Awakening

‘Don’t smile at me… I am cross with you.’ she tried hard to remain angry but she knew she couldn’t, Gabriel could do anything and still not upset her. That said, he had never been intentionally hurtful, he was just so sweet. And that smile, noooo! It melted her. He knew her guard was down so he moved closer and broadened his smile. She could smell him, she loved his cologne, it didn’t smell that way on anybody else, of course it didn’t.

‘I’ve said am sorry…’ and he was, he pulled her into a hug and she couldn’t help but close her eyes and fall into him. He covered her face with kisses as he apologised again. She had lost that battle, whatever was left of her anger was gone, she couldn’t even pretend to sulk.

'Damn you Gabe, why do you wind me up so much?’

‘I am crazy about you… you know that...’ she said nothing, ‘Josephine…look at me.’ he always wanted her to acknowledge she had heard it, she looked up at him,

‘Umm hmm, yeah I know you are.’ He never used the L word, she’s not sure why. Sometimes she thought maybe she wanted to hear it but it scared her. She never said the L word to him either. She didn’t know if she was in a position to say it, those words, did she feel that way?

‘Gabe.’ She said not looking at him as she did.

‘What is it?’ she was silent for a little longer than a pause, Gabe let her go and lowered himself to her level, he was just about a head taller than her, he held her shoulders and looked straight at her. He was big on looking into eyes, ‘Jo! What is it?’

‘Nothing.’ She smiled, her sweetest smile, the one that could only spread across her face when she was with him. She was certain her smile had the same effect on him as his did on her, ‘let’s go eat, I am hungry.’

‘You sure?’ he was still looking into her soul, how was he able to do that?

‘I am sure.’ She leaned forward and kissed him, she had to kiss him whenever he got that close.

They got their coats and headed out. Once outside, they held hands as they walked down the street looking for somewhere to eat. She liked holding his hand, it made her feel safe with him. They were both quiet, normally when they were out, they would joke around and talk over each other at the same time. He was playful so he would shove her or pick her up or chase her down the road, and it got more physical the more they had had to drink. But today they walked along in silence. The only other time they got this way was when she had been away for a family wedding and they didn’t have as much contact as they usually did. It was her cousins wedding and she was a bridesmaid. Apart from the preparations and ceremony being so hectic, she misplaced her phone for a few days and only found it just as the wedding party was about to come back home. When they saw each other after that trip, they barely came up for air. When they did come up, they were both exhausted and perhaps so overwhelmed that they just stared at each other.

Those were the early days, they were still touchy feely now but not nearly as bad as in the beginning.

‘What do you feel like having?’

‘Dunno. Pizza?’

‘Yeah I feel like pizza.’

He kept looking at her as if waiting for her to say what was on her mind, but apprehensive of what she would come out with. His grip tightened on her hand as if to reassure her he was there, solid, a rock. She wanted to ask him. She was sure he wanted to say something, maybe not it but perhaps explain himself a little. What was stopping them from taking the plunge? At first they had joked about saying things like ‘crazy about you’ and would say ‘I love the way you do this’ but never expressing the sentiment itself. She let go of his hand and put hers around his waist, her head on his chest.

‘Come one Jo, tell me what’s wrong.’

‘Nothing Gabe…’ she wasn’t very convincing. She tried finding a pet name for him but nothing seemed natural. She had had boyfriends in the past who she called babe, but Gabe wasn’t a babe type. She’d always referred to him by his surname, so calling him babe now was proving difficult. Once when they were messaging each other, she had typed the word honey in response to a question, he responded with ‘yes?’ as though she was calling him that. He was very much a honey so why couldn’t she say it to him?

‘Are you still upset?’

‘No, am not, I promise…’ she said the honey in her head. ‘I am just being a girl.’ He was silent for a bit,

‘You know I really care about you Jo.’ Again, she completed the statement with the word honey in her head. She was practicing, but even in her head, it sounded stilted. She felt so much more at home belting out ‘Ashford!’ or Gabe when she was being tender. ‘You mean the world to me.’ His voice was a whisper now. She knew he felt all these things and any other day it would have been enough for her. Today for some reason she wanted more, she needed more. Gabe could sense that so he pulled her into a closed shops’ doorway and kissed her, long and deep, down her neck and back up again. He held her close, his hands on all the places she wanted his hands to be. She kissed him back grabbing his hair with one hand and placing the other hand on the glazed wall to balance herself as her knees failed her. Thankfully she was propped up against the shop front so she didn’t slide to the ground.

‘Gabe… were not going to get any pizza at this rate…’

‘Forget pizza.’ He carried on. There were no arguments from her. A group of revellers walked by and whoop whooped at them, they stopped to laugh but the crowd soon moved on and they turned back to each other.

‘Not here…’ she said,

‘Why not, we’ve done it before?’

‘Gabe!’ she slapped his chest.

‘It’s true though,’

‘I know but…’ she looked around, there were people walking up and down the busy street and the ever present police van doing its rounds. The last time they let nature get the better of them, they hadn’t planned it and had nowhere to go. As it was a spur of the moment thing, travelling back across town would have killed the mood. They weren’t far from home this time and she wasn’t banking on a short sharp encounter. Gabe was nuzzling her throat, she grabbed him by his hair and pulled his face to hers.

‘Gabriel.’ She was in full name mode, ‘I want you…’ he nodded like an eager little boy, ‘I really, really want you…’ it took him all of two seconds to understand what she was saying but as soon as he did, he straightened up and grabbed her hand, pulling her away from the shop and back into the street towards home.

‘We’ll order in, let’s go.’

They were both smiling as the raced back to the flat. Screw the word she thought as she ran behind him. Even if he never says it, she knew he felt it, he had to because she felt exactly the same.

‘Ashford! Wait up.’