Chapter 10
Fox
“Do you think, at some point, you could nip over to my room and grab my stuff? Like…I haven’t brushed my teeth in the past twenty-four hours. And I might need my phone.”
He laughed at my silly demands, and that in itself was a relief.
“I did think about that, but then…”
“Yeah, you fucked off.”
“I didn’t mean it like that. Your friends…”
“My friends can fuck off too,” I grumped, picking up a chip from the plate in front of me.
We now had food, which Noah was busying himself organising on a tray between us.
On the bed. Because, yes. Food in bed. “They didn’t seem too bothered to figure out where I’d been,” I continued, both talking and stealing chips off his plate.
“Like, I go missing for twenty-four hours, and they were more concerned with Thomas and his bloody drama with the man-child.”
“What’s up with the man-child?” he asked, as I grimaced wildly.
“Flirted with someone else around the pool, again. He’s young, and Thomas is an idiot. Always was.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
“About my ex and his awful taste in twinks or the fact that I latch on to people far too quickly?” I didn’t bother waiting for his response to that one.
“Truth is, I meet someone and think I’ve found the love of my life, and then I become clingy and obsessive and assume they want to be with me as much as I want to be with them. ”
“Sounds… I want to say familiar.” He swallowed loudly, then smiled awkwardly.
“Now I want to take that first word back so I can say something nice and supportive instead of agreeing with that being your entire personality summed up in a few words. I get it. You come across exactly like that. Even after just knowing you for a day or whatever.”
“Yes,” I said, nodding, and weirdly appreciating all the words he’d said.
They made perfect sense. “I’m like that.
And I can see what you’re thinking, you want to run away again, but this is me, okay?
And it sucks and it’s shitty, and I trust people far too easily.
The strange thing is…at work? I’m nothing like this.
I become someone completely different.” I'd only had one sip of a drink earlier, and now I was weirdly word-vomiting feelings. Like I was frightened that he’d disappear again before I could tell him everything that was festering in my head.
“I know that.” The way he nodded was…maybe concerning?
Or perhaps he was just always this honest. “I know exactly what you mean. I’m pretty confident and straightforward at work.
I can trust my instincts, and I absolutely talk the talk and walk the walk.
But with…you know. Dating. Meeting people. I’m terrible.”
“You’re just scared. But what I am trying to say here is…”
“You’re a good person,” he interrupted, sitting himself down on the bed. Weird. The two of us, and a tray full of food.
“I’m irresponsible with my feelings.” More honesty, from me this time. “And sometimes with other people’s feelings. I fall too fast, and I go headfirst into situations and make them big and complicated and then.”
“Then you…” He stopped again, like he’d said too much. “I can swap into work mode and psychoanalyse your personality and give you advice, if that is what you need here.”
I wanted him to smile. I wanted him to kiss me again. I wanted. Fuck. I was doing exactly what I shouldn’t do, and I was still doing it, reaching out and letting my fingers stroke along his face.
“You can. Or you can just tell me to fuck off back to my hotel room and leave you alone.”
“No.” He looked like he meant it. Then he suddenly looked like he regretted everything.
“If you want my advice? Then here it is. This is going to end badly, Fox. Because you’re going to go back home and I will go back home, and we won’t have this again. Whatever we have here between us right now? It’s…just this…holiday. A temporary…insanity.”
“Absolutely.” I did agree. “But it’s too good to ignore. Too lovely not to take advantage of, don’t you agree?”
“But then, in the end? I’ll be a complete wreck.”
“Why?”
The question was as stupid as the way I’d burnt my foot, which now throbbed against the mattress.
I was just trying to adjust my position, to get closer to him, but he sat up and moved away.
Just a few inches, the tray clattering alarmingly between us, but still.
And I followed despite my foot screaming in pain with every brush against anything.
But I took it, tolerated it, because I was not having this.
Also? I was an idiot. I was exactly what I’d said.
Clingy. Childish. Rushed headfirst into anything.
“Because all I want is something like this, what we’re pretending we’ve got going on here,” he continued weakly, “and I know I can’t have it. I’m not fun, Fox. I’m boring and work too much, and I’m just… I’m nobody’s idea of a life partner. I’m not super fit, and I’m definitely not handsome….”
