A Work in Progress

by L. T. Smith

  When dawn arrived, it wasn’t the memories of Gillian Parker that woke with me. Nope, not her at all. It was an image so strong, so clear, that I could almost say I had experienced it instead of having dreamed it up.

  I was on a bed, a double bed, my back against the headboard and my legs outstretched. Someone was seated next to me, her jeans-clad legs stretched out alongside mine, her feet bare, toenails painted lilac. In my dream my chest was filling with expectation, the shortening of my breath almost painful. A hand appeared in front of me, palm upwards, as if asking for it to be taken. I could feel skin on skin as we touched; the sensation was electric. I lifted the joined hands to my mouth, brushing my lips over her soft skin before delivering a tender kiss, my shyness ebbing. Her gasp as I kissed her hand resonated against my lips, and I kissed her fingers again in hopes she’d repeat the noise. She did. And I felt the same jolt from it.

  Closing my eyes, I turned to where I knew her face would be and inhaled her scent. Rose, chamomile, and cedarwood, and I breathed her in. Her face was next to mine, the warmth of it drawing me closer. I wanted to bury my face against the nape of her neck, take in more of her scent, but I also wanted to kiss her, and kiss her, and kiss her. My bottom lip trailed along her throat to her ear, where my mouth closed on her lobe. I lifted my hand and cupped her jaw, my thumb tracing its fine contours. She did the same, each stroke of her thumb sending ripples of expectation through me.

  I raised up, shifted, and passed my mouth over hers, our lips connecting briefly, the resulting rush of excitement racing southwards. A moan, her or me, I don’t know, but desire throbbed through me.

  My hand released itself from hers. Moving my body over her, I slipped a leg on either side of her hips. Wasting no time, my fingertips stroked along the side of her torso, and I gloried in the responsive jerking of her hips.

  I trailed my fingers up to her collarbone, her throat, her jaw. Her skin was so smooth, like silk, and I knew I would never tire of touching her. Again I traced her jaw, the line of it strong and resilient, then up to her mouth, her lips full and soft and inviting. I leaned closer and stole a kiss, her response instantaneous, consuming.

  Her hands slipped around my waist, creating sparks of want that sizzled through me, her fingers spreading, leaving their invisible marks on my skin. My gaze moved up past a straight nose with perfectly shaped nostrils, up to her eyebrows, the arch of them almost aristocratic. I slid my gaze down a bit to meet the most beautiful eyes I’d ever seen in my life. I knew those eyes, remembered them. When I had first seen them, I’d known that however long I searched, I would never see eyes like those again—the divine shape of them, the wide innocence of them, the dark lashes guarding their secrets. But more than that, it was their colour. The longer I stared into them, the more their colour shifted and changed like the water in a mystical pool. As when I had seen them before, the outer rim of the iris was green, a dark green, the circle of it definite and exact, which contrasted with the lighter, almost translucent green or grey adjacent to it and made it seem misplaced. Then the amber, the soft, sweet amber that shimmered and shifted as the pupil pushed it outwards across the green to magic a spell to bewitch me.

  They were her eyes, the eyes of the woman who had done so much more than help me up from the pavement and lead me safely to my destination. They were the distinctly captivating eyes of the only woman who had pushed past my adoration of Gillian Parker. They were the glorious eyes of none other than Virgina Donaldson. And my heart swelled with the joy of knowing it was her I was dreaming about.

  My eyes sprang open, the realisation of my dream hitting home. Instead of feeling anger or trying to rationalize or dismiss this revelation, I felt my muse take hold. A smile blossomed across my lips as the joy of creativity flooded through me. I climbed out of bed and leisurely made my way to my study.

  It was time to write.

  Chapter 11

  Epiphany

  Dawn.

  Fingers of light stroke the windowsill

  whilst curtains billow bravely

  and reveal the day into our care.

  Cumulus sit beneath cirrus

  as the sun bleeds into blue.

  You shift, your body folding onto, and into, mine,

  your hand sliding over my skin

  evoking images of our coupling and the way we touched, joined, loved.

  A lone digit separates, straightens,

  alert and inquisitive,

  a commitment to discovery in its action

  as it trails along skin, lazily marking the places where your mouth should be.

  Bending slightly, I inhale,

  fill my lungs until my chest aches,

  fill my lungs with our mingled scents, our passion, our loving.

  The echoes of our cumming,

  our desperate pleas of ‘please, please, oh please’ that grip and hold;

  our breathless promises of wanting, of needing, of this is forever

  all beating with the erratic rhythm of a flowering and disquieted heart,

  a heart that needs to spill its love to become content.

  A tingle, a spark, an insistent hunger

  not satiated after hours of you and me,

  me and you.

  But even after all this,

  all these memories of the flooding and joining of us,

  it is when you tilt your face to mine,

  your lips slightly parted, slightly swollen, slightly glistening,

  that I once again become lost.

  It is your eyes, I see. These eyes.

  And in these eyes I see me with you, forever with you.

