10. Georgie
CHAPTER TEN
GEORGIE
Fired. He was fired because of his kindness to me.
I feel sick. The moment I leave the elevator, I think it will feel like I can breathe, but all I feel is dread and guilt.
Val hung up on me shortly after she broke the news, and if I didn’t know that the calls were recorded and video footage saved, I would try—and fail—to call back or find the company’s name to tell them to bring N back and get rid of her.
The moment I show up at my Mom’s home, she’s out front watering her hyacinths.
I called her on the way over, and she told me that a fresh pot of tea was on the warmer and waiting for me.
That’s the other thing she always instilled in me: you always greet your guests with tea and coffee and treats.
I know she was just trying to remind me to be courteous and a good host, but when I was younger, I liked to think that this was her rule to make people love our home so much they’d never leave.
My mom was always the one to entertain, it was like our place was the home base for parties and tea and dinners.
She loved it. She got to take care of people and make them happy, and I never minded because I had a plethora of friends who would come with their gaggle of mothers, and we always ended up in my room playing with my Barbies, making forts, pretending we were the moms. As I got older and the parties lessened, it was hard not to notice how much my mom missed it.
I always wondered what changed, why they stopped coming over, but I never asked and she never told. The reason still remains a mystery.
Retirement makes some restless, and that is the case for my mom.
I try to visit her at least once a week for dinner, and even though I argue that I can cook for us, she insists on going to the nines and setting a whole family dinner for two and I come home with all the leftovers.
When I come to spend a weekend like this and she gets to spoil me and take care of me all weekend without complaint (well, mostly no complaints), she’s in her element.
“Hello, sweetie.” She says as if she didn’t just see me last week, like I have been away for forever.
She touches my cheek, eyeing up and down to take me in.
To anyone else, it would look like just that, a child coming home for the first time in forever and mother protectively inspecting that her child is indeed alright.
But I know she’s inspecting to make sure I am taking care of myself, to make sure that things haven’t got bad with my health and me hiding it from her.
Again. I only did that once, and yet she never forgot about it.
That may have been because I ended up in hospital with an infection over it, but that’s beside the point.
It wasn’t like I wasn’t taking care of myself then; it just happens with HS sometimes.
“Mom,” I whine, and she tuts at me as if to say, ‘I am your mother, don’t even try it’.
When she’s done, she kisses my cheek to say hello again and leads me inside to the promise of tea, hot or cold, however I’d like it.
She and I settle into her sunroom on the back side of her bungalow, the afternoon sun shimmering through.
This was always my favourite room when I was growing up, all glass walls with a walkout screen to the backyard, the well-loved wooden table, chairs and the rocker in the corner has seen better days, and my hips would barely fit in that seat now without popping out some of the wood dowels on the sides, but I still wouldn’t change a thing about this room.
“So, what are we escaping this weekend?” My mom asks as she stirs sugar into her teacup, and I nearly choke on mine. Leave it to my mom to know.
“What makes you think I am escaping something?”
She giggles, slurping some of her tea before reaching for her tea biscuits, “Georgia, I love you, honey. But I am not daft, and I know you. I love that you visit me, but I know that this is your getaway place. So out with it.”
She knows about the elevator incident already, but I didn’t want to worry her about the nightmares.
I didn’t want her to think that I couldn’t handle myself, I am a grown ass 25-year-old, and I can do it.
But I give in and tell her everything, because somehow, she’d know if I left something out.
Her motherly intuition is outrageously on point; I swear she must have been a psychic in another life.
“So, I finally figured out how to get in contact with him, and then I found out he got fired. Because he stayed on the line with me.”
“I mean, I am sure he knew what the consequences were and wouldn’t want you to feel like it’s your fault. But I understand where you’re coming from. He sounds like he was a proper gentleman, and I don’t know him, but I’m grateful that he was there for you.”
I nod, “Me too.”
