Chapter 22 #4
I stand at the window looking out into the back garden, garden lights are shining into the garden and lit solar lanterns hang from the trees.
I have a glass of wine in my hand, music is playing through the sound system and not your usual music, something called “Sunny Mornings.” It’s all piano and zen with birds and shit.
Alora is happily chatting away from the kitchen and whatever the hell she’s cooking smells divine.
I turn and look around the house, home. This is a home. Candles flicker, and lamps throw a warm glow through the small and intimate space, and the weirdest feeling runs through my veins, though I can’t quite put my finger on exactly what it is.
“Babe,” Alora calls.
Babe….
“Yeah?”
“Do you want béarnaise or Diane sauce?”
What is this alternate universe? I take a gulp of my wine, almost shocked to silence.
“Whatever,” I call back. “Both sound good.”
“Dinner in ten.”
“Okay, I’ll just freshen up.” I tentatively walk up the stairs, unsure what new surprises lie in store.
There are two bedrooms on the next level and a small bathroom.
Is one of these hers? I duck my head in to see that one bedroom has been converted to a wardrobe, it’s full to the brim of clothes all hanging neatly.
Boxes of shoes are lined up but they aren’t your usual boxes, they seem very old.
Ah yes, I remember that she has a love of all things vintage. This must be where she keeps her collection. I keep going up the stairs and find the main at the top, my eyes roam around as if I’m a child in a candy shop. “Fuck. Me.”
This isn’t a grand room by any means, it’s small and intimate.
Romantic.
The walls are a shade of blush apricot, the drapes are an antique lace.
A beautiful chandelier hangs in the center of the room and there’s a giant picture of a vase of roses.
There’s a cream marble dresser with a gilded gold mirror above it.
Over the bed is a sheer canopy and the bedside tables are a matching cream marble.
This is probably the most feminine and luxe bedroom I have ever been in…
and I’ve seen a lot of bedrooms in my life.
“Wow,” I whisper as I drop to sit on the bed and look around.
I can feel Alora in every inch of it; her presence is so strong in here. My eyes roam around the space and I see a book on her side of the bed and I pick it up.
The Alchemist
I skim over the blurb and place it back down, not at all the type of book that I imagine she would read.
My eyes go to the shelves and I go to them, my finger runs across the spines.
They’re worn as if read time and time again, like an old companion that’s constantly brought out, a friend she revisits.
I pick up an oval photo frame of a woman, she has long dark hair and a pretty smile, she looks like Alora and my heart sinks.
This must be her late mother. I carefully put the frame back where it was.
My eyes land on an old metal tin, it’s obviously an antique and very well loved.
Red and gold and very worn, I wonder what’s inside.
My guilty eyes rise to the door to check the coast is clear and I pick it up, slide the lid off and frown as I stare down at the contents.
Needles and thread, with a selection of black or white satin fabric labels in different sizes, huh, what are these for?
I pick one up and turn it over to see that it has been embroidered with the initials.
A S
I don’t understand why she would have this, AS what does that stand for…oh, Alora Sorenson. What the hell? She embroiders her initials onto labels for her clothing? I’ve never met anyone who would take the time to do such a thing. I close the tin, unsure how to unpack that piece of information.
The bathroom is small and cream marble, quaint and understated. I hate to admit this, but Alora is the first normal person I’ve ever been with.
The women I date have all come from money and a lot of that has to do with the circles we run in, but a lot of it also has to do with the fact that I have no interest in meeting a gold digger.
Alora doesn’t fit into either category, or any that I’ve ever known for that matter. She isn’t even normal, she’s eccentric with weird grandma hobbies.
Completely happy as she is.
I sit for a moment with my thoughts, blazingly aware that she wouldn’t give up anything here for the life that I live. My world is fast, hard, and competitive. Nocturnal.
A million miles away from a vegetable garden, embroidered initials and playlists called “Sunny Mornings.”
This will never work.
“Dinner.” I hear her voice echo up the stairs.
“Coming.”
Before I know it my hands are under the faucet and as the hot water runs over them, I’m wondering if this thing between us is even worth pursuing.
Let’s face it, I already know how this ends.
I make my way downstairs to see that she has set the table outside in the garden in amongst the lights. Two long, thin, white candles are in the center of the table, crystal glasses of water are beside the delicious-looking meal and everything looks perfect.
I smile as I sit down. “You are quite the entertainer, Miss Sorenson.” I pick up my napkin and place it on my lap.
“Don’t get too excited.” She smiles as she picks up her knife and fork. “You haven’t tasted it yet.”
I take a bite of the melt-in-the-mouth steak and my eyebrows flick up in surprise. “I knew this smelt good, but that was nothing in comparison to how it tastes.”
She smiles proudly and we eat in silence for a while as my mind scampers through this new information.
“Tell me.” I finish my mouthful as I try to get the wording right in my head. “Where do you see this going?” I wipe my mouth with the napkin.
“What?”
I gesture to the air between us. “This.”
“Well.” She cuts her steak with a subtle shrug. “I’m happy today.” She smiles with another shrug as she bites the steak from her fork.
I stare at her with a frown. “What does that mean?”
“I live for the day, I’m happy in the moment.”
