Lizard
Chapter 8
She ran around the park.
Alone.
Leaving George in bed. Sleeping off the effects of one of the most socially awkward nights she'd had for a long time.
Their birthday meal with Rebecca, Sam and Rob started well. Though to be honest Molly was unsure at one stage if it was for her benefit or George's. He'd certainly enjoyed lapping up the hero worshiping their hosts had thrown his way. His part in Sam's rescue elevated him to God like status in their eyes, and he knew it.
Then Charles had arrived. Politely he'd been asked to stay by Rebecca. No one expecting him to do so. The Charles she last knew wouldn't have dreamed of doing something like that. Yet he did. He stayed, and he stayed.
At first George, although knew Charles' name, was slow in putting the name to the stories Molly had told, but once he'd appreciated who Charles was from Molly's past it was very clear for all to see. From that point forward it became a giant dick waving competition between her ex-husband and her current beau, and Molly was most definitely the intended prize.
Both men told stories about her. Both men tried to claim her so to speak. It was a testosterone fuelled game of 'Molly Top Trumps'. She hated it; they both knew that, but it didn't stop them playing. George though non verbally claiming victory each and every time as his arms clung to her constantly throughout.
Eventually Molly put an end to the verbal sparring, and said their good nights. The taxi drive to their hotel for the evening was silent and fraught. Equally the tension remained in the hotel room. One look at Molly's sour face told George that his joke about a birthday shag was well off the mark! Molly was simply furious at him, and let him know. He didn't stay long to listen to her and stormed out after she'd subjected him to a tongue lashing of Molly Dawes proportion, and he didn't return until many hours later. She feigned sleep as he entered the room, and judging by the smell of his breath he'd been in the hotel bar consuming its delights. She was saved from any more anger as he passed out within minutes of climbing into the bed.
As she ran she mused. She wasn't just mad at George she was mad at Charles too. Angry that he no longer had the right to behave like that over her. Angry with his behaviour. She wasn't his anymore. He had seen to that when he slept with Georgie. When he stopped loving her.
As she ran she very much knew that after last night's behaviour she wasn't going to be anyone's anymore, never be. Whatever she had, whatever she wanted, it would always be on her terms. She wouldn't lose the Molly Dawes she had fought to become.
Seeing him though was a surprise. She'd never thought she'd see him again. Well not never never, but not for a while. The last time they had met she had seen how broken he was, and she offered him the chance. She offered him the chance to explain, to apologise, to help to put right some of the wrong he'd done to them, to her.
He talked, he taken the chance she'd given him. He talked a lot, and talked about everything, and she began in some tiny part to gain an understanding as to why it had all gone wrong.
How a large part of it was the PTSD, the detachment he felt from them. A lot too was down to his guilt, and how he couldn't share that with anyone.
She learnt also that of what went wrong was simply down to them as a couple. Their semi separate life styles. Their jobs taking them off in different directions, too many times, too often. They simply just had too little between them to save their marriage. He talked, and he told her their marriage was just too weak to survive it all, and so it inevitably crumbled. Together they weren't enough, they weren't strong enough to survive, and they didn't.
He'd talked, and she had just listened. She offered no opinion, no counter reason, and no pardon for it all, but there again he didn't ask her for it. It would seem he didn't need to hear her views, or her forgiveness. He used his time instead to explain and say sorry, as he was the one who in the main threw it all away.
As she watched him though she saw the Charles she used to know, and she saw a Charles she'd never met before. A vulnerable, considered, delicate man, who was slowly rebuilding everything that he had lost and had been destroyed by the past events.
She liked it. Found it refreshing how he wasn't in control of everything. How everything he said and did was no longer steeped in years of confidence and success. She felt him more accessible, and she felt more of his equal in a way she had ever felt before.
Their time together hadn't been long. Not nearly long enough to explain, talk, discuss what had happened, but it was enough. Enough for Molly to know that she still loved him. Always would. Yet not once during those hours together did Charles mention the world love. Not when he talked about them, or what they had. Not once did he tell her that he still loved her. Not once did he ask if she still loved him. Not once did she hear, what she secretly was waiting to hear…. that he still wanted her. That hurt her more than anything, and so she offered him nothing, because he asked for nothing. They parted with a brief hug and smiled, and moved on. She knew then all was lost.
It was that parting that had hurt her more than any of the previous ones they ever had had before. That parting was so cold and definite. So final, and she walked away believing that all that love between them had been lost. It had left him, along with all the bad memories he had tried so hard to overcome.
