Just Rose

Chapter 23

It was a long dragging evening that led into a tossing endless night. She checked her phone a thousand times in case he had anything to say to her, then dying when it showed nothing on her screen. She replayed that kiss over and over in her head. Trying to remember every tiny detail of how it felt. She couldn’t focus on work or anything in particular. She couldn’t eat her home baked lasagna or even enjoy playing with Muffin.

Listless. Restless. Agitated.

She scooped Muffin up in her arms and laid on the couch to rub his soft velvet face against hers in a soothing manner. The lump in her chest and throat un-shift able. She tried to watch a movie and burst into tears when the leading couple snogged passionately, before he told her he really loved her and turned it over.

She texted Abby some pointless chit chat and had a brief conversation about nothing in a bid to distract herself. Trying anything to shift her focus and calm her rattled emotions. She could not tell Abby about the kiss, she was a bit too close to Rob for this kind of talk and Rose had no idea what the heck to make of it at all.

She called her mother and had the briefest of catch ups in an attempt to distract herself.

She emptied her email inbox and threw her laptop aside impatiently.

Nothing could take her focus off what he had just done to her. That kiss was the stuff romance books were built on and he had just walked off casually as though he had just kissed his gran farewell.

Picking Muffin up again, she headed through to her bedroom finally, too restless to keep trying to stay awake. She replayed every minuscule detail of his face, his look, his actions and tried to make sense of them. Torn between anger, heartbreak, a tinge of hope and torture!

‘Muffin why are men so hard to figure out?’ She held the little fur ball close under the duvet watching his large brown eyes. He watched her carefully giving no hint to the inner workings of the male mind.

‘It’s the worst kind of torture for a woman.’ She explained sulkily, his little face listening intently. ‘If you want to inflict pain and suffering on a future girlfriend Muffin, may I suggest leaving her in great doubt to how you feel about her.’ She sighed, pulling his little face close and reveling in the warm licks he spread across her nose enthusiastically as though sensing she needed them.

‘Kiss her passionately, like she’s your absolute world, in a way that will ruin her for any other man and then give her the cold shoulder. Like dangling a worm on a hook. The result is a pretty messed up emotional wreck.’ She sighed loudly, Muffin narrowed his eyes a little and that almost made her smile, before he turned around facing her with a little fluffy rear and a sure-fire sign he was going to sleep. His butt directly in her face; no longer interested in consoling her.

‘You are a just a typical male, aren’t you?’ She rubbed his fur and left him in peace to roll on her back and stare into the darkness. She sighed and resigned herself to the fact that this mental turning over and dissecting wasn’t helping anyone.

She finally drifted to sleep in the early hours when fatigue overtook. A welcome relief. Muffin snoring loudly on the pillow beside her and the trees casting odd shadows across her room through her thin shades. The moon was high and full and giving everything a silvery sheen that had done nothing to soothe away her turmoil.

* * *

She woke early, despite her lack of sleep and plunged herself into another bath. Even her normal relaxing bubbles and luxurious products could not bring her out of this tizzy. She just needed to see him again, see how he behaved around her. She needed to know what the hell was going on between them. If anything? To try and read his behaviour or see if he would say anything more about what had taken place.

He was literally torturing her.

She agonised over her outfit far longer than normal, relying on the non-responses from Muffin as he watched from the perch on her bed, tongue out and ears up and opted for another floaty sundress. Somewhere in the back of her mind, that little voice of stupidity.

‘Well it worked yesterday!’.

She spent too much time on her hair and barely noticeable makeup and even longer on her perfume choice. She felt like a teen going on a first date and had to shake herself a million times as the clock drew nearer to nine am. Her hands trembled on her coffee mug and her eyes darted to the clock every minute in the last remaining minutes. Pacing her floor had become the only calming action this morning that gave her any sense of control. Muffin had not enjoyed being dragged out for a six am walk and was now sleeping soundly in her bed. Not offering much in the way of comfort to his frantic owner.

Finally, the familiar crunch of his tyres on the gravel out front had her spring from her perch at the kitchen table. She had to grab herself and wait for his knock on the door and calm herself down.

Okay...okay, okay, Calm and slow.

