Page 90 of Rough Around the Hedges

Expect the Unexpected

What the fuck was wrong with me?

Why could I not keep my hands off that bloody man?

Was there really any need for me to drop to my knees and suck his cock like a ice lolly on a hot day? In myshed, no less!

My she shed!

My sacred space!

It was now tainted. Ruined. Forever the place of a dirty, steamy hook-up with the person I hated most in this world.

The person I simply couldn’t stay away from.

And, God, how I wished I could. How I wished I could never speak to him again, never see him again, never touch him again.

All of those things were, of course, in my power. All I had to do was exercise a little thing called self-control whenever I was around him and, boom! Just like magic, I’d never touch him again.

Not speaking to him was tough, given the current situation and the fact he owned the land I technically managed as thecommittee chair, and never seeing him again was simply out of the question.

Unless he went back to his business and life in London. Then I’d probably see him once a year, maybe, if I was unlucky.

But why did the thought of that make my stomach tighten almost uncomfortably?

Did I… want to see him?

No. That was absurd. There was no way. I couldn’t possibly want to see this man.

Then, why…

Ugh.

Thank God I’d never voice these thoughts to anyone, because I was pissing myself off with all the flip-flopping I had going on. It felt as though I was in a pantomime with my emotions with the whole, “Oh, yes, it is,” “Oh, no, it isn’t,” bullshit that was parading through my head right now.

Perhaps my life would be easier if I just admitted that I didn’t truly hate Oliver. I hated what he was doing, but I didn’t hatehim. Despite how many times I tried to tell myself that he was a horrible, uncaring, awful person, I knew the truth was that he wasn’t that kind of man at all.

In fact, he was the opposite.

He was only selling the allotments because he cared about his family’s historic estate.

His care wasn’t directed in the place I wished it was, but wasn’t that just life? Things didn’t always go your way, and it was a really sucky thing when that happened, but there was nothing you could do about it. I couldn’t do any more than I was already doing right now.

I was close to exhausting all my options to fight the closure. For the first time in my life, I was out of ideas to make someone’slife hell. Between the media exposure we’d gained through the protest and what we would get locally with the upcoming craft fair, I suspected we’d maxed that out.

There was even only so many times I could bring it up on our social media. Everyone fancied themselves a philanthropist, but the truth was,nobody cared. Not enough todoanything about it, and the reason why was simple.

When our allotments closed and our page became obsolete, someone else would simply come along and take my place. Another account would appear with content similar enough that it would scratch the itch, and Hanbury Allotments would be forgotten.

Did it suck that all the work I’d put into that stupid, amazing account and its community was going to amount to nothing?

Yes.

It sucked.

Updating the page was a part of my daily routine, and it showcased us all. Young, old, furry, feathered… It was a collection of our memories, a real-time photo album, and no longer having that left an emptiness in my heart that I couldn’t quite fill.

Nothing would fill it.

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