And so with this belief Molly had returned back to New Zealand and into George's arms. A man who was seeing her as a new start. A man who was asking her to give them a go. A man who let her know he was emotionally available for her. The total opposite to Charles, and so she started to let George in. Finally certain there was no more Charles and Molly to go back for.
Well that was until last night. Until Molly has witnessed Charles' territorial behaviour. When she had seen how badly Charles had behaved with George. Why would he behave so if he still didn't care? And it made her mad. Mad at the two warring men, but mad at herself. That despite it all Charles Benjamin James still, despite it all, had the ability to stir up her emotions up.
Her phone beeped and she expected it to be George requesting fluids and pain killers.
She stopped dead when she saw his name flash up. Opening the text with a degree of understandable hesitancy.
Sorry... and Happy Birthday….. for yesterday. C
That was all, but it was more than she had ever expected. More than she had allowed herself to hope. As she put her phone away and jogged back to the hotel she realised that was the first time in many years he'd wished her a happy birthday. It made her happy, yet she didn't feel the need, for now, to reply. She hadn't the strength.
"Head bad?" She asked as she loudly closed the hotel room door behind her.
George sat on the end of the bed. His head in his hands and looking very sorry for himself. He wasn't usually a drinker and last night efforts were taking effect.
"Yeah. Bloody sore." He looked at her apologetically. "Sorry."
Molly just stood looking at him. Half her heart feeling sorry for him and the other still mad. His behaviour last night was embarrassing.
"Sorry?" George tried again.
"What you sorry for?" She asked. "Getting pissed or for pissing me off."
He managed his killer smile despite the pain to his head.
"Both." He offered. Cocking his head and looking at her in a pleading type way.
She sighed. A lot of men in her life had been apologising of late. She'd accepted one apology already today, she now had to accept George's.
"Here." She smiled as she handed him a bottle of water and tablets. Running her fingers through his hair as though he were a little boy. "And you're forgiven!"
He took them, smiled back and asked.
"Forgiven?"
"Yeah." She placed a kiss on his head and then left for her shower.
"God you're an idiot." She told him loudly down the phone. "First time you've seen Molly in nearly five years, and you behave like that."
"Like what?" Charles demanded of Rebecca. Though he knew what she meant.
"Like an idiot." She spat back.
"Well how was I meant to behave with Mr Handsome pawing her constantly? Christ he never left her alone." Charles said.
He paused and then added before Rebecca could say anything else.
"Anyway it's not the first time."
"What?"
"Me and Molly... we saw each other last October. When she was last home." Charles continued. "We talked."
"Oh." Rebecca squeaked out. "Did you say sorry then?"
"Christ Rebecca. Of course I did." He shouted back. "I said it again and again. Apologised for everything."
"You never said." She replied.
"No I didn't, did I?" He snapped. "I don't have to tell you everything."
"Why does everyone want to interfere when it comes to me and Molly?" He'd knew it was up to him to sort it out.
"Besides." He continued. "It didn't do any good did it? She's moved on. Found someone else." Then quietly asked. "How long?"
Rebecca had been prepared for this question.
"A while. Close to six months." She said gently back. "Think it's serious. Sorry."
"Shit." Was all he replied. "I guess then that's really it." Was all there was left to say.
He'd been gone for such a long time. She paced around her rooms. Her past history always making her think the worse. She was starting to really worry.
He'd volunteered to do extra shifts. The service was down numbers and the beautiful crisp autumnal days of April made the mountain ranges of New Zealand all the more appealing for walkers. Hence the need for more rescue call outs, more folks simply out there with limited experience and definite lack of understanding of how the weather can suddenly change. And change it did.
It was windy, cold, raining heavy and visibility was poor. The worst conditions to be out looking for someone. The worse conditions to be flying in, and George was out there doing just that. Yet he was one of the best, one of the dedicated ones. He knew his stuff and she tried to calm herself down with that information.
Since their trip to England they had been getting along well. Really well. They spent most of their free time together, shifts and workloads depending. They socialised together, and over the past few weeks, they almost lived together to. His clothes, personal effects starting to take over her floor space. She didn't mind. She knew her place was closer to both their works than his. It wasn't an issue. Except it was fast becoming one.
She knew he was after more. She knew he was after it all with her. He'd told her numerous times how much he loved her. Never directly, always testing the water, afraid of her response. Just as she was afraid of what her response would be when she was expected to say it back.