I try, I really try to not think about it, to not feel like the guilt is hanging over my head.
I let myself get distracted by mom’s endless fussing.
She sets up a nail appointment for us, her treat.
We get ice cream afterwards, and when we get home her favourite meal to make me is in the oven and wafting through the air and making the house smell like the a Sunday afternoon’s from my childhood.
Her pot roast, roasted potatoes and glazed carrots are my go-to comfort food.
She makes it for me at least twice a month, if not more.
My mom lets me have a bath in her jacuzzi tub, and she gives me every possible option to choose from.
Epsom salts, my go to helper when the flares are super bad, aromatherapy candles and soft music playing from her Bluetooth speaker.
This bathroom is like an oasis, all soft cream, and bright white accents and of course that jacuzzi tub that puts every other bathtub to shame.
Mom sends me to said bathroom with a basket of all her favourite self-care items, the previously mentioned salts and candles and music, with natural bath bombs from my favourite bath essentials place, shea and cocoa butter and the smell of vanilla wafting through the entire bathroom.
Magazines to entertain my mind, a book she just finished that she just couldn’t put down.
A fluffy robe to wear, and the promise of a freshly warmed towel on my bed when I return from the self-care adventure.
I know she’s trying to help me forget, and damn it, it’s working.
I fill the tub with the sweet-smelling things that will have me melted into a puddle of happy little self-cared Georgie goo.
When I sink into the almost burning hot water, my body instantly sighs.
If only this was a daily thing and not a once-in-a-while occasion.
I could see this being helpful for flares, on days where all I can do is soak and sit and hope for relief from the unrelenting pressure, the red-hot skin, the chills, the impossibility to cool off.
My body sinks down just in time for the jets to turn on and pelt my back in just the right spots, making me sigh and forget my own name.
It would be so easy to let my hands wander, to make my mind melt further, to really solidify the loss of every coherent thought until the only thing on my mind is how the jets and my hands touching and caressing would feel.
I could picture someone other than me touching, large hands that could do anything they wanted, and I’d let them.
It has been so long since I’ve been touched by someone other than my right hand or made to feel like Jell-O from something other than a good book.
I don’t let myself indulge though, it wouldn’t feel right to do this in a place that wasn’t my own, even if I lived here for eighteen years of my life.
I can imagine it in my mind, though, and that’s almost as good, right?
Eyes slip closed, and I think about how it would feel to not be alone in this tub.
If there was a person behind me, holding me close, my back to their chest, hands trailing across my chest, cupping, teasing and tickling their way down.
Their breath in my ear, slight hitch on the intake as they feel how badly I need it. Down across my navel. Down, down, down—
“Georgie,” the imaginary voice in my ear rumbles deep and surprises me.
The voice, I know it. I know who it belongs to.
I have no idea why now of all times the memory of N’s voice echoes into this moment, but here he is.
Suddenly it’s N who is doing all these things to me, to make me feel squirmy and holding me around the hips and making me stay put as he explores.
I wriggle in the daydream, wanting to feel the large, strong hands hold me.
“Jesus,” I gasp, picturing a feeling of lips against my neck.
The imaginary N hums softly, and then nips where he’s sucked.
It’s too much, he’s everywhere and he’s not even actually here and I am feeling too much for this to not be real.
I force myself to open my eyes, chest heaving and that feeling low in my belly begging me to deal with the feelings I brought on myself.
“What the fuck was that?” I say to myself, brushing my hair off my face. My cheeks are absolutely pink, burning in the blush I created. I let out a long breath, draw another in and sink under the water to escape my thoughts. But somehow, they still find me, ringing loud and clear.
Where did that even come from? Why did I let myself get that far?
Why when the mystery person turned to… him, why didn’t I stop then?
Why did they turn to him anyway? I don’t know this man, will never have the chance to know him now that he’s been fired.
This whole get away was to work on forgetting him. So why the hell can’t I quit him?