Talia's Torment

Chapter 5: Exercises in futility.

The dinner had gone well and Talia was headed to her cabin after helping to clear and clean the dishes as usual.  It was the least she could do since he did all the cooking every night.  She remembered the first time she had brought the pizza to his place when he suggested they eat dinner together that first night.  He had stated that they could go over her training advancement while eating together and he was going to have someone look at the wiring on the stove the next day.  She hadn’t had the heart to tell him that the fire was her fault and not the stove so she had agreed on the instance that she bring the meal.  Bless his heart he had actually taken a bite of the charcoal briquette she had brought over before she let him off the hook and explained that she had burned water and couldn’t cook to save herself.

He had sighed and stated that he was glad to hear it and even happier that he would not have to finish the pizza she had brought over.  He had actually put air quotes around the world pizza with a grin.  He had then told her that if she didn’t mind he had some leftovers in the fridge and he would set the table since she didn’t know where everything was.  He had just asked her to nuke the leftovers in the fridge for a couple of minutes while he did that, and much to their misery she had agreed.  Talia swore up and down she had only set the darn thing and walked away, she didn’t know that she couldn’t leave the lid on that darn dish.  Really, how could she have known that the microwave would react so violently to the little sliver of gold trim on that darn thing?  Ever since, Tanner had nicknamed that night the “Kaboom” incident and she had been banned from touching anything that would make or reheat food whatsoever.  Then that statement was rephrased to add that she was also not allowed to make anything that they would consume as he pointedly threw out the “pizza briquette” that she had brought that night.  It really had been to their best interests, and bonus now she got to eat lots of steak, she loved steak.

Talia’s thoughts flashed back to that grin he had been wearing tonight.  She knew he had been avoiding explaining it to her and she had let him.  She didn’t like secrets, not after her life had been bombed by the biggest rug pull ever, but she had a feeling that the truth would come out to her later.  She couldn’t explain why, but she knew that Tanner wouldn’t hurt her and she trusted him to tell her what it was really all about when he was ready.  That man was tough to c***k, but she could see she was making headway into figuring him out more.

                The thought struck her again that she was letting him behind her walls that she had built to complete her mission and she chastised herself for allowing the distraction again.  Then his comment about being a small puppy licker came back to her and she had to stifle the urge to laugh.  I mean come on, if the man was going to admit to being that rather than tell her what the grin was really about Talia felt she could let it slide for a while.  At least she could now tease him every time she saw a puppy commercial on the television, assuming there was a future where they actually just sat to watch television one day.

                Talia had to admit to herself while she got ready for bed that the idea was becoming more and more appealing to her.  She climbed into the covers and tried to think of anything else in order to rid the images of Tanner and his muscles from her brain before attempting to sleep yet again.  She knew it was futile to try to sleep but let’s just say she was starting to enjoy practices in futility if her ever returning thoughts of Tanner were any indication.  Hopefully tonight would be just dreams of Tanner that she should not be having rather than another night of waking up in cold sweats with her own screams ringing in her ears.   Yet what was it they say, the definition of insanity was repeating the same action over and over expecting a different result?  Well, insanity here I come, Talia thought as she sighed in exhaustion before she closed her eyes and the room went dark.