She chastised herself and her over eager nerves. She pasted on her brightest smile, walked slowly and deliberately down the hall; opening the door and almost swooned at the sight of him. He was in a dark grey hooded sweater over jeans, a navy t-shirt evident where the zipper had not been pulled all the way up. It really brought out the colour of his steel grey eyes and black hair more so than light colours did and the effects were utterly soul destroying on her already fragile heart.

He looked different today, more sinister than smooth and charming. Possibly a little tired with a slight shadow under his eyes. He hadn’t shaved for once and was sporting some serious shadowy stubble that made him even sexier. His aftershave smelled divine and he looked less pulled together than normal, not the overly in control well-groomed Rob of yesterday. Shyness overtook her.

‘Hey.’ his thousand-watt smile as always, no change there.

‘Hey.’ She smiled back, feeling the tension sizzling between them. He followed her into the cramped hall, once again that awkwardness and tension looming between them. She held her hands behind her back to make sure she did not reach out and touch him as she let him in. Every one of her nerve endings urging her to do so. He seemed torn.

‘About yesterday Rose. Can we just forget it? ... Moment of madness? Weakness! Fatigue and sawdust drunk ...’ He trailed off as he manoeuvred past her in the hall, trying to pull out a response from her facial expression. There was an aura of restlessness and unease about him; his body giving off a million conflicting signals to her as his body heat began to stir up her blood from close proximity. ‘I don’t know what I was thinking, and I don’t want it to come between us.’

Inwardly dying, surprised by this turn of events, she plastered on a fake smile and nodded, trying her hardest not to react.

‘I guess ... Moment of something, that’s for sure.’ She dropped her eyes to focus on the collar of his t-shirt, her voice soft and almost deflated, trying to stop the tears coming up from deep within. She could not look him in the eye like this.

‘I think we were just caught up in a brief second of craziness, from too much sun and god knows what. I’m sorry.’ He sounded weird and tense. But she couldn’t bring her eyes up to him, no matter how much she tried. It was taking all her energy to keep her face calm and straight.

‘We won’t mention it again. Say it was heat stroke or something’ Her voice didn’t fully conceal the emotions coursing through her this time, it was obvious she was upset, but he didn’t respond. Her heart had shattered into a thousand little pieces that were filling up her hollow legs and all the while, he seemed relieved.

She was desolate; so easy to brush her off, so easy to brush that kiss off like it was nothing.

He was an asshole after all.

He gestured for her to follow him to the car and she obeyed. Grabbing her bag and avoiding looking at him anymore; she no longer wanted him near, she wanted him to go away so she could curl up on the floor and cry. A conflict of emotions battling inside of her that wasn’t going to be so easy to get over.

Her mood never lifted the entire time they were driving, the car journey was strained, as was conversation and in the end, he put the radio on, allowing them both to stay silent and look at the passing scenery. A few times she thought he looked like he wanted to say something, but then he would aggressively gear shift and look away again and just concentrate on the road. She wanted to get away from him. Somehow being beside him as he expertly handled his little sports car, just made her even more heartbroken.

In the store, they selected the waxes and stain without much interaction, her answers were mostly nods or short responses and he seemed equally quiet. When she moved forward to pay for the wax stain he cut in front of her, a gentle hand on her shoulder.

‘I’ve got this.’ He smiled at her, almost as though he was trying to get her out of her funk, but she just shrugged.

‘It’s fine, I don’t need anyone to pay for things for me. I’m more than capable.’ She shrugged his hand from her shoulder, hating that it’s heat still affected her body and slid in front of him daintily. Smiling widely at the shop assistant while pulling her purse out. She could feel Rob still so close beside her, he hadn’t moved back, and she didn’t care if he had taken this refusal to let him pay as rude. She didn’t care if he was annoyed at her mood. Right now, she didn’t like him very much at all.

She felt him finally move as she punched in her debit card pin on the machine, he seemed to take an awfully long time to walk away from her though, carrying the cans of wax and sealant and brushes. She said goodbye to the clerk and followed slowly.

The long journey back was not much better. He tried empty idle chat and was met with short uninterested replies and finally gave up. He didn’t press further but retreated into silence and turned the radio up further. He seemed to sense that it was futile to try and the atmosphere between them was no longer hospitable. Some love songs came on, filling the car with soothing seductive tunes and he immediately flipped the channel.

Said it all really!

Rose continued watching the road.