Page 41 of Safer Alone
“I enjoy spending time with you, a lot, I just don’t want to get comfortable, as in my experience, that’s when things tend to go downhill, and I don’t want to lose, whatever this, between us, is.” Well that’s it, it’s all out there now. I look down at my hands, and then reach for the water pitcher and refill my glass again. When I place it back on the table, I chance a glance at him. Instead of looking at me, he is looking out towards his extensive backyard. I had blown it; in that moment I know that I should have kept my mouth shut.
“Angela.” he says slowly. “Thank you for being honest with me. I don’t want this to come to an end either. Since I met you, I’ve found someone with whom I have so much in common. You challenge me with your ideas, you make me laugh, even when you aren’t trying. You take control.” He stops for a moment and then turns to face me; our eyes lock. “I want to see you as often as I can, get to know you, everything there is to know about you. And maybe, if you’re interested, I could even share some things about myself, too.” He doesn’t say anything further, just looks at me for my decision. He is going to leave it in my hands, my control. What do I say?
I decide to say nothing, instead I push my chair out gently. I see Elliot follow suit, to him it must look like I am preparing myself to leave. Instead, I decide to do something completely out of the ordinary for me. I decide to be brave, too brave for my own good. I am sure that this will backfire on me, but it is too late for that now, I won’t back down.
I reach for his sweater, grabbing two fistfuls of the material and pull him towards me and kiss him, not gently, not at all timidly. I kiss him with feeling. I lick his bottom lip with my tongue and encourage him to open his mouth for me. He allows me entry and I push my tongue into meet his and they dance. The electrical current on my skin erupts into flames, even more than the last time we kissed, and I know in this very moment that I have fallen for this man. In less than two weeks I have let some of my walls crumble down, allowing Elliot into my heart. This is either going to end with a happily ever after or it was going to end terribly. But for now I would enjoy the immense amount of joy coursing through my veins.
I slow the kiss and begin to gently feather kisses on the edge of his mouth before pulling away. I release my grip on his sweater and place my arms around his neck. I stand there in front of him, gazing into his eyes, waiting for him to say something, anything. He looks away for a few moments and then returns his gaze to me before he takes my face in his hands and whispers one word. “Wow.”
I can’t help but smile at his response. Elliot Sands had bowled me right over and he didn’t even know it. “I don’t know about me but, you certainly are wow, Mr. Sands” I move my right hand into his hair as to ruffle it slightly. As I do, he starts to shake his head.
I drop my hand immediately, he must have felt my hand begin to retreat because he starts to speak again. “When I said wow, I meant about you. I thought you were getting up to leave, like I had said something to scare you away. But instead of walking away, you kissed me. I wasn’t expecting that.” He glances over my shoulder quickly and then back into my eyes, with a smile he speaks, “Andrew is coming with our dinner, shall we sit?” He captures my left hand and helps me to my seat; after pushing me in, he then retakes his own, never letting go of my hand.
I see Elliot nod toward the kitchen area located behind us and I gather it must have been a signal, as shortly after I can hear Andrew walking towards us. He places our dinner in front of us both, clears his throat and begins. “For your main course this evening, I have prepared lamb rack with dauphinoise potatoes, steamed baby carrots and green beans with mint sauce”. He fills both our wine and water glasses, gathers up our soup bowls and used spoons and makes his way back to the kitchen.
I am looking at the meal in front of me and wondering which item to try first, when Elliot interrupts my train of thought. “This is one of those meals I eat quite often. In fact, I try to have it once a week. Are you a lamb eater, Angela?”
I’m not sure how to respond. I don’t want to be rude so I nod, and think of a way to answer this without offence. “The potatoes look fantastic, and the intense hue of the mint sauce, I don’t know how he has produced such a deep green, Andrew sure knows how to cook,” I reply. Two compliments and no mention of the lamb; hopefully that will appease him. After all, tonight is going so well and Andrew had been slaving away in that kitchen for several hours at least. He doesn’t need to know that lamb was the meat I enjoy the least.
I decide to try the vegetables first. The green beans have a nice crunch to them as do the baby carrots. I can taste the honey glaze that coats the carrots, and then when I am feeling a little braver I cut one cutlet free from the rack and slice a tiny piece of meat away from the bone. I fork a piece of carrot along with an offcut of bean with it to try and disguise the flavor. It almost does the trick. The lamb taste wasn’t overbearing. I chew as quickly as I can and then swallow. I reach for my glass of water and have a sip to wash it down.