It wasn't that she didn't love him. It was that she was unsure if she loved him like he deserved to be loved. A part of her unable, and maybe even unwilling, to give over her heart completely to another. Unable and unwilling because the last time she did that it had been well and truly trampled over. And she, in the end, just hadn't been enough.
Even in this happy state with George she still worried about her past, how she couldn't escape it, and it was as she had feared. Now that Charles knew where she was, how to get in touch, he'd started doing just that. And that's what he was now doing. Not in a direct stalking way, just in a very subtle Charles James' way. The odd e mail about the charity, the odd text about Sam or his mum. Something or nothing, but they started up a previously severed link to each other. A link she felt happier having severed, concerned about how she'd manage with his attentions once again. And so each and every time he made contact, Molly never replied back, not once. Too afraid to start up a friendship with him on any level.
It wasn't just fear though that stopped her. She needed to protect herself: aware Charles didn't love her, and there was no hope for them, she needed to live for what she had, rather than what she had once wanted. Also there was George to consider in all this. She had a loyalty to George. A loyalty she believed in and knew how it felt to be on the other side of infidelity, no matter what level the act was committed at.
Every car that drove close to her apartment. Every time her phone flashed with some unconnected alert she reacted, and when he did finally knock on the door hours later, she fell into his arms as he stood on the door step.
The tears flowed down her face as she hugged him. She told herself right there and then, Charles was the past and she couldn't lose George, not like she'd lost another before. Having him here, back in her arms was perfect. Or at least it was until he spoke.
"Missed me?" He asked.
A simple question, but as he stood there hopeful for her answer she was transported back to years before when she had stood on someone else's doors step saying exactly the same words. Her mind tried to cover up the confusion her body showed. Her face, she was very much aware, was betraying the emotions that had breached from her heart at the resurfacing of memories.
She tried to hide it, but she failed. He'd felt the change in her, he'd seen the change in her. He moved skilfully past it though, for now.
"Have I done something wrong?" He asked later that night.
Molly lay next to him in bed, they weren't touching, were close but she felt a million miles away from him. Despite the emotions they'd had before, they both feigned sleep as soon as they got to bed. For once, unusually for them, sex was not on the cards.
Now in the early morning, the dawn was on its way, George rolled over and addressed the elephant in the room.
"What's going on Molly?" He asked.
"Nothing, and no you haven't done anything wrong. It was just all a bit... you know?" She sighed back at him.
"That's it Mols! I don't? You never say. You never tell me anything." He replied. His voice level and soft.
It was always so calm with George. No shouting. No storming off. No fireworks. He wasn't like that. The complete opposite to Molly. He was considered in everything he did, everything he said. It had taken her a while to get used to it, but she did, and while most of the time this calmness was nice, it wasn't Molly. She wanted love, but she also wanted fire, heat, passion. She wanted the fights, so the makeup sex would follow. She wanted the slammed doors, so they opened again with intense contrition. With Charles she had all that in abundance. With George she didn't get that. Every day was even, controlled.
She gasped as she realised yet again she was comparing George to Charles, and saw only fails rather than differences.
"Ain't nothing to say." She began in an equally calm voice. Inside she was screaming, begging him to lose his control.
"Think there is?" He lay on his back with his arms tucked under his head.
She glanced over and saw his Adonis figure silhouetted by the early morning light. His blond hair, longer than usual fanning out on the pillow. His eyes focused on the ceiling above him full of the pain he was in. He was gorgeous. He was kind. He was everything she should be wishing for.
She didn't reply, so he continued. With care.
"You still love him don't you?" Was all he simply asked.
Tears silently rolled down her face. She hated this topic of conversation, with anyone, but especially with him.
"No." She managed to say with a steady voice that even convinced her. Her face half turned away from him, she was certain her tears weren't noticed.
He made some type of negative noise to her answer.
"You sure about that?" He asked. "Or is it just me?"
She still hid her hurt and focused up on the man next to her.
"You what?" She asked, pretending to be confused.
"Is it just me, or is it just you...?" He said slowly. "That can't see that you still love him?"
"What?" She yelled back. "What do you mean? Still love who?"
George laughed, a sad lonely laugh.
"Charles."
"George…." She began.
"Look Mols." He stopped her. "You know how I feel about you. I always knew we had to do this slowly...but I thought after seven months you might have told me at least once how you feel." He still didn't look at her, but she felt his pain.
"It's not that easy." She replied. "It's complicated... and well... it's just hard."
He rolled over and gathered her in to his arm. He could never be mean to her. She felt at peace, safe, that the confrontation was passing.
"It's OK Mols. You take your time." He kissed her lips and tasted the tears. "I'm not going anywhere."