“What the fuck does that mean? Speak English.”
“Well….” She thinks for a moment. “So many people live in the future and are always thinking ahead as to what will make them happy, but in the meantime are walking around miserable.”
“True.” I sip my wine as I listen.
“And up until recently I had always been very happy on a day-to-day basis.”
“Why until recently?”
“Well.” She smiles softly over at me. “You were this beautiful book that I started to read in Switzerland but I got interrupted and felt like I didn’t get to finish the story.
” She takes a sip of wine. “But I always had your page turned down in hope that one day I could pick it back up to see how it ended.”
My heart swells as I stare at her.
“And then I saw you at that auction and instantly I was back in the unfinished book. And no matter how hard I tried to live in the moment and enjoy my day, I couldn’t do it.”
“Why not?”
“Because I was back in there with you.”
We stare at each other as the air crackles between us.
“So my days became sad and lonely and I felt like I wasn’t where I was supposed to be.”
“And now you’re here and back in our book.”
“Yes.” She holds her glass over and I tap it with mine.
“Where does this book go, Alora?”
“I don’t know.” She shrugs. “But I do know that I’m happy being back in the moment and I want to just take it one day at a time with us. As long as we’re both happy today is all that matters.”
I stare at her for a moment, uneasiness falls over me at her answer.
If your plan is to make me fall in love with you…only to leave me as soon as things get hard.
“You like to live a simple life?” I ask.
“I do. Stillness changes me in a way that busy can’t.”
“I have never been still.”
“I know.” She chews her food as if thinking. “But how do you know what’s in your heart if you are never still enough to listen to it?”
“Maybe my heart doesn’t speak.” I shrug.
“Or maybe you just never listened to it.”
I eat in silence, unsure how she wants me to respond.
“Love isn’t always loud, Edward.”
My eyes rise to meet hers. “What does that mean?”
“Lust is loud, love is quiet. It grows in between spoken words and offers a sense of belonging between two people.”
“That’s if you’re looking for love.”
“That’s true.”
“You know….” I hesitate. “If you’re looking for a grand love, I’m not the man for you. That’s not what I’m looking for.”
“I get that.” She nods. “But do you ever ask yourself why you wouldn’t want a grand love in your life?”
“No.”
“Well, then.” She shrugs casually. “Maybe this will be our last night together.”
Don’t say that.
“Why?” I put my cutlery down.
“Because I’m not going to dim my light to feed your shadows.”
My eyes hold hers.
“In my eyes…if you give up on true love then you are making a conscious decision to live a life with an average love. But no matter how you look at it, they both hurt.”
Her words hang in the air between us.
“Is that what you’re looking for?” I ask. “True love.”
“I’m looking for a best friend. Someone who knows what’s in my heart even when I don’t speak. A teacher, a protector, a beautiful father for my children.” She shrugs and sips her wine. “At my age this isn’t about orgasms, this is about finding my soulmate.”
I snap my eyes away from hers, typical fucking bullshit.
“I mean….” She stops herself mid-sentence.
“What?” I snap, annoyed.
“What can you offer me, Edward?”
“What does that mean?” I huff, she’s getting annoying now.
“Let’s be real, apart from orgasms and money…what can you offer me?”
“Apart from orgasms and money?” I frown. “Is that all I am to you?”
“Not at all, but I believe that’s all you think you are.”
I throw my napkin down onto the table. “I didn’t come here to get lectured on my shortcomings.”
“What did you come here for?”
“I came here to see you.”
“And yet you shy away from a hard conversation.”
“I’m not shying away from anything. I just don’t need this bullshit.”
“Okay.” She shrugs and picks up her cutlery and begins to casually eat again.
“What does okay mean?” I snap.
“It was fun while it lasted, but the reality is that this probably will be our last night together, and I hope you have a nice life with your white-hot money and your lukewarm love.”
I blink, surprised.
White-hot money and your lukewarm love…. She hit the nail on the head.
If she stabbed me through the heart it would hurt less.
She’s ending it.
I drop my head, rattled.
“I believe that at some point in your life you have to take a big swing and truly go all in, or else what’s the point?” She shrugs.
“It’s not that simple, we come from different worlds.” I drag my hand through my hair, completely flustered. “I’ve told you already, I’m not good at relationships and as soon as we put pressure on it everything is going south.”
“Why do you think that you are not good at relationships?”
“I don’t think it, I know it. I’m not….” I pause. “Wired the same as most people.”
She reaches over the table and takes my hand in hers as her eyes search mine. “My love will not heal you, Edward, but I can hold your hand while you heal yourself.”
Emotion unexpectedly fills me and her silhouette blurs.
What the fuck is going on with me lately?
“Hey….” She gets up and comes around and sits across my lap, her lips dust mine. “We can work it out together.”
“I’m not capable of giving you what you want, Alora,” I murmur as my arm tightens around her. “You need to move on.”
“No.” She kisses me again. “I’m not leaving you where you are.”
“You need to because…” I shake my head, “…I can’t….”
“Yes. You can.”
I lean my forehead against her shoulder, words escape me. There is nothing I can say that will make either of us feel any better.
“If you can’t do it for you…then do it for me.”