  This one night, this one dawn, this afterwards

  make it clear to me:

  I can never let you go.

  Chapter 12

  Ten o’clock Sunday morning saw me dressed and seated at my laptop, the muse still active. Papers were scattered all over my desk, my scrawl haphazardly marking the blank pages with dreams and future scenarios. The thrill of writing again was coursing through my veins and I was exhilarated, the challenge of choosing words to create my images, my characters, my worlds positively delightful. My dream from the previous night had fuelled my imagination, taken my dormancy and obliterated it with action. I hadn’t yet written more of the story I’d started; I was too busy planning where I was going to take it, something I rarely ever did. I’d even undertaken background research on the locations my characters would visit, checked out the images on Google Maps, another thing I rarely did.

  When my mobile sounded, Lionel’s velvet tone greeting me for the day, I stopped, my fingers poised above the keyboard.

  “I should get that.”

  Instead, I continued to type. Maybe I would have answered the call if my phone had been right next to me, but it was in my handbag on the floor near the doorway and I was on a creative roll. It had been too long since the words had come so easily, and I wasn’t about to put a stopper in it. Whoever it was that called would call back.

  And they did. About four times, as it happened. The fifth time, I caved in. I pushed my chair back with a slam, marched over to the doorway, snatched my bag from the floor, and rifled through its contents until I found my mobile. As my fingers curled around my cell, it went silent, almost as if I had smothered it when I grabbed it.

  Swiping the screen, I saw that all five missed calls were from Gill, and a smile curved my lips. The thought never even entered my head that something might be wrong. Just as I was about to call her back, I noticed I had a text message too.

  Opening the app, I was surprised to see Virgina’s name, along with her message: “Where’d you go?” I checked the time on the text, and it had been sent five minutes after I’d left the previous evening.

  I hadn’t bothered checking my phone when I got home. Obviously. If Gill had needed to contact me, she would have called, so there had been no point in my constantly looking to see if I’d missed anything. Then I realised she had called, and maybe she did need me after all. />
  No sooner had that thought entered my head than Lionel began singing again. Gill’s face appeared on the screen, her smile wide and her eyes sparkling. The photo had captured her so beautifully.

  “Hello, you.” As I said the words into the receiver, I couldn’t stop the grin spreading, thoughts of her being in danger or upset evaporating.

  “Thank fuck for that!” Gill’s voice was a little loud, and I winced slightly. “Open your door. I’m just coming through your gate.”

  Before I had chance to ask her why, she’d ended the call.

  I pulled the phone from my ear and stared it for a moment before scuttling towards the front door.

  Gill’s hand was extended to knock, but stopped just short of punching me in the face. I couldn’t quite work out her expression. Was she upset? Maybe her discussion with Tom hadn’t been as successful as she’d hoped it would be and she needed a shoulder to cry on, a job I had always selfishly relished in the past.

  My musings were cut short as she reached out and grabbed me, then pulled me into her embrace. The scent of her was as overwhelmingly familiar as always, but for once in my life I didn’t melt into her. I squeezed her and drew back, my hands slipping onto her arms.

  “How are things?” I looked into her eyes and tried to gauge how she was feeling. She looked directly back at me, her head tilting to the side, her lips curling upwards in amusement. “Well? What happened? Did you talk with him? Ask him?”

  Gill released an exaggerated sigh, but her budding smile had already given her away. “What is it with you and doorsteps? Are you going to let me in, or do you want me to freeze to death?”

  “Oh bugger!” I stepped away from the door, turning my body slightly to give her room to slip past me. Gill laughed as she stepped inside, her hands sliding down my arms as she passed. Her skin against mine would typically have sent my body into meltdown, which I rarely knew how to deal with. Though my brain always knew that any touch on her part was completely innocent, my libido still seemed a tad confused as to whether there was more meant than there actually was. Most of the time.

  That thought confused me. There was something not quite right with it. Yes, sometimes I was physically attracted to Gill, but other times I just believed I was going to make an idiot out of myself if she saw how my body could react to her touch. My heart would always crave being close to her, protecting her, holding a special place for her, but did I really want to have more with her than what I already had? I closed the door and stopped, my hand on the handle, my thoughts in a whirl.

  “And whilst we have a cuppa, you can tell me why you are looking so confused and hugging the door to your house.”

  I looked over my shoulder to where she was waiting at the end of the hallway. “You can put the kettle on yourself, Parker. You know where it is.”

  She didn’t move, just waited for me to get to her before she dipped her head as if in mock curtsey as she let me pass.

  “Looks like it is me that is making the brew again.”

  “Without smashing it this time, if you please.”

  “Git.” Without turning to her, I raised my hand and gave her the British two-fingered salute.

  “You’d better stop that, Brynn. You don’t want to startle the baby.”

  What she had said didn’t hit home until I was in the kitchen. I’d actually picked up the kettle by the time realisation struck, and I turned with it in my hand as if I was presenting a bouquet of flowers.

  “Baby?”

