Chapter 7

SEVEN

When Georgia opened her eyes the room was light and his presence was heavy beside her. She laid towards him on her right side and pulled her legs up. One of her knees rested on his hip and her hands rested on his chest. He was still peacefully asleep on his back, one hand above his head on the pillow and the other just below hers on his chest. The blanket she brought the night before laid on the floor. She looked at his face, two lids hid his blue eyes and his lips were parted slightly. Every now and then a soft sigh would escape from between them. When she stretched her legs and tried to sit up he groaned and she feared that she woke him, but after a few seconds nothing had changed and she laid back down. Keeping her legs and arms on her own small side of the couch this time. His black t-shirt came up a little and showed her a small part of his stomach. She had to fight the urge to touch it. He had opened the button on his jeans and he wasn’t wearing socks. She could only see one foot from the position she was in and could make out the contours of a tattoo on his ankle. To her that discovery was just another confirmation that she didn’t know anything about this man. She did not even know his body.

She knew she could get up and go back to her own bed. Pretend it never happened and hope he would play along to her game and leave. She knew she probably should because this should never have happened. Before last night she imagined that if anything, she would have sex with him. It would leave them both satisfied and they could go on with their lives. It would be their secret. A good memory for her, a confirmation that he still had it for him.

Instead she fell asleep in his arms and found herself in the most intimate setting the morning after. Even though they were still dressed. Waking up with him like this was worse than anything they could have done. It was real, pure. Not something that happened in the dark after a long night of drinking, that she could either forget about or cherish. This wasn’t up to her to decide. The room was filled with weak morning light that crept in through the closed blinds and she had been completely sober when she laid down with him the night before.

He sighed softly when he turned towards her and his arm fell over her waist loosely. The feeling of her beside him seemed to wake him. He opened his eyes and she could see the worry behind them when he looked at her. She also saw how it all came back to him slowly, and he didn’t make a comment about her while he easily could have. He didn’t tell her how he won, that she gave in, that she wasn’t so strong after all. He did not even say anything flirty or sexual, while he had slid one of his legs between her bare ones while he turned before he woke up. He didn’t say a thing. But the silence spoke for itself. It let her know he understood what this meant, and that frightened her more than anything.

For too long he just laid there and looked at her. He could see the fear he felt, reflected in her eyes as she stared back at him. He didn’t know what to do, swallowed every word that he could have said. He wasn’t prepared to feel what he felt right now. Not for another woman. Not for someone he did not know at all. He didn’t even know it was possible. He wondered if it was too late to get up and run, but realised that would only confirm what she thought about him. And now they ended up like this he had to prove to her that he was not that kind of guy. That he didn’t want to be in this situation as much as she didn’t. He slowly moved his hand up towards her face that looked so natural, so beautiful in the morning light.

She needed space. She felt imprisoned between the couch and his body and she needed to get out of there to think clearly. So before he could rest his hand on his cheek, she stood up on the couch and stepped over him on to the carpet without touching him. She sat down on the carpet with her back towards him against the couch and pulled her legs up. She felt how he sat up as well and his feet appeared beside her on the carpet. He stayed that way and they waited for each other to say something. She wished she knew what he was thinking. Why he still hadn’t left, but that was probably because he was still waiting for his chance. She felt weak, tired although she slept all night without waking up once. Which was something else she didn’t want to think about for too long. She hated to imagine how he could have woken up that night to look at her like she had just looked at him without him knowing. That made her feel too vulnerable.

She closed her eyes for a second when she sensed how he lowered himself on to the carpet beside her. They sat like that for a while until she gave in and looked at him.

“So…” he said, “are you coming to the show tonight?”

She didn’t know what to think of his question. From all the things she had imagined he could say, she had not seen this coming. But she couldn’t help but laugh. Somehow it fit in with the way they communicated so far perfectly. He chuckled as well. But when she shook her head and said: “hell, no.” he laughed louder. Georgia pictured what they looked like at that moment. Sitting side by side on the carpet. He was still fully dressed, while she was wearing a sweater and a pair of black lace panties. Two strangers with a desperate but unexplainable need to be together while they could fill books with reasons why they shouldn’t be. She was no longer looking at him but she felt he was looking at her. She turned her full body towards him. It gave him the opportunity to grab her upper arms and when she felt how her body responded to that innocent but firm grip around her arms she admitted to herself what she had known since they first looked at each other in the conference room.

She never stood a chance against him.