbook.

“Hi, Carter,” Daniel says, embarrassment tinting his cheeks pink. “Um, sorry I’ve been crashing here so often.”

“No, it’s fine. Young love and shit,” he says with a dismissive wave of his hand. “Just make sure not to fuck while I’m sleeping. That’s crossing a line.”

Carter can’t see, but Daniel blushes. I guess we shouldn’t tell him that we jerked each other off last night while he was doing just that.

Either way, the narrowing of his eyes makes me think we’re not that subtle.

Carter rolls his eyes as he stretches his arms over his head. “You ready for World War Three?”

“Why?” Daniel asks as he reaches for his discarded shirt on the floor. “Why would it… Oh…”

“What?” I ask him.

“Did you forget?” Carter asks with a groan. “It’s family weekend.”

I furrow my brow. “And…” He raises his eyebrows at me as it hits. “…right.”

Family weekend, a day that is supposed to be special and memorable when everybody’s parents get to visit the campus for two days. While I’m not too excited about spending two days withmyparents, I’d rather be locked in a room with them than have to deal with what Carter and Ozymandias are going to have to put up with.

The Everetts and the Clarks in one room? That’s truly enough to kick-start a war.

“Want us to do damage control?” Daniel asks sweetly, and he’s just so adorable, I give in to the urge to kiss his temple.

Carter smiles fondly at him and shakes his head. “No. Oz and I can play nice for one day and keep our dads off each other’s throats.”

I start at the name and smirk. “Oz, eh?”

“Shut up,” he snaps, grabbing his shower caddy from our shared cupboard. “Look, you have ten minutes to do sex stuff while I’m in the shower. Everybody better have clothes on when I get out.”

I snicker as he leaves and turn back to Daniel, pouting as I try to pull off the shirt he’s just put on. “Baby, we’ve got ten minutes. What kind ofsex stuffdo you want to do?”

“I want to tell my parents about us.”

My fingers stop their upward trajectory. That’s not exactly where I was going with this.

“Really?” I say with a wince.

“Yeah, I mean, don’t you?”

He looks suddenly stricken with insecurity, misreading my hesitancy. I drag him on top of me and kiss the top of his head. “Baby, I don’t want to tell my parents what I had for lunch. Your parents, however, are a different deal. What do you think they’ll say?”

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