Longer this time as a thank you for everyone who's continued reading/reviewing. Not my favourite chapter of all time but in original FluffySpook style i.e. totally implausible. Enjoy!
The required checks take all of ten seconds much to her annoyance. Without a real reason to stay in the kitchen, she busies herself with mundane and unimposing tasks - re-arranging plates, lining already set cutlery, washing and drying a mug thoroughly. Out of politeness she figures he won't follow her. He wont pressure her. But as soon she enters that room again the temperature will soar, eyes will collide and plead making it painful.
Perhaps then it would just be easier to embrace it; no-one ever solved anything by running away.
That, and she feels awful for abandoning him so abruptly. It's not self control if it's just jumping at the decisive moment. He's waited long enough and so has she. The sink water reflects her guilty glare and forces her away towards the door.
Where's he's standing, watching.
So much for not following her.
"Ruth," he starts at once with an apology almost carved into his features. This is almost the most uncomfortable she's ever seen him. It's heartbreaking.
"Harry I'm sorry."
"I... what?" He doubts his ears, "You're sorry?"
"Yes. I know we... we can't, I can't..."
Talk. Put three words together. Justify anything.
"Look," he offers, "For a bit of painting this is all a bit... tense. I don't understand why I can't explain myself, or find an appropriate ending for this sentence, but I want to apologise for making you feel awkward. And don't deny that," he adds sharply seeing her lips part, "Do you have any idea how quickly you left that room?"
She smiles and feels a catching weight lift from somewhere.
"I have a pretty good idea. But I really did need to check on dinner."
"So I understand. All ok?" he looks over her shoulder. And on cue, to the nanosecond, his stomach releases a fearsomely thunderous growl. She gawps and equals the roar with a healthy outburst of laughter, to which he joins, somewhat embarrassed.
"Blimey Harry!"
"Sorry..." he holds a hand to his belly as if it could silence the demand and looks away.
"Not at all," she chirps, "But it'll be about half an hour, forty-five before we actually sit down to eat. Can I get you something to nibble? Er, crisps or..." she pads to the kitchen, "something..."
"No no, thank you," he follows, "I'm not going to fade away am I."
"Well - "
"There's no comeback to that Ruth. Come on," he calls before walking away, "Let's get this room finished."
Easier said then done. The story of their lives.
They settle into a concentrated but comfortable silence. As she touches up the base of a now completed wall, Harry decides the next ceiling corner needs tackling before they sit down to eat. Originally she makes no protest, allowing him to place the ladder by the furthest wall and clamber up until he bangs his head on the roof. Even then she has to stifle a laugh when he curses and thumps the side of the ladder. His stomach snarls in decided agreement of his frustration and Ruth checks the time.
Plenty of it left, which it quite a delightful rarity.
By the time he's started to administer the unusually spreadable paint, she's finished with the skirting board just in time to see the slapstick comical disaster unfold.
"Harry be careful," she paces forward and grips the base of the aluminium ladder, creaking as he shifts his weight to one side, on one foot. How can you say 'you'll tip it' without implying something much more insulting? He'd probably take it well but even so, she bites her lip as he stretches further and swallows the warning.
Having said that, it isn't all bad. She could ask this of him more often if he'd be willing to wear the same clothes he noted didn't fit properly. The surprisingly clean t-shirt abandons his jean waistband and rides upwards, carried by his shoulders as he reaches further, exposing fresh smooth skin of his hips and back. Some small part of her mind make's a vague remark about owing him privacy; stop gaping. He never gazed at her clothing that hugs her figure.
So much for self restraint. He couldn't get much sexier.
"I can't..." he tries, stepping one rung up to the top and bending his knee's, "Reach..."
"Harry watch the paint!"
But what good are words when a fully grown man is hurling towards you from a height, the ladder crashing down and the paint spilling freely through the air.
"Shit!"
He falls from the top step, the ladder topples to one side at too awkward an angel to control. As he makes a frantic attempt to leap off with the aim of refraining from colliding into Ruth, his right knee's contacts the paint tin and brings it down with him, above him, and a fresh thick layer smoothers his t-shirt completely. Through a miraculous coincidence or well placed reaction, Ruth makes an attempt to catch him. It is the preparation for the impact of his full weight smashing into hers that prevents any real pain when they hit the ground with a colossal and fantastic THUD.
An intense ooff! bursts from his throat but she doesn't match it. Her words are taken by frenzied breathing, which she bites suddenly at the metal crash of the ladder collapsing beside them. Against her chest the cold of the paint sets in, seeping through from his t-shirt to hers. Though the reason behind their crushed bodies is hardly what she'd longed for, let alone ever envisaged, to have his heart hammering against her now is enough to drug the slow ache at the back of her head sustained from banging against the floor. The pain caused to him is clear too; he makes no urgent attempt to alleviate his weight that suddenly squashes her, though she admits it's hardly a regretful thing.
In fact he says absolutely nothing. In a groan carried heavily by distress, he eventually enforces movement to his muscles and raises his head from her shoulder until their lips brush and they start to breathe for each other. Though he hadn't noticed when they fell, her hands are gripping the material on his back and his have slipped to the back of her head. It's wild, sudden, terrifying. She can almost taste the –
He rolls off. She shoots upwards.
With shaky arms he sits himself upright, slightly coiled into his own chest when something electrifyingly sharp courses through it.
"Harry." She reaches for him, quite extraordinarily uninjured. Heaving themselves upwards she takes more of his weight than he does of hers. When they recall this in twenty years, laughs too numerous to count will be shared, she's sure of that. The hopeless couple dazed and wearing more paint than the walls. But right now it seems serious to a grave level. The first sign of blood makes her jump slightly. Soon though she's able to help smudge the first trickles of a nosebleed from his face and offer a smile, which slowly, he returns as the pulsating bruising ebbs slightly.
"Ruth I'm so sorry. Are you ok?" he asks and gives a soft squeeze of her upper arm.
"I'm fine. Here," she carefully wipes more blood from his upper lip.
"You tried to catch me."
"I... yes."
"Are you sure you're alright?"
"Harry really I'm absolutely fine." Her gaze drops to his chest, "Couldn't say the same for you though..."
"It's just a nosebleed."
"No I was referring to your t-shirt. You're soaked through!"
That, he hasn't noticed. No wonder it suddenly felt so heavy and cold, pasting itself against his body. He makes a brief indifferent tug at it,
"I'll be fine, really, it's - "
"You need to take it off."
"What?"
"I'll put it in to wash straight away. Take it off."
"Ruth I didn't bring any spare..."
A dismissive hand flashes in front of his face,
"I'm sure I can find something upstairs somewhere. If the paint dries you'll never get it out. Oh it's all on your trousers too... I'm sorry Harry."
"I'm not taking my trousers off!"
"I shouldn't have asked you round to help. I... I'm sorry."
"It was my own fault," he shrugs, "I've wasted all your paint as well," he observes the empty tin, incongruous now lying in the middle of the room, the last of its contents dribbling from its mouth. Ignoring the fact that actually that really was her last tin, she paces to the door and commands,
"Go upstairs, have a shower."
"But – "
"Dinner will be ready in ten."
Exactly as before she leaves for him to swallow his words alone. What she doesn't know is this that time, he's found from somewhere the confidence and logic to argue his case. He wont let her run. He'll make something of this night whether she likes it or not. What is there to lose? It couldn't get more ridiculous.
"Ruth! RUTH!"
More if you'd like...?