I can do this. There are three cutlets to a rack. If I could eat one cutlet and then cut the other away to look as though I had tried to eat it that might get me out of trouble. I didn’t want to offend Andrew and all of the effort he had put into creating this meal for us to enjoy. I make sure with every mouthful of lamb I also had a piece of vegetable and then coat it all in mint sauce. I look up a couple of times to see if Elliot was watching me, but luck be a lady, he was concentrating on devouring his own meal.
When I have eaten as much lamb as I can possibly stomach. I decide to speak. I have an idea as to get away with eating no more. “I suppose Andrew has prepared us a dessert, too?”
Elliot looks up at me and he smiles. “He has. Why is that?” He replies. This is the response I was hoping for. I fork my last cut piece of meat with a piece of potato and lift it towards my mouth. “This will be my last forkful then. I need to leave some room for dessert.” I smile and then pop the fork in my mouth and finish it quickly.
“You’re right. I should probably leave some room too” Elliot places his cutlery down and I notice that he has eaten a similar amount of meat as I. That was good, Andrew wouldn’t see anything off about my plate.
“Do you mind if we try to get to know each other a little better? We can both ask each other questions.” Elliot gestures with his hand waving first to me and then back to himself.
“Okay, depends what you ask me. A girl has to keep some things to herself, you know,” I reply and wink. I hope that he doesn’t hear the reservation in my voice.
“Touché Miss White. Some topics are off limits. If we are asked something we don’t want to answer, we should just say, ‘move along,’ agreed?” This puts me at ease a little. Then also raises more questions, there must be some topics he doesn’t want to discuss, either.
“Agreed, I will go first. Hmmm, what to ask?” He nods to confirm. He once again steeples his fingers under his chin. I notice he does this when he seems to be thinking.
There are so many things I want to know about this man. Should I start out with easy questions hoping that he would follow suit? Or go straight to the ones I am dying to know? Wikipedia hadn’t mentioned anything about his personal life. Tempting as it was, I decide safe, easy questions were the way to go. At least to begin with.
I compose my features into the most serious face I can muster. I place my hands on the table interlocked with each other, looking into his eyes and start the interrogation with an easy one. “Okay, Elliot. Question number one is…” pausing for dramatic effect, “What is your favorite color?” I smile.
I can see that he lets out a breath he must have been holding. “Good question. My favorite color is green,” he replies. “Okay, it’s my turn.” He rubs his hand along his chin. “Okay, I’ve got one. Do you have any siblings?”
I’m glad he has asked me an easy question. It appears my tactic to start with easy questions rubbed off on him. I shake my head. “Nope. It’s just me. My mom and dad wanted another child, but it never happened for them.” I didn’t need to give that much of a response. A simple nope would have been sufficient.
“Okay, it’s my turn again” Do I ask him about siblings? I decide against it, instead asking something I really wanted to know the answer too. “How many girlfriends have you had?’ I ask, Elliot raises his eyebrows in response and stops stroking his chin. He quite possibly might refuse to answer. “One. It was when I was still in high school. We separated our first year of college. She cheated on me.” He pauses, before continuing. “Cheating is a deal breaker for me.”
I nod, “I’m sorry. I agree one hundred percent with you. Cheating is a deal breaker for me too.”
“Same question back at you Angela, how many boyfriends have you had? Or girlfriends, even.” He cocks his eyebrow.
I playfully swat at his arm. “One boyfriend.” I sound out each syllable of the word. “I met him when I was in high school. I left him close to four years ago.” I didn’t want to tell him the reason behind my leaving.
“Why?” Elliot asks. Do I tell him he has already asked his question and it was now my turn? Then he would just ask it next time, or I could voice our safe words of move along to get off this topic. I take in a deep breath preparing myself for the story.
“It’s a long story.” I start hoping he would say not to worry about it.
Instead he surprises me. “If you don’t want to tell me that fine. However if you do I will listen.” He reaches out and takes my hand. He is so caring. Nothing at all like Dylan. I suck in a breath and release it. It was time to tell Elliot.
