15 minutes later

Sunz hears the bathroom door open so he turns his back against that direction and looks at the wall, just in case he sees something he shouldn’t.

He can hear droplets of water flow down from her hair and hit the floor one by one (At least she dried her hair). Then he hears the sound of the towel dropping to the floor…

He sighs in relief (Whew! She is still conscious enough to dry herself off.)… (And now thinking about it. Kinda weird to eavesdrop on someone showering.)

After a minute or two he heard Grace go back to the bathroom to blow-dry her hair then went back to bed.

During all this Sunz just sat there doing nothing, not using his phone or turning around to take a peak. Just sitting in silence with only his mind and paying attention to his surrounding, just to pass the time.

Then he heard Grace getting out of bed, slowly walking toward his corner. Sunz tries to keep his cool but his mind keeps cycling through all of the bad scenarios that Grace could do to him.

Then he felt a strong grip on his shoulder from Grace and she said “ Turn around”.

He obliges to turn around (fear for his life) and asks “You need something from me?”

She said “You bed now! Or else you’ll catch a cold” while caressing her hair.

Sunz: No no no. It’s your bed, so only you allow to sleep on it. I’m ok with the floor. And won’t it be weird for us strangers to sleep on the same bed together?

Grace stop caressing her hair, stare him dead in the eye, and said “You are in no condition to reason with me!” as she slowly increased the force of her grip on Sunz’s shoulder.

Sunz then frantically agrees while trying to release her grip with his other hand. After he agrees she releases her hand off his shoulder and walks past him to turn off the light in the room.

When she walked past Sunz again to get back to the bed, he heard a whisper “I’m sorry!”.

Sunz thought that it wasn’t a big deal but maybe it was to Grace, which make him thinks (Sometimes action do speak louder than words)

After that, both got onto the bed. Grace gets on first and starts reading the book she brought from the start. Sunz gets on after her and tries to leave Grace as much room on the bed as possible.

Even though Sunz feels a bit nervous about sleeping in the same bed with a girl. That nervousness soon be overcome by the comfiness of the bed. He then slowly fall asleep while Grace was reading her book.

Just like Sunz, Grace is also nervous to have someone of the opposite gender sleeping next to her. She was multitasking, reading her book while constantly glancing at Sunz to see what will he does next.

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

Soon enough, she catches on that Sunz has already fallen asleep. That is when she finally calms down but occasionally checks to see if he is ok.

At one point she even poke his face to see if he is really asleep.

Soon enough Grace started to feel tired, her eyes started to feel dried and she continue to yawn a lot. She put the book away on the table next to the bed.

Take another glance at Sunz, and see that he is quite near the edge of the bed. So she carefully pulls him closer to the middle and then adjusts the blanket so it can cover both of them.

She then turns off the light, tugs herself into the bed, and… Slowly moves to the middle until their body comes in contact. Before closing her eyes she giggles.

(I feel happy!)

Hours later, Sunz slowly opens his eyes staring at the ceiling, and wonders (What time is it?). As he tried to get up, he feel something heavy weighting him down. When he tried to apply more force to get up, the same thing that is weighing him down also increase its force.

That is when he tilt his head up to see what was stopping him from getting up. And it was Grace’s arm laying outside of the blanket across his chest.

Knowing the reason Sunz then turned his head to the side and was startled by Grace’s position. She must have turned her head to the side while sleeping which creates a small gap for a kiss, and one person leaning forward is all it takes.

Then he notice how close their body was touchy (shoulder to shoulder). So he decided to shuffle his body away from her because they shouldn’t be this close.

(I thought I was far from the middle and near the edge of the bed. What happened?) He remembers.

Then he heard a groan from Grace.

“Ughghg what are you doing… stop moving around so much!” She said in her sleepy voice and pull Sunz closer to her body again with ease.

Then she asks “Do you hate me”

Sunz: No! What made you think that?

Grace: Then why are you trying to get away from me?

Sunz: I just feel that this is unethical. People only do this when they both have committed to each other.

Grace: Unethical? Said the guy who tried to sleep in the corner of my room. Didn’t you think that it would feel creepy?

Sunz: I did! But I was more concerned about you. After the ice skating incident, you start to act strange.

Grace (I can’t tell him that I was embarrassed to be held in such a romantic way. Which lead me to ignore him the rest of the trip. That was rude of me!)

I’m sorry that moment I wasn’t feeling well and wanted to go back immediately. (Lies)

Grace: But thank you so much for caring about me. (It’s kind of nice to have other people see me differently.)

Grace: You know… I imagine us being a couple would be so fun and quirky. Don’t you think so?

Sunz: I… have no comment on that…

Grace giggles: Whether you like it or not. We’ll be official in two days. So let’s not go easy on each other. Ok!

Sunz: Ok!

Grace then slither the hand that was hugging Sunz from outside the blanket into the blanket. Then she pulls Sunz even closer to her and leans her head close to him.

Grace whispered: Now if you don’t mind, I would like to sleep more so don’t move. Ok?

Sunz did not respond nor move at all. It is like he is trapped in a casket made only to fit him in one position with no wiggle room.

Grace “I’ll take that as a Yes” then fall back to sleep immediately.

Having no other options Sunz also falls asleep minutes later.

Hours later Sunz woke up feeling refreshed. That was one of the best sleep he ever had. Then he hears Grace’s voice

“ Finally wake up. You sleep even longer than I expected. Was that a good sleep you had? ”

Sunz: Yes! And I think it was because of you.

Grace just smile at his response and said “I’m heading down for lunch, you coming?”

Sunz: I am, wait for me to freshen up then we can go together.

Grace: It’s not like I’m planning to eat alone!

On the last day before Round Two, we didn’t do much except train on our own then meet up with each other for dinner then go back to our separate rooms to prepare for the next match.