Even After Everything

My mind is in overdrive as he walks us along again, trekking through the park by the river.

Why did I do that? Sure, I like him like that, but I’m never the one to initiate things. Besides - we’re working together. How much more inappropriate could I get? He asks an adoring fan to duet with him, and what does he get in return? A come on and a spaz attack.

I put it down to the horrible feeling I’ve had all day. It’s as though I’m seeing everything through a veil - so I can’t tell what it really is, what it really means. I don’t remember ever being to Birmingham other than that time at Robannas, and yet I feel like it’s so significant to me.

As we walk along in an impenetrable silence, I try to grasp at the wisps of smoke in my head, the ghosts of the past that could tell me what I’m doing here, why I’m feeling like I’m feeling.

And what Will means to me.

In the short time between arriving at Birmingham and now, I’ve gone from a light hearted crush and a respecting demeanour, to something so much more. I didn’t like to think at what it was.

Before I know it, Will and I have reached the hotel again. He pushes me towards the entrance gently by my lower back and says a quiet, ‘I have to make a call - I’ll be in in a second’, as he hands me the key card.

I debate on whether to find somewhere I can eavesdrop, but decided against it, pushing my way through the hotel’s door. I guess somewhere along the line I have to learn to respect his privacy, I think to myself, stepping into the elevator and pressing the relevant button.

As the doors slide open, I step out and into the hall, creeping along it slowly. This was still so familiar - where had I seen it before? I walk right past our room and carry on, coming to a stop outside another for no known cause.

For some reason, I feel like this door holds my answer - or at least a clue to how I’m feeling. Trying to picture it, in a different way, in a different light, with a different me, I frown - I’m coming up with other pictures, but who’s to say they’re not fabrications? My brain trying to come up with an answer for an unknown question? I bite my tongue, and knock on the door resolutely. I hear footsteps drawing nearer, and the door is pulled open by a dumpy woman, a small child clutching onto one calf.

‘Jamie, don’t do that,’ she scolds the boy, then turns to me. ‘Can I help you?’

‘Uh…I - um, no,’ I stutter. ‘Wrong door.’ I begin to limp off down the hallway as the woman watches on perplexed, and I’m suddenly hit by an image of what she must be seeing, only in this image I’m clothed in the little black dress that currently sits rumpled at the bottom of my wardrobe.

When I’d gotten out of hospital, I’d gone to wash the dress, only to find I couldn’t go near it without heaving. Not in a bad way, but the smell was just so…so heart achingly gut wrenching that the best I could do was throw it to the bottom of my wardrobe.

That smell! It was coconut…and something else…

I shake my head tearfully, blinded by confusion as I slide the key card into the reader on out door. With a dull thunk, it opens, and I’m suddenly famished, thinking back to my unfinished lunch regretfully.

I consider closing the door again and going to find something to eat…I quite fancy Oreos now that Will had mentioned them - but my weariness gets the better of me so I enter the room instead. Closing the door behind me, I inspect the contents of the kitchen cupboards unenthusiastically.

Nothing in the bottom shelves, and nothing in the top I note, before turning to open the last one on the end. I stare in amazement as I see a huge box of Oreos and another of Weetabix.

God bless William Beckett, I find myself thinking, tearing open the Oreos and shoving one into my mouth, crunching it. I swallow it dryly and shove in another as I run a glass of water from the tap.

I love Oreos.

‘Or do I?’ I think suddenly, eyes snapping open. When have I ever had Oreos? When have I ever eaten a single one? And yet the second I saw the box, I could already feel the powdery cream dissolving onto my tongue - I’d been desperate for one the second Will had brought them up.

I blink the thought away. What did it matter? I have Oreos now, and that’s what counts.

I’ve pretty much finished the box, and feeling a little sick by the Will knocks on the door. I freeze, shoving the box back in the cupboard and dusting off the kitchen counter, hopping over to the door. Pulling it open, I smile, keeping my mouth firmly closed to hide the Oreo crumbs that were undoubtedly in my teeth.

‘Hullo,’ he says, smirking.

‘Hi,’ I mumble - it’s pretty hard talking with your mouth closed. ‘I told you we should have gone to the police.’

‘Hannah, if you opened your mouth a little, I might be able to get the slightest of what you’re saying.’

I put my hand over my lips to cough, and just don’t remove it when I’m done. ‘I told you we should have told the police,’ I say a little more coherently.

‘What do you mean?’ He steps through the door and closes it behind him, eyes falling on a few black crumbs I had failed to wipe away. I grin behind my hand in spite of myself.

‘Um…well, I tried to find something to eat, but when I found the Oreo box, it was pretty much empty…’

He tries to stop himself from laughing, so it comes out as a sort of half repressed snigger.

‘Is that so?’ he grins.

I nod innocently and clamp my mouth shut again as he pulls my hand away from my face, then pushing away my upper lip with his thumb. We both collapse into hysterics as he sees the Oreo crumbs and slump back into the sofa.

‘So I might have eaten a few Oreos…’ I manage to gasp, as he slaps my head lightly. We sit and catch our breath for a few seconds.

‘It’s okay - I bought them for you anyway.’

‘Really? How did you know I liked them?’

‘I have a pretty top notch biscuit-dar,’ he snorts, not even able to keep from laughing himself. ‘I can tell whether someone likes Oreos from just one glance.’

‘Oh really?’ I say, laying my head on his shoulder wearily, though still smiling.

He turns to look at my head. ‘You tired?’ he whispers, as though I may already have gone to sleep.

‘Uh huh,’ I murmur.

‘Then lets get you to bed.’ He stands and pulls me up, wrapping an arm around my waist and pulling mine round his neck as though I were an invalid. I can’t even begin to think how early it is. This all feels so resonant, as if it happened a million years ago already - I wonder if he feels the same?

We stumble together into the eggshell bedroom and I pull my clothes off, stripping down to my underwear. It doesn’t even bother me that he’s there. It should do, I know, I’ve only really known him for a few days - but I won’t force myself to feel something I don’t. He strips down too, tossing me a pink t-shirt which I pull over my head, yawning.

I sneak a look at him with the ‘phase two’ eyes, but look away sharply, my breath catching in my throat. He’s like an angel - he looks just like an angel.

He steps over to the bed and throws back the covers, slipping into them as I do the same. There’s no question that we’ll sleep together tonight - and not in that way either, it just seems the way it should be.

So wriggling to get myself comfortable in the pleasantly familiar sheets, I don’t move away as he puts his arms around me, and I don’t flinch as he rests his head on my shoulder, and just as I’m drifting to sleep the smell of my dress wafts under my nose.

Except it’s not my dress…it’s him.