“Shut the fuck up,” I growled. “What the fuck?” Now I was angry.
“That’s the most stupid thing I’ve ever heard.
What? Why the hell do you think I’m back here, Noah?
Because you’re the only man in this bloody sandpit?
Because you think I’m that desperate? I should be at the bar doing shots with my friends, well, my so-called friends.
They’re all idiots too, and they make me feel like shit, even when I don’t deserve it.
Because that’s who I am. I put up with them because it’s easier than admitting that I don’t have any friends.
Not friends who make me feel good about myself.
You do, Noah. I know this is me being delusional, but… this? Fuck. I make no sense, do I?”
He shook his head, and I did too. I knew, okay?
I was starving and stole a few more chips off his plate whilst he sighed and composed himself.
Chips. I never ate them. Not part of the nutritional diet I tended to fool myself into being good for my wellbeing.
Amongst all the other lies I told myself.
And now I was sharing far too much about all of this with a complete stranger.
“You know,” I said, letting him serve up vegetables on my plate.
I stole another chip off his and almost swallowed it down whole.
My hands shaking with hunger. I hadn’t eaten properly since yesterday, and it showed.
Mentally as well as physically. “I’m a mess.
I know how fucked up I am, and how mad this is.
I do this. I hook up with people, and then I get attached.
My friends are all I have, and they’re shitty.
Maybe I should know better. Perhaps I am this desperate. I know it’s stupid, honestly, I do.”
“You’re not stupid,” he said quietly.
“I am. And I know it, okay? I am well aware, no need to tell me off about it.”
“I’m not.” Truth. He was just quietly picking up a piece of broccoli from my plate and eating it. Like we were sharing food. A very small part of my insides twisted at the very sweetness of that.
“Just so you know,” I deflected, out of things to say. I’d already said too much. Overwhelmed him with everything that I was.
“Can I…ask you something?”
“Sure.” I stole another chip. What were we like?
“Why? Why did you come back?”
Oh. We were going there. “Because I am…”
“No. You don’t get to say it because I don’t think it’s true. You putting yourself down like this. You’re nice, Fox. Open and honest and I don’t think you’re desperate, I just think…maybe…” And there it was. Him looking uncomfortable. Me being me. Still sat here with a stolen chip in my grip.
Shameful. I was a grown-up professional and still sat here clinging to this man. This wonderful human being, who had done everything, rescued me and treated my sunburn and carried me…right out of his life.
Yet here I was.
“So, you came back, but then how would this work, Fox?” He yapped on, waving his arms around.
I liked the shirt he was wearing. It suited him.
Great colour. Me? I was smiling. And he was ranting.
“I mean? You live in what, deepest darkest Scotland? I couldn’t be further away.
I have a good practice, decent colleagues, the workload is bearable, and I’ve almost paid off my mortgage. ”
“And?” I snapped. “I have a very good job too. My dream one, actually. I live on site in this historic old school building, and it’s stunning. My life is good. I am good. I’m just…”
“Lonely,” he filled in like he actually knew me. It took me aback. Like my whole body went rigid, him calling me out like that. I wasn’t lonely.
I was fucking lonely.
“True,” I whispered. “But aren’t we all?
I just want someone in my life. I want someone to wake up with.
Someone to make me a cup of tea in the morning, sort out my troubles and tell me I’m…
fucking pretty or whatever.” I laughed bitterly because I didn’t think I could sink any lower.
Sat here spilling all my truths to a stranger.
I had to get that properly set in my head. He was a stranger. And this would never go anywhere. He’d said it too; Noah and I would end in disaster. In sadness and terrible… I couldn’t even find the proper words for it.
“You’re pretty lovely, Fox. You’re handsome and very attractive.
If you… I mean, if you’d walked into my practice, I would have fluffed my words.
Made a right fool out of myself. That’s what I do when someone walks in who ticks all my boxes.
Attraction is a tricky thing, but when it’s there, it’s hard to ignore. ”
“Agreed,” I said, finally putting something decent in my mouth, a piece of carrot. He hadn’t touched his steak. Neither had I. And the wine bottle sat on the side unopened.