And just like that the emotional bomb was defused. Was over... for now.
He sat for a while considering. He did this each and every time. She probably just thought the few texts, the e mails, were one offs. Just throw away remarks, not the considered scripts they truly were. It had been a week or so since he'd last messaged her. Since her birthday night he had tried to do it once or twice a week. It was a tradition he'd started. She though, he sorely noticed, never replied.
He was close to giving up. Stopping all together, but then his mother reminded him... Benny had never given up on them. So why should he?
Like all his texts they were simple and never once implied he expected her to reply. She guessed he didn't want to force her, or that he simply didn't care either way. No conversation had ever come from them, and she could deal with that. She was managing them.
However his latest one thought affected her more than any of the others. The words in his text flinging her back to a happier time. She smiled as soon as she has read it. Hadn't deleted it, and days later still had it on her phone and revisited it often.
Might gonna need a medic! Just used the very last of my Rosabya capsules! C
The words he'd text were part of their start. She knew that. He knew that. What she didn't know was how to reply, and so yet again she didn't.
The autumn turned into a harsh winter. The resort and the village hit hard with flu and winter bugs. George himself, this unbeatable man, even succumbed to the flu, and Molly took time off to care for him. She saw the hope in his eyes as she tenderly looked after him day after day.
After that illness, without ever discussing it, they suddenly found they were definitely living together. All of George's effects now officially at Molly's, and they seemed settled. His insecurities over Molly's feeling for him never mentioned again. They 'L' word used very infrequently by both. George to scared he'd push her away. Molly to scared to admit to how she truly felt. However Molly at least felt settled, and believed that was enough.
That was until Mia showed up. George's rescue service had brought in other pilots from the New Zealand Air Force to help with their staffing shortages, and increased workload. The need for help and family issues in a village close to the resort meant Mia was a semi-permanent fixture for the foreseeable.
George knew Mia well. Everyone did. A beautiful, popular local girl, who'd he'd grown up with. A close family friend. Plus she was his first love; and the woman who broke his heart. The woman he believed was his future, before she left to peruse her dreams. She left to join the Air Force, to train and become a successful pilot for them. Her world and everything in it changed and she left George brutally behind.
It had taken him many years to recover. To try again. Molly was his attempt at having another go. She knew that. Just like George was for her. He felt settled with Molly, happy, and Mia's appearance back in his life, without warning, caused him a mild degree of concern only.
However Molly saw it all. She saw the way Mia still looked at George. How she smiled a different smile just for him. She was never inappropriate, she never stepped over the boundaries of friendship, but Molly still saw that the flame Mia had once held for George had certainly not gone out.
From George though she saw nothing but the sweet kindness that made this man so unique. She knew he'd never look at another. That he was loyal and accepted his old flame back into his life with happiness and friendship... and that was all. Yet she also knew that he'd never let go of his feelings for Mia. That the loyalty he had for them, also was loyalty he still had to the memory of him and Mia. She was still a very special someone in his life.
In all this Molly saw a potential disruption to her comfortable life. Saw how her lack of words, her lack of the expressions he wanted to hear, her hesitancy after almost a year together, might change things now Mia was back in his world. Knowing the hard way, how one partner not communicating, holding back what they felt, could destroy a relationship, and so she started to try harder with George.
"Not that I'm complaint Mols, that was amazing, but what brought this on?" He asked setting his knife and fork down.
She smiled. He knew her too well. Never one for putting herself out when it came to preparing meals, yet tonight she had. The full Monty. Everything homemade, numerous courses, candle light and even music. Romancing him as she never had done before.
She was scared of being on her own again. Scared that she'd messed this relationship up too, and needed him to know how she felt, before it was too late.
He stared at her as she made her way across the table to him.
He opened his arms willingly and accepted her with a simple kiss as she sat on his lap. Her delicate body, held firmly in his large frame. He knew she was building up to something. He also knew he just had to wait it out until she was brave enough to say it.
She held his face and stared into his blue eyes. Eyes that were shining for love, just for her. She ran her fingers over his jaw line and felt the bite of the stubble that grew there, and she liked it. Pulled herself up. It was now or never.
"I love you." She said. Simply and with a very shaky voice.
After a year together that was the first time she'd ever consciously told him that. She watched as the happiness danced across his handsome face. As her words made his heart burst with happiness, and she knew that no matter what her past had been, or still was, she was right to try to love this man.
