9 Names

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My eyes widened in realization on what slipped my mind.

Liam looked in the direction of the sound and saw my phone lit up on an ongoing call, a caller ID of an unfamiliar number in his eyes.

He looked back at me with furrowed brows, lips in a thin line, ocean eyes swirling with confusion.

I stared back.

"You were talking with someone?"

"Uh yeah?" I said in question more than an answer as I set down the utensils in my palm.

"Do I know the guy?" He stood up and made his way to the other side of the bed, grabbing the phone from the edge, staring at the screen for a moment, looked back at me for a moment, and went back to my side.

My heart was frantically beating at an abnormal speed, body heating up more than it already is. My face would've been unnaturally red right now, but thanks to my fever I have an excuse on why I was red as a tomato.

He was returning the phone, holding the device in front of me, with a relaxed but an unreadable expression on his face.

'𝘞𝘩𝘺 𝘢𝘮 𝘐 𝘯𝘦𝘳𝘷𝘰𝘶𝘴? 𝘞𝘩𝘺 𝘥𝘰 𝘐 𝘧𝘦𝘦𝘭 𝘭𝘪𝘬𝘦 𝘐 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘤𝘢𝘶𝘨𝘩𝘵 𝘥𝘰𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘸𝘳𝘰𝘯𝘨?'

"Should've told me you were talking with someone, sorry if I interrupted something." He wasn't looking at me, his eyes were diverted on my windows, refusing to meet my gaze.

"Y-you interrupted nothing, I was just—we were—" I huffed out an exasperated sigh, closed my eyes shut and opened them right after.

I looked up at him. "Why do I feel like I'm being scolded?" He still has his face away from me. "Hey don't avoid my eyes, idiot."

He brought his gaze back to mine, and I was startled at what I saw. An amused and goofy grin with a teasing expression was plastered all over his face.

"Why? Were you doing something that needs scolding? Was it something inappropriate?" His grin never faltered, and it even got irritatingly wider at the last sentence he said.

I scrunched my nose up, grab the pillow beside me and threw it furiously with all the force my sick body could master up, and aimed it directly at his face.

He stumbled from the chair and crashed down to the floor. "Hey!"

"Keep your filthy mind to yourself and stop dragging me into it!" I grabbed another throw pillow and aimed again at his face. But luckily for the idiot, he dodged that one.

"What? I was just asking a question, I didn't say anythi—" I didn't let him finish as I shot another pillow directly to his head.

"Quit throwing pillows at me!"

I grabbed another pillow and threw it across his direction, him barely dodging it, "Then quit being an idiot!"

Reaching for another pillow but failed to touch anything, I diverted my gaze from him and realized I ran out of bullets. My bed was bare, devoid of throw pillows and stuff toys. Only the sheets, blanket, me, the table, and PC were lying atop of it.

I glared at him instead as he brought his hands up in surrender, clasping his lips shut in indication that he was throwing the white cloth but failed to mask the slight turn of his lips stifling in a laugh.

"Quit your wild imaginations Liam, it's not like that." I grabbed the phone from the bed, pressing the 'on' button at the side of the phone, and was met with a call ended display of the number I was having a call earlier.

I sighed and dropped the phone on the sheets.

Liam was smiling at me teasingly still, "So who is he?"

"Shut up with the teasing, I don't know who he is."

He raised his brow at me, but an amuse grin was still etched to his face.

"Seriously, I have no idea who he is!" I fell down on the bed, stared at the ceiling above, my arms and legs widely plopped down on the bed, putting me into a starfish-like position.

"What do you mean?" I stood up and looked in to his swirling blue eyes that I've come to know for the past two years.

And then I said everything. I retold the events and occurrences that happened in the park, how I was supposed to call him but dialed the wrong number instead, how I ranted non-stop on a total stranger, how the stranger called me again at 3am—leaving the contents of the conversation aside—, and how he called me again just a while ago to ask for my name.

As I said those, Liam was surprisingly quiet, he was listening thoroughly to every word I was saying, never interrupting or asking a question, he just let me talked.

When I finished, he also plopped down on the bed, legs dangling at the edge and half of his upper body sinking down on the mattress.

"You always call me an idiot, but you are one too." He turned to his side and looked at me with a smirk, blonde locks messy from the pillows I threw earlier, framing his face untidily.

I raised a brow at him, shooting him a glare. "What are you implying?"

He grinned. "You didn't even realize it until it was already late and awkward. Imagine how uncomfortable that felt, having a girl call you in the morning, waking you up from your sleep just to rant her life's problem that you weren't completely aware of before."

I grabbed a ponytail from my nightstand and tied my hair up, ignoring him, and just continued my meal in silence, refusing to ponder and delve into the topic further.

He chuckled at my reaction and with no warning or any inidication; he snatched a nugget from one of the containers, catching me off guard and shoving it immediately to his mouth.

"You thief!" I kicked his side from under the table.

"Ow! I gave that to you, I'm not stealing anything." He said in a muffled tone while chewing.

I uncrossed my legs and lifted the table up to my side, putting some distance between my feast and from Liam.

"Possessive food addict." Moving closer just to tease me, he crisscrossed his legs directly in front of me and placed his elbows atop the table, causing the contents to rattle at the sudden weight, and held his chin on his palms, looking deeply at my glaring amber eyes.

"So tell me, what's up with this boy? Being your personal alarm clock?" He smiled, amused at the new found situation, his eyes glinting with pure mischievousness, swirling with intent to only irritate me to death.

"You're not dropping it, are you?" He shook his head in disagreement and just grinned wider. "I already said everything there's all to it!"

He chuckled mockingly and just raised his eyebrows up and down in a loop, looking like a perverted maniac.

I finally reached my limit and gave him what he was asking for. I whipped a strong, heavy, and a major smack in his head that caused him to easily tumbled down from the bed—considering he was already at the edge—, hitting the floor with a loud thud upon impact.

"Ow!" He yelled from below.

"Shut your trap and just leave me in peace to eat!"

"It was just a question!"

"Don't mock my intelligence! Now quit being an idiot if you know what's best for you!"

"What did I even do?!"

We continued bickering at our usual pace and atmosphere, shouting retorts and comebacks at each other. Cutting the other's sentences off, utensils being thrown—that's me—, smacking of the head mercilessly—also me since he can't do it back because I'm sick—, and being shut upped by my mother coming up to us from downstairs, telling us to keep it down for the neighbors were already complaining.

The hour went by with mostly normal volume conversations and a few random arguments. By the time I finished my meal, we talked for a bit and then he finally went on his way to go home.

Finally settling down on my bed after I walked Liam outside to say goodbye, I was about to continue writing my story which I was planning to do earlier when I brought the laptop out before Liam barged in.

After I was done preparing the PC down on my laptop table and was about to start typing, my phone dinged.

There was a message prompt displayed on the screen.

Tiny words plastered in a tab bar on the lock screen, staring at me no longer in a familiar number but now with words, signifying me who it was:

𝘈𝘪𝘳𝘩𝘦𝘢𝘥 𝘙𝘦𝘺𝘦𝘴

I grabbed the phone and swiped it up, my fingers moving in an autopilot as I pressed the message, displaying the text he sent me.

𝘚𝘰 𝘙𝘦𝘺𝘯𝘢 𝘩𝘶𝘩? 𝘛𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩𝘵 𝘪𝘵 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘓𝘦𝘪𝘨𝘩?

My lips curved up in a slight smile and I could almost hear his familiar voice stating the text he just delivered.

I typed in a quick reply, hitting send, and placed the phone down the table.

𝘉𝘰𝘵𝘩 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘮𝘺 𝘯𝘢𝘮𝘦𝘴 𝘏𝘦𝘭𝘪𝘰𝘥𝘰𝘳 𝘙𝘦𝘺𝘦𝘴. 𝘐𝘵'𝘴 𝘙𝘦𝘺𝘯𝘢 𝘓𝘦𝘪𝘨𝘩 𝘈𝘭𝘷𝘢𝘳𝘦𝘻.

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