  Gill leaned against the doorframe, her face glowing, radiant, flawless, even more so than usual.

  “My baby.” A slight shake of her head followed. “I mean, my and Tom’s baby.”

  My whole body froze, became numb. My brain worked feverishly to process what she’d said, but it whirled air and expectation, nothing solid.

  Gill stepped forwards, holding her hand out to me. I stared at it and then at her face before returning my attention to her hand again. When her fingers touched my forearm, the spell was broken and reality came crashing back.

  “You’re pregnant?” My voice sounded a little too high, a little too stunned.

  She nodded, her expression caught between happiness and concern.

  “You’re pregnant?” This time I managed less incredulity and my voice sounded deeper, with only a hint of dipshit.

  She nodded again as she stepped towards me and uttered a soft yes.

  As I looked into the eyes of Gillian Parker, my best friend Gillian Parker, my gorgeously witty and funny and intelligent friend Gillian Parker, a rush of my absolute love for her exploded through me. The sensation of being filled by that love, encased in that love, freed by that love was one of the single most glorious experiences of my life. I slammed the kettle onto the kitchen counter and lunged forwards, my arms circling her and pulling her to me.

  “You’re pregnant!” My words hit the right tone and delivery this time. Excitement, happiness, delight. I squeezed her until she oomphed and laughed, and I instantly released her. “Are you okay? Did I hurt you? The baby?”

  Her laugh was light, joyful. “Yes, no, and no. We’re both fine, quite fine.” Gill slipped her hands down to grasp my hands, squeezing them quickly before loosening her grip and retaining only one of them.

  “And you and Tom?” My tone was hopeful.

  Gill nodded, her smile widening. “Yes. Definitely. Seems as if I was being a little hormonal.”

  The image of Tom and Gina entered my head—the touch of her hand on his arm, the laughter, the echo of my anger at both of them. The jealousy I’d felt raging through me that Tom Griffiths could have both women I wanted whilst I had none. “So, what about… oh, what’s her name?” I pretended to struggle to remember Virgina’s name, and Gill laughed outright.

  “Don’t give me that crap, Brynn. I know you from old.” Gill squeezed my fingers. “You know damned well what her name is.”

  “I… What?” The blush raged up my throat and over my face. “No, I don’t.” My eyes were beginning to burn with the onset of my embarrassment, even more so when Gill laughed louder.

  I began to squirm. Why didn’t I just admit it? Tell her that I had met Gina on the way to the hotel, tell her that I had met a woman I’d quite liked and hoped to see again? Gill had always been supportive of my relationships. She might even have put in a good word, too, if she hadn’t thought my new love interest was shagging her fiancé. Not the best scenario I could’ve hoped for, the shagging of her fiancé bit, but it still didn’t explain why I didn’t just say her name.

  Gill lightly grabbed my chin, forcing my attention to be on her. “So, if you don’t know her, why did she look so disappointed when I told her you’d left last night?”

  My mouth gaped open, more in shock rather than in the beginning of a response.

  “And when I offered to give her your mobile number, she told me she already had it.”

  This time I moved my mouth, but still nothing came out.

  “We had a lovely chat about you falling over on Elm Hill and her helping you up.”

  “I got up on my own.” I winced at my unintended confession.

  “Ah, it speaks! It admits it knows Gina!” Gill threw her head back and laughed, stopped and looked at me before laughing again, gripping her side as she did so. “You’ve given me a stitch.”

  I glared at her, my eyebrows raised and my face pulled into a mask of expectation to signify I was waiting for her to shut up laughing long enough for me to speak, but she didn’t.

  With an exaggerated sigh, I turned away from her and clicked the kettle on. With the way her laughter kept stopping and starting, I decided to make a pot of tea, maybe get the biscuits out too. Might as well have a cuppa whilst I waited for Gill to settle down. But even though her laughter was at my expense, I knew there was no malice coming my way, knew she was pulling my leg, knew so many things her laughter meant.

  And the reason why I knew it? Easy. Gillian Parker knew me better than I knew myself.

&n
bsp; That thought made me snigger. The feel of her slight tug on my T-shirt followed by her laughter made another snigger sneak out, but I continued to sort out the cups and teapot for our drink.

  “Brynn and Gina sitting in a tree. K-I-S-S-I—”

  “Pack it in.”

  Gill’s laughter showed that she wouldn’t be packing anything in for a while, and that made me grin all the wider.

  Chapter 13

  Over tea and biscuits, Gill recounted her talk with Tom. As I left, he’d worked his way over to introduce her to his new colleague, Gina Donaldson. By his account, Gina had asked Tom to introduce her to his fiancée and the woman she was talking to—me, as it happened.

  “She told Tom she’d met you briefly earlier, but thought she might’ve upset you at the bar for some reason. She’d tried to be witty and thought it had backfired.”

  Although I wanted to hear more about what Gina had said about me, I turned the conversation back to Gill. “I bet you wanted to run when you saw those two heading your way together.”

  Gill paused in lifting her cup to her