Chapter 14
?Don’t be afraid of failure. Be afraid of not trying.?
—Roy T. Bennett
Devon
The next day I woke up early because they were delivering the furniture I had bought to set up Aurora’s bedroom.
The little one was still sleeping, but I didn’t want to have breakfast without her, so I just had some orange juice and waited for her to wake up.
Meanwhile, I went to the empty room that until now I hadn’t known how to furnish, and I started planning how to arrange the new furniture.
That room had been empty since I moved in, and until now I hadn’t had any intention of furnishing or decorating it because I had no idea what to do with it.
Now it had its purpose—it would be Aurora’s bedroom, at least during these days she would be with me, and I hoped that in the future she could use it again.
Perhaps during another trip of her father’s she could come stay with me.
After deciding where to place the bed and the rest of the furniture, I went to the bedroom and sat beside her to wake her up.
“Good morning, princess,” I said, while caressing her round, sweet cheeks.
Aurora began to open her eyes and, when she saw me, a tender smile appeared on her lips.
“Good morning, beautiful. Did you sleep well?”
“Yi.”
“Shall we have breakfast?” I asked, while taking her little hands to help her sit up in bed, but as always, she surprised me with her sweetness, sitting up and hugging me tightly.
“Divon, let’s play,” she said, trying to get down from the bed.
“No; first we have to have breakfast. Besides, today the bed we chose for you arrives and we have to decorate the bedroom with all those princess things we bought. We’re going to have a lot of fun.”
“I want to be Princess Aurora,” she said, looking at me with a smile and giving me a kiss on the cheek.
“Of course you’re the princess. You’re Divon’s princess,” I said, giving her a kiss on the cheek, and referring to myself the way she did.
“And daddy’s,” she said, looking at me with a smile, and just the mention of him made my heart race.
“Of course, and Alba’s too,” I said, and she smiled broadly while I tickled her.
While we were having breakfast, the company delivering the new furniture arrived, and it was impossible to get her to finish her breakfast. She was anxious and happy because she wanted to see the princess bedroom.
She had become a chatty little parrot with the two people who were assembling the furniture.
She told them that this bedroom was for princesses and that it was just for her, that her name was Aurora, that she had many toys and many other things.
The men laughed at her innocence, but I think they were already dizzy from it all.
“That’s my bed,” she told the two men, when the bed was assembled and placed in its spot while they worked on the rest of the furniture.
“It’s a beautiful bed, now you can tell your mom,” said one of the men, looking at me with a smile, “that you won’t be climbing into her bed anymore because your bed is prettier.”
When I heard him, I immediately looked at her because I was afraid Aurora might feel bad at the mention of a mom, but my surprise was enormous when she hugged my legs and exclaimed:
“Mommy!”
Hearing her and seeing her hug me like that made my throat tighten.
Aurora calling me that way stirred something inside me.
I stared at her not knowing what to do or say.
I had dreamed so many times of being able to hear a little person call me ?mommy? with that sweetness and that adorable voice with which Aurora had done it, that I couldn’t help but be moved.
If since meeting Aurora I had felt a warmth in my chest like never before, with that simple word, my heart contracted and I was overwhelmed by an emotion that was very difficult to hide.
I knew I shouldn’t get any wrong ideas about the situation; she was a little girl who had only repeated what the man had said, but for me it had meant a lot.
I crouched down and hugged her, but I had to make it clear to her that I wasn’t her mom.
I took her by the hand and went to the living room to talk to her.
I sat in one of the armchairs and sat her on my lap.
“Aurora, I’m Devon, not your mommy.”
She looked at me and burst into laughter, but didn’t say anything.
“Princess, you understood what I said, right?”
“Yi,” she said, and freed herself from my grasp to return to the bedroom where they were assembling the furniture.
I didn’t want to insist too much because sometimes children forget things easily, and if you insist, it’s worse. So we went back to the bedroom and stayed there until everything was in place.
When the men left, I dedicated myself to cleaning and putting everything in its place.
The bed had been transformed into a beautiful princess bed with sheets, comforter, and pillows in pink with princess figures.
Aurora was jumping on the bed while I held her hands to prevent her from falling.
