The first thought Cara had after waking up was that something was tickling her ankles, and she squirmed, kicking her feet out to try to get rid of whatever was bothering her. She had absolutely no intention to wake up before she was supposed to, and she knew that her alarm would wake her up at that point. Her bed was the absolute perfect temperature with the bedding slightly cool thanks to the ceiling fan as the comforter drowned her. People — as in her boyfriend and brother — thought it was weird that she wanted the fan on alongside the warmth of the comforter, but that’s what made the temperature perfect. Misty understood that, and that was why she was best friends with Misty. 

After a few seconds of peace, the tickling sensation started back up, and she finally grunted as she pulled her leg away from whatever the offending object was. Squinting her eyes open, she realized the offending object was her boyfriend running his finger up her leg that was exposed. His eyes moved from her leg up to her face, realizing that she was awake, and he purposefully placed the tip of his index finger back on her calf. He slowly started tracing the muscle while maintaining eye contact with her. Cara was glaring at him, but after living with him for the last year, she knew very well that her glare did absolutely nothing to him, except maybe turn him on, especially when it had been all of two minutes since she’d woken up.

In his words, she looked like a disgruntled puppy.

“Why are you being dumb so early in the morning?” she asked, tucking her limbs away from him, curling into a ball underneath the covers. It took her that movement for her to realize that he wasn’t wearing clothes, only a towel covering his lower body. He must’ve taken a shower, and then came to wake her up for some reason. She was so tired that she didn’t even appreciate the view.

He chuckled as he came closer to her and bent down to sit next to her on the bed. “It’s not early,” he said. “It’s 7:30 in the morning, and for someone who used to run at 6:30 throughout college, that really is saying something.”

“It’s a completely different world when you spend 10 hours at work in a week just to take a day off, alright. I would like to at least sleep in on that day off.”

“You did sleep in, though,” Kai pointed out in his obnoxious voice. “You normally wake up at 6 for work.”

“Oh my god, please stop talking.”

“You certainly were saying the opposite last night, Cara. Also probably why you’re tired.” He sounded way too smug for her liking.

“I’m, like, this close to skipping and sleeping for the rest of the day,” she complained, raising her right hand and pinching her thumb and index finger together with barely any space between.

“And miss seeing your brother, boyfriend, and best friend graduate from college?”

“As if I didn’t see it the first time around two years ago,” Cara deadpanned.

Kai smiled. “It’s going to be different now! You’ll be up in the audience instead of suffering through the actual ceremony.”

“That’s exactly why I’m wondering why you even want to go. Our undergrad one was long enough.”

“You know that my dad is insanely excited that Cian and I got our MBA and wants to see both of us walk across a stage.”

“Are you sure your parents will notice if I’m not there?”

“Yes, Cara,” he laughed, taking a hold of her hand and pulling her upright. “I know you’ve been busy and you’re tired, but as soon as we get through the morning and lunch, we’ll come back home and just sleep. How does that sound?” he asked, sounding incredibly patient with her, that it made her want to cry. She blamed her emotions on the lingering exhaustion from working on a new project for the last two weeks, and pulling long hours just to take the day off without using up any of her PTO.

She was saving those for her vacation next month with Kai, and Cara wanted as much time with him as she could possibly take. 

She would never admit this to a l