“He told me your mother warned him about you liking men. How she expected him to love you more for it. Did he ever have a bad reaction to you? It seemslike he is understanding, but it is a complicated situation regardless.”
“Wait, he said what?” Charlie pulled back, taken aback by my statement and query, his eyes full of questions. “My momma told him?”
“That’s what he said to me on Sunday during our ‘talk’,” finger quoting that word. “Did you not know?” I tilted my head in concern that I just gave something away I shouldn’t have.
“No,” he whispered, eyes shifting everywhere, processing this new info. He finally said, “She knew. I can’t believe she knew.” Tears were starting to fill his eyes, his eyelids holding them back like a dam.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know you didn’t know. I wouldn’t have said anything, especially with it being so early in the damn morning.” I pulled him close to me again, rubbing my hands up and down his back to comfort the emotions I created.
“I just can’t believe she knew, and told my dad,” his voice muffled from being pressed to my chest. “It explains so much as why he reacted the way he did when he found out.”
“Clearly it was at least an okay outcome since you are here, with him by your side, yeah?” But he didn’t respond and it was too early in the morning for this topic anyway, to push the answer out of him. He would share it when he was ready.
This entire subject was bringing me right back to my thoughts from earlier. I’m glad Charlie’s experience with his family figuring it out or finding out had a different outcome to mine– so far. There was still time for Mike to blow a gasket over us being together.
After I held him for a couple minutes in silence, just breathing each other in, body, mind, and space, my stomach interrupted again.
Charlie puffed out a sigh. He surprised me by kissing my fuzz covered chest where it was exposed above my open collar. Then he gently rolled out of bed and stared down at me, sucking in his lips and clamping down, gears turning in his mind. His entire demeanor shifted with the pillow talk we just had and I hated it. “Umm, do you need to–,” pointing out the door, standing there all adorable and shy over suggesting a trip to the bathroom.
“–use the bathroom? Yes. I do. Can you just help me up? I think I can get there on my own and get back in bed,” confident I was able enough to do it based on my pain level. Other than my little tornado as my wake-up call, my pain seems more manageable as long as I don’t twist, bend, or strain. It is just this constant soreness that radiates a little like a heat wave.
Charlie pulled the pillow, spun me around and got me on my feet. As we got to the bathroom and the top of the stairs at the end of the hall, he said, “I’m going to go see what you have for breakfast, and make a list for the store. Do you have any requests or ideas?”
I leaned and kissed him. He’s so sweet. “No, Honey. I’ll eat anything,” kissing him again with a smile. He went downstairs and I went into the bathroom to do my business and brush my teeth.
On the way back to my bedroom, I stopped in the spare room to see if there was a book I would want to re-read, since I didn’t have any new ones available. I found my copy of ‘The Fellowship of the Ring’, book one of the ‘Lord of the Rings’ series, though technically it was never supposed to be a series, but one physical novel broken into six parts. The publisher made the author, Tolkin, break it up for publishing purposes. He wasn’t pleased with the decision but had to go along with it.
It made me think about how we do that to ourselves to fit in with society. We were forced to split our personalities apart to fit within certain groups of people out in public while all we wanted was to live in a whole state of being. Instead we have to plainly hide a different part of ourselves completely, depending on who we were around, like we were ashamed or we had to keep hidden for safety, while fighting the evil in the world.
Like Charlie and me.
This will be a good distraction to get lost in for a while, plus it’s my favorite one out of the series. I love a good origin story and the theme of people from different places and ranks coming together for one singular purpose and becoming friends that care for one another. Fighting for what is right against the evil in the world.
As I was getting back in bed, I glanced at the alarm clock on the nightstand that read fifteen minutes till seven in the morning. We probably would have woken anyway, even if our twister wake-up call hadn’t happened, with miner-time ingrained in my head. As I twisted to put the pillow under my back, it stung like a mother fucker, so I just balanced myself with book in hand until Charlie came in with two slices of toast with grape jelly smeared on top.
“This is all I could scrounge up. I’ll run to the store after I get ready,” smiling shyly at me. I hope he bounced out of this feeling. It’s cute, don’t get me wrong, but I wanted him one-hundred percent comfortable around me all the time. When he didn’t hold himself back, he shined. I felt more open when he was in a joyous state.
“No rush.” I took the plate, taking a bite. “Do me a favor,” eating around my words, “and please makesure you eat and help yourself to anything here, yeah?” I took another bite.
“Okay.” He shifted from side to side, seeming like he was trying to decide if he should stay or go when he saw my pillow wasn’t where it should be, so he wedged it under my back. I grabbed him with my free hand and pulled him toward my face and gave him a sticky jelly kiss, raising the corners of my mouth in a simple closed smile.
“Go. You know where the store’s located and you have my wallet?”
“Yeah. I’ll be back shortly.”
He left me with a piece of toast, my book and a spot in bed next to me that was starting to cool.
twenty
A Wet Willy
Charlie
Ithrew on some clothes and grabbed the list off the kitchen counter that I made of things I could get for easy meals. When I opened the door to leave, I didn’t get very far. Sitting there on the little covered porch were bags of groceries. I stood there staring at them, trying to make my eyes tell my brain that I was actually seeing them and it wasn’t all a mirage.
Where did they come from?
I stepped out to pick them up and looked around to see if anyone was within sight. There were seven paper bags in total full of food and personal items. I carried them inside and set them on the small two-person table to unload onto the counters. There was so much, including canned goods, milk, butter, eggs, sugar, coffee, bread, with a slab of bacon, ground beef, chicken and deli meats clearly all from a butcher,and more. There were also bandages, tape, soap, and other personal items. I was awe-struck.