Arranging and decorating the bedroom had taken me all day.
We had stopped for lunch and then I continued with the task.
While I was doing it, she played in the bedroom with all her new toys.
We had also made a video call with Sylvia to show her how it turned out because she had helped us with the purchase of everything.
After a shower and dinner, Aurora had gotten into bed with the joy and excitement of sleeping in her new bed, but she was so tired from all the activity of the day that I hadn't even finished reading two pages of a book when she had already fallen asleep.
I hadn't received a call from her father, but I assumed it was because he was in many meetings and his day had been complicated, as he had mentioned to me the day before.
I was physically tired, but my brain wouldn't stop thinking.
Sitting in the living room armchair, I fell into the abyss of my ruminations and sank deeper into the distressing worry of knowing that my heart would break into pieces when Aurora left and that I would miss her terribly, just as much as I was missing her father at that moment.
Yes; I could no longer deny that Cavaller had slipped into my thoughts and.
.. I shook my head slowly in denial and stood up to pour myself a glass of white wine.
I wasn't used to drinking, but that day I needed it.
I needed the numbing effect of the wine because, if I wanted to rest, I had to banish those thoughts from my head.
With the glass of wine I returned to the living room, turned on the stereo at low volume and sat down in the armchair again, drinking and listening to “Fix You” by the band Coldplay.
Some knocks on the door startled me. The knocks were soft, but in the silence of the night and as concentrated as I was, they managed to surprise me.
I went to the door with no idea who it could be, but I opened it convinced that it was one of my friends because the doorman only let known people into the building.
I was wrong. A blue, deep and intense gaze fixed on my eyes making me lose all sense of everything and the ability to speak. That gaze overflowed with desire. Without saying a word, he approached me, slowly, stealthily, like a predator stalking its prey, and whispered in my ear:
“I couldn’t stand waiting to come back any longer.”
I could only be aware of him, of his voice echoing in my ears, of the racing beats of my heart, of his fragrance that had entered through my nostrils and invaded my entire body, and of the deep and agonizing desire I felt for him.
I looked at him and, with great effort, I was able to articulate a few words.
“I didn’t know you were coming back today.”
“I wanted to come back as soon as possible.”
“If you had told me, I would have tried to keep Aurora awake for you.”
“Is Aurora asleep?” he asked, whispering and without stopping looking at me in that way that disturbed and weakened me more and more.
“She fell asleep about an hour ago.”
“May I come in?”
“Yes, excuse me. Come in,” I said, and stepped aside to let him enter.
When I turned and saw him standing in the middle of the living room, I felt that his presence filled the entire place. His lips stretched into a sensual smile that made it impossible for me to take my eyes off that sinful mouth.
“May I go see Aurora?”
“Of course,” I managed to respond, and wanted to slap myself for acting that way, “she’s sleeping in the bedroom across from mine.”
“I remember where yours is,” he affirmed, and a slow, sensual smile appeared on his mouth, and the crazy hammering of my heart was already concerning.
He walked to the bedroom and, when he arrived and looked inside, he froze. For a few eternal seconds he just stared at that scene in amazement. Aurora was sleeping peacefully in her bed hugging a stuffed animal. It was a very feminine bedroom, fit for a princess.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, worried, seeing that he had been so astonished that he didn’t move a muscle in his body.
He turned and looked at me with a strange expression.
“Devon, do you have or did you have a daughter?”
“What?”
“Why do you have a bedroom for a little girl?”
I sighed with relief. For a moment I had thought he was upset at seeing that his daughter had a bedroom in my home.
“Until today I didn’t have one. All this,” I said, pointing to the interior of the room, “we bought yesterday for Aurora because I wanted her to feel comfortable and not miss home so much. I’m sorry if it bothers you, I assure you it was only so she would be as comfortable as possible, I didn’t do it with any other intention.
I wasn’t using this room for anything,” I said, and couldn’t help lowering my gaze to hide from his, because the reality was that he had made it clear that he didn’t want Aurora to get confused and, until that moment, I hadn’t thought about that.
He gently took my chin and forced me to raise my face so our eyes could meet.