Nothing felt worth celebrating here. Nor did it feel like a date. I just felt deflated and upset.
“I didn’t mean for all this to happen. I never went out to look for you or anything, didn’t purposely end up here.
It just happened, Noah. Like fate. I wanted to make things…
I don’t know. I just stumbled upon your villa, and I think I just needed a break.
And yes, maybe I wanted a rebound. I just wanted someone to make me feel better about all this.
That’s how I ended up drunk on your deckchair… ”
“How did you end up so drunk?”
“Thomas.” I sighed. “I thought I was… I don’t know.
Just him being there, and annoying me and Jordyn being a brat, showing off and being all over the guy who at one time told me I was the love of his life?
He moved to Glasgow for me. Upped his entire life, told me this was it for him, and then he promised we would have a whole life together!
We talked about children, for fuck’s sake.
So, yes, I’m bitter. I’m upset and heartbroken and angry that I fell for it all, and having it constantly thrown in my face, my friends treating it as a joke, and I get it, I get that they try to lighten the mood, but it’s not funny when you’re the one sat there with all the heartbreak.
I was the one who believed in it all. I was the one he cheated on.
And now I was sat there like an idiot. So yeah.
I got drunk because I thought it would just make things easier to carry.
That I would just make my way back to my room and finally sleep.
Perhaps things would seem better in the morning. ”
I didn’t know when I’d burst into tears.
When the wetness had spilled from my eyes.
But then his thumb was suddenly there wiping my skin, and then he leant over and kissed me.
The way he did. Because I was figuring him out.
The little things he did. The way my upset yielded affection.
If I asked for something, he gave it so willingly. So easy. Like it was just who he was.
“Sorry,” I whispered.
“No.” His voice was so tender that I cried even more. Sobbed into my hands as he tried to hug me, our plates clattering on the stupid tray between us.
“You’re right, you’re a bit of a mess,” he soothed.
“Says the guy who doesn’t want me either,” I howled. Fuck. I really was a child.
“Darling,” he said. He sounded just like his mother, which made me splutter out some ill-advised hysterics. A mess? Me? I was a disaster.
“You know what I’m going to do?” he said, pulling back and once again wiping down my face. Smoothing hair out of my face. Then gently tugging me closer and kissing me. All things I felt I didn’t deserve. All his kindness. All his gentle care.
“What?” I slobbered, picking up my napkin from the tray and blowing my nose. I might as well. I was disgusting. Awful. Stupid.
“I’m going to cut up your steak and feed it to you. One bite at a time. And all I want you to do is hold the wine glass.”
Yes. That was me laughing. But he did exactly that, poured me a glass of silky red, and placed it in my hand. Motioned for me to nudge up the bed so I could get comfortable against the pillows.
“Here,” he said, feeding me the first morsel of steak. Carefully dipped into whatever sauce he’d supplied. Spicy and rich against my tongue. “It goes really well with this wine.”
“You haven’t even tried it,” I snorted.
“I know my wines.” He winked. “Now let me tell you a story.”
I just chewed. Then he fed me another bite.
“I don’t hook up with people much because I don’t do well with it. Firstly, I don’t have much confidence in my abilities as a…” He grimaced out the word, “Lover. I’m often awkward, and you know what it’s like.”
“What?” He was actually telling me things, personal details. I wasn’t going to let him get away with just the basics here.
“You know. You connect with someone on an app and think you’re on the same track, and then you actually meet up in person and everything is off.”
“Awkward,” I agreed. Been there, done that. I nodded enthusiastically.
“It never ends well. I don’t expect it to ever do. Because…me.”
“You’re you. Have you any idea how easy you are to talk to?”
That made him pause. Pour himself a glass of wine. Then he took a quiet sip as I just watched him.
His handsome features. That absolute calm in him. I liked that. I was sure he had a feisty side as well, but for now I couldn’t imagine him being anything but this. Quiet. Calm. Handsome. Kind.
“I struggle with connecting with people.”
“No, you don’t. You connect with me fine.” I grinned, hoping he would see what I was trying to say.
“Maybe,” he agreed. Then he shoved another piece of steak in my mouth.