At dinner time I leave Tim to it in the kitchen and hang around in the living room with my good old friend Shiraz. Its been a long day and we have been speaking but its been terribly awkward for me. I can feel the atmosphere and he can sense that I fear him just a little, no matter how much I try to conceal it. Call it years of bad treatment and abuse, I mean look at me, look at my past, my male track history...lets be honest its really not good. I sip at my wine wandering around the room slowly and pointlessly before I come to a stop at the window.
It's black outside, dark and merky and my street and front garden have no source of light to help. I stare out and lose myself in thoughts. I question my sanity and why I am letting Tim hang around after he hit me. Maybe its a comfort thing because I know Peter is hanging around somewhere, or perhaps it is my subconscious screaming at me to make Peter jealous to win him back. Either way I have no idea and it makes my head thump trying to figure it out. Vaguely aware of shadows reflecting in the window created from the low lights on in the room, but I don't pay attention to what they are of.
"Carla..." his voice is soft and I jump feeling his hands gently atop my shoulders.
He smiles at me warmly as my alarmed face turns quickly to look at him. I swallow hard and then force a small, tight lipped smile back at him as I look away again and back out of the window just in time to see a car, identified only by its headlights go sailing passed slowly until I can't see its taillights. I feel Tim breathing against my neck as he brushes back my hair from my neck and kisses lightly upon my skin. He is so gentle that its like a different person to the one who showed up last night. I give in to the advance, but still take a large sip from my wine. He places a few more light kisses down my neck and towards my shoulder until he reaches the hem of the neckline of my top.
"Carla..." he gently states my name again before gently turning me around to face him.
I am like a puppet he is in control of and don't resist but it doesn't mean I am going to be pushed around or controlled permanently. He takes the glass from my hand and I look up at him warily, but he attentions don't seem to be on me looking at him. He kisses me gently and I lightly oblige a kiss in return. He smiles and kisses me again a little harder. He leaves my wine on the window ledge and takes my hand leading me across to the sofa where he offers me to sit first. I do so quietly, watching and observing him closely. He sits beside me and leans in, reaching with him hand to my neck and rests his palm gently against it as he kisses me and I kiss back. The kisses are so tender but I don't feel threatened, just a little incomfortable. We kiss for a while, him inching ever closer to me until I have settled back and down into the corner of the couch. I feel his weight on me but I am a little more involved in the moment now and allowing it to happen quite concentually. Perhaps it will help me to relax with him again, I don't know, worth a try though. Plus I have had enough wine really to be able to supress any real feeling.
Things progress quickly, to the point it ends up being quite a quick and rough experience, like a teenager scared of getting caught by their parents coming home, and its over in a flash too, but he seems satisfied. I am on the other hand left feeling a little worse for wear, head thudding again and in desperate need of more to drink. Devon wasn't supposed to be a repeat of my Manchester life, and to be honest so far its not coming up smelling all roses like I had imagined it would. He kisses me and gets up as if nothing has just happened to continue with cooking dinner, as I slowly pull myself up and return to the window only to retrieve my glass. I head to the kitchen and take the bottle from the side to return to the sofa and drink myself into further submission. Tim humming to himself is a distant sound in my mind as I sit and stare blindly at the fire place and the burning candles on the mantlepiece and coffee table in front of me. The flicker of the flames is mesmerising and hypnotic. I watch them dance only vaguely aware of anything else going on around me.
"Carla, darling I won't be long, but that was my Grandma, she just needs my help with something quickly. Keep an eye on the dinner and I'll be right back" he states as he comes over and quckly places a hard kiss on my cheek as he struggles quickly into his jacket.
I don't take my eyes off of the flames and take the last large gulp of my drink so that I can refill the glass. The second the door slams behind him I reach forward, snatch the bottle and empty a good portion of the contents into my glass, leaving less than a quarter in the bottle. I glug at it for a moment or too before I end up in tears and snuggle up back onto the sofa. This was not supposed to happen, not to me, not again, not another misjudgement of a man. I am angry, at myself more than anything, but partly at Tim and at Peter too. Frowning and crying I take another few sips of the drink before my phone lights up on the table in front of me and I look through teary eyes, with blurred vision to see 'Peter' lit up on the screen.
It tips me over the edge and I scream, grabbing the bottle and topping up the glass again only to glug it straight down as if it was only water. The phone stops, goes black and promptly starts again. I reach forward to get it and slip forward, slipping straight off of the sofa and with a thud everything goes black.
In a dazed state I am certain I hear Peter's voice, I can hear myself telling him to go, but I can see the street back in Manchester its not the present, nor a memory and its distorted but Peter's voice is there I can just hear it, muffled as it is. I sense movement too, but it feels strange, not normal like I am in any control and its boiling hot, roasting in fact, I feel warmth I think upon my skin but soon again all the sensation is gone.