Page 61 of Dirty Rock

“No way can I spend years around rockers and go home with some boring banker.”

“But could you go home with a rocker?”

She paused, her slow smile rising. “Maybe. If the right one came along.”

“Care to tell me what the right guy consists of?” I asked, leaning in a little closer.

Jules glanced down at the table, gathering her thoughts as she trailed her delicate finger over the top of it. “Honestly, I don’t know, but I like to think that there’s someone out there for all of us. I just don’t like to waste time on the wrong men. I’d rather not bother.”

Time. Time. Time. The word I was coming to despise all too quickly.

“If you don’t try things, you’ll never know.”

“But a decade passes by so quickly, Rhett. Too quickly. Look how fast the last three years have gone for us both. One minute you’re twenty-two and free. The next you’re thirty-two and stuck wondering how much longer you’ve got left to do all the things you want to do.”

“Like…?”

Her eyes shot up to mine. “Seeing the world without working. Taking risks. Settling down. Kids.”

“I didn’t have you down as someone who wanted a family.”

“You’re not the first person to say that.” Jules huffed out a laugh, as though to herself, before she folded her arms on the table and leaned into them. “I’ll tell you a secret. I always had a dream of taking a child of mine to Disneyland. I’d be sickeningly in love, obviously, and the father and I would each take a hand and swing our son or daughter in the air as we walked towards Cinderella’s castle. There’d be little Minnie Mouse ears on our baby girl, or Mickey ears on a boy. We’d be this brand-new family filled with nothing but love. All of us so young, happy, carefree, and caught up in a bubble of magic. I cling onto that dream some days. I still think of it often.”

I swallowed the dry lump that had formed in my throat, and I shuffled in my chair as my chest became tight.

“That doesn’t sound very rock ‘n’ roll, Jules,” I croaked, quickly clearing my throat.

“It doesn’t, does it?” She smiled sadly. “Maybe I would be better off with a banker, after all.”

“Could you really put up with the missionary position for the rest of your life?”

Jules sparkled as she held my gaze, but I saw the hidden longing in her eyes that she tried to hide.

“No.” She shook her head. “Perhaps not.”

“Something tells me you’ll get whatever the hell you want, anyway, no matter the journey you have to take to get there. You never fail at anything you set your mind to.”

“I like you like this.” She smiled. “More human, less robot.”

“I’m only a machine when it matters.” I smirked, earning a laugh from her that lit up my damn chest again.

We spent the rest of the day going through similar conversations. We talked about our friends, the things we’d been through, and the places we’d travelled. I was discovering so much about this woman I’d never bothered to pay attention to, and now I couldn’t get enough. But the more we talked, the more I understood that, while I was still learning all about her, Julia already knew me better than I ever realised.

She’d seen me from the start.

Without acknowledging it along the way, we’d already shared one hell of a life together.

After one last walk down the beach, we made our way back to her cottage. As we stepped into the back garden, I looked up at it for the first time. It had a thatched roof and was alight with well-placed, soft-glowing outdoor lights.

It was also painted the colour of a fucking sunflower.

I turned to her and scowled. “Your house is… yellow.”

“Isn’t it fabulous?” She sighed dreamily, admiring her own home. I guess her house could have been neon green at that point, and I’d have said yes just to agree with her. Her smile made the lie worthwhile.

Jules reached for my hand again and turned her face to me. I squeezed her fingers, feeling like the drunk, fucked-up boy in me was drifting away with the sea breeze, and the world was allowing the sober version of me to step inside a grown man’s mind for a while.

“You can stay again… if you want?” Her voice was a shy voice from a shy girl asking a not-so-shy guy for more.

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