He'd hoped she'd come. Knew it was a long shot, but still he'd sent her the invite to attend the charity's second premises opening. A huge achievement for all involved, and it was no coincidence that Charles insisted the opening occurred in the month of October. The month Molly usually came home on leave.
So he had hoped she'd come. Knew though that she wouldn't, and so when the doors to the day finally closed and he sat alone in his office he no longer held out any hope.
The delicate knock on his door brought him out of the day dream he'd been having. Not a happy one, a memory of what he'd once had and what he now no longer had. A sad look on his face, a heaviness to his world.
She'd spent minutes before knocking just watching him. Sitting alone in the semi darkness. She knew he was thinking hard. His hands ran through his curls repeatedly and he was mumbling. A happy memory she had of a similar situation from their early days, flooded her mind. How years ago she'd surprised him in his office as he'd worked late. How she'd treated him to a desk picnic, and ear for his moans, and a body which he had adored right there on his office desk.
She pushed it down and controlled her breathing. even the memory affected her. She was here to see him, to simply talk. He'd invited her to the day. Had messaged her several times with the question about her attendance. Yet she hadn't answered. Hadn't intended to, though something happened in her life, there were changes ahead and Molly knew she needed to see him.
"Charles?" She said quietly after her gentle knock.
He jumped up from his seat at seeing her. Unsure at first if she was real.
"Molly?" He smiled as he walked towards her. "You came. Thank you."
She sat down in the seat he offered. They both clumsily fudged their way through a lack lustre hug. They moved to safer ground as he busied himself in making her a tea.
"I had a look round." She said. "The new place. It's amazing. You've done a great job."
He dipped his head and studied his toes. Her compliments always made him blush.
"Thanks." He replied. "So..?"
She smiled, encouragingly. He never used to be stuck for words, and to see him now made her realise that she still affected him. He might not love her anymore, but she still had the ability to win him over, however slight, with her charms and magnetism. To Molly that felt good, that she still had something over him.
"Thanks for the texts. And e mails." She said. "I'm gonna go and see your Mum tomorrow. To catch up."
He lifted his eyes to look at her.
"You didn't mind?" And seeing her shake her head. "It's just you never replied. Not once." He added.
"Yeah." She picked at her nails rather than look at him. "Guess I didn't know what to say and that."
He nodded as though he understood. A silence fell between them. He had so much he wanted to say. He wanted to stand and hold her, grab her, never let her go until she knew how sorry he was, and how much he still loved her, but he didn't.
"You home alone this time?" He asked.
"Yeah." She smiled at the rueful face Charles was pulling. "All alone."
Things were changing in Molly's world, she was moving on with living, and that was one of the main reasons she was here. The chance to visit the charity only a small weak excuse. She knew she had to see Charles. She knew she had to explain to him in person.
When she first explained to George, told him what and why she was doing it, he was silent. She persevered, he listened, and as her commitment to him grew, new plans were made, he accepted it. He'd agreed to her returning back home because he trusted her, he was asking a lot from her, and because he knew it was something she had to do.
"I brought you these." Molly said as she place last year's purchase on his desk. Six pods in a plastic sleeve. A red ribbon tied around.
His eyes lit up and he let out a small chuckle.
"Rosabya? Where? How?" He asked picking them up and turning them over in his large hands
She watched. She'd always loved his hands.
"I've my sources." She mirrored the grin he was giving her. It felt light and happy with him for a while.
"Thank you." He said, and he stood and moved towards her. "Don't know if I deserve them?"
He was hopeful though at such a personal gift. The inclusion of the red ribbon filled him with hope.
"Nah. You probably don't..." She teased back. She bravely continued. "Thing is... well... I kind of needed to give them to you."
His eyes raised in question. He stared at her.
Her body language tight and her barriers were up. He moved no closer.
"They are kind of like a good bye present." She looked directly at him.
"Goodbye?" He asked, but he knew what she was saying.
"Yeah. The texts, the e mails and that... well they are gonna have to stop." She said.
"Shit." Charles said. "Shit Molly. I hope I haven't caused any problems." He really meant that. "I was just being friendly. I just wanted to be your friend."
"Yeah I know, and no they haven't." She reassured him. "George ain't like that really,"
She watched as he snorted in disagreement. His past experience with her boyfriend hadn't indicated that.
"Then? What?" He shook his head. "Why 'goodbye'. I mean I understand... but why now?"
She looked down at her shoes. She looked out of the window. She eventually looked into his chocolate brown eyes as he stood silently pleading with her to answer him.
She started out quiet, but then grew stronger.
"George has asked me to marry him." She stated. "And I've said yes."