Chapter 14 Harrison – Growing paranoia
Hell is empty and all the devils are here
The Tempest, William Shakespeare
It was ridiculous. He didn't even know about my relationship with Emma until Miranda spilled her guts.
If we were such a bad example, how he had not even noticed our relationship yet?
I put my arm around Emma and pushed my face into her neck.
She was beautiful and so gentle and sweet.
She had a way of supporting me. She was always in the background encouraging me and praising me.
I fell more and more in love with her every day.
Our passion in the bedroom had not abated one bit, and I was so ravenous for her we sometimes found ourselves in my car on our lunchbreak, fucking behind Walmart.
I could hear Cordelia and the asshole neighbor laughing from the dining room. She was overselling it. She never laughed that hard with me, and I had a very dry wit that she loved. This guy was more of an overgrown puppy, eager and over the top. His humor would be clumsy and blunt, unsophisticated.
I’d washed my hands when I got home but felt like I should sanitize before our dinner arrived.
Thankfully, I’d thrown the sanitizer Miranda tampered with away.
I grabbed the bottle from the coffee table drawer and applied it.
The stats on how many germs lived on the skin were horrifying.
I wrung my hands together but felt the same slippery sensation I had when I used the kitchen bottle.
Fucking Miranda. She’d got to this bottle too.
I swore out loud and jumped up to wash my hands, accidentally knocking Emma off the sofa.
“Sorry, baby.” I leaned down to help her up, realizing too late that my hands were a slippery mess.
She fell back down as her hand slipped from mine.
“What is that?” she asked, wiping her hand on her skirt.
“Don't rub it into your clothes. I don't know what it is, some kind of lubricant. It's bloody Miranda again.”
“You need to fix this Harrison. We can’t keep living in this chaos,” she warned. “It’s not good for either of us.”
She stood and I guided her towards the bathroom. I'd have to throw out all of my sanitizer and replace it. It was lucky I worked at a pharmacy. This time, I'd keep it in my room, away from childish pranksters.
Damon headed home at about midnight. They'd been giggling together for hours, then spent some time on the back patio, where they continued to giggle.
Emma asked why I kept pausing our movie to listen, but I couldn't really answer her.
She'd assume it was jealousy, but it wasn't. I was just outraged by the audacity of Cordelia to date right in front of me.
I knew it wasn't real love, not like it was for me and Emma.
Poor Cordelia was stuck in some kind of rebound, which was understandable because I'd broken her heart, but it wasn't healthy for her in the long term.
I was the last person she'd listen to, but I'd keep my eye on her, just in case.
Miranda wouldn't stop her, that's for sure.
Miranda would let Cordy parade nude down Main Street if she thought it would hurt me.
I may have broken Cordy's heart, but I still cared for her.
I wouldn't let her hurt herself the way Miranda obviously was willing to.
Yawning, I headed off to bed with Emma. She headed into the bathroom and stormed out less than 10 seconds later holding cling film. “This was over the toilet!” she announced.
Miranda’s pranks were lacking in sophistication, but I found myself looking over my shoulder anyway.
Today, I’d looked up “pranks” on the internet so I could be one step ahead of her.
Tomorrow, I was going to take apart my shower head to look for Jolly Ranchers.
Apparently, that was a popular one. I also needed to check my home office PC to make sure she hadn't messed with the keyboard or mouse.
I considered buying a lock so I could keep my food in a locked box to ensure Miranda wouldn't tamper with it.
Oh yes, Miranda, I'm one step ahead of you.
I'm not going to let you get into my head!
Emma stripped off and went to pull the cover back to get into bed.
“Wait!” I ordered, pulling back the cover slowly, tentatively.
There would probably be a frog or spider in there.
Or something immature like fake vomit. “I’m tired, come on!
” Emma pleaded. I put my finger up, hushing her.
If there was some kind of critter under there, the moment I pulled back the cover, it would scatter and be harder to find.
By the time I had the cover all the way off, Emma was tapping her foot impatiently.
I was only trying to protect her! There was nothing there, so we climbed in tiredly.
Emma fell asleep straight away, too tired for sex apparently.
That was okay; we'd had our lunchtime session today and I was exhausted too. I closed my eyes but couldn’t sleep.
All I could do was run through the pranks I’d read about in my head.
Tomorrow, I'd have to check the car, the garage and my bike.
Maybe even get some kind of bug detector to ensure she hadn't wired my room.
Nah, surely that would be going too far, even for Miranda.
But then ... I ran through scenarios in my mind until I finally drifted off a few hours later.