They Said He Hated Clingy Girls—So I Stopped… And He Didn’t Like It Chapter 13

They Said He Hated Clingy Girls—So I Stopped… And He Didn’t Like It Chapter 13

I woke up the next morning and decided I was done with that single bed, which had creaked through the entire night. One night on it and my whole back was killing me. So while Blaine was making breakfast, I slipped up behind him and wrapped my arms around his waist. “Um… can we move back today?” Blaine was quiet for a second, then nodded. “Makes sense,” he said. “The bed at the house is a lot better suited to what I have in mind.” I had nothing to say to that. We’d barely reached the front door when a long-haired calico kitten came wobbling toward me.

It meowed nonstop and couldn’t have been more than three or four months old. I scooped it up, and the second I did, I thought of the scratches on Blaine’s hand. “Did you get this for me?” He looked extremely pleased with himself. “I got her from Claire. She’s one of Ginger’s kittens, the one you always feed.” My eyes stung. “I thought you didn’t like cats,” I said. He shrugged. “But you do.” I looked at the scabbed skin on his hand and felt my eyes fill. “She scratched you?” I whispered. “Yeah. It was the first time I’d trimmed her claws, and she wasn’t used to it.

Scratched me when she started squirming.” He reached over and scratched the kitten behind the ear. “She’s vaccinated and dewormed, don’t worry. I even taught her to use the litter box.” I laughed even though my eyes were still wet. And the stuffed cat in the car that had been Claire’s gift for me all along. I set the kitten down, took Blaine’s hand, and pressed my lips to the mark on it. “Blaine,” I said. “I’m really glad I met you.” Blaine cleared his throat, looking away. The tips of his ears turned red. We ended up naming the little menace Mischief because she earned it.

She was relentlessly, wonderfully alive. A while later, Mason texted out of nowhere asking if I wanted to see a movie. Blaine heard the name and went very still. He looked like he was gearing up for a fight. I asked cautiously, “Should I not go?” He laughed. “No. Go. You’re going.” That day, Blaine got dressed like he was headed to a photo shoot, clearly planning to mark his territory immediately. He planted himself directly between Mason and me and watched Mason like he expected him to pick someone’s pocket. The movie started-a war movie. When we walked out, Blaine looked faintly aggrieved.

“Why wasn’t it a romance?” Mason walked past him. “They were company tickets. Take it up with HR.” Blaine looked confused. I gave him a helpless smile. “He had a spare ticket and knew I hadn’t seen it,” I said. Blaine said, “Oh,” in a very specific tone. That night in bed, Blaine held me tight. He’d been getting clingier by the day. I’d been sitting on a question for long enough. “Didn’t you always act like I was too clingy?” He looked genuinely puzzled. “Did I?” “Back then…

you always pulled away when I tried to get close.” Blaine sighed like I’d just asked him the dumbest question imaginable. “Ever heard of playing hard to get?” He raised an eyebrow. “If I just let you do whatever you wanted, you’d stop valuing it.” Apparently, this was a theory he had tested extensively. If he let me kiss him whenever I felt like it, I’d kiss him once. But if he dodged me, I’d chase him down and kiss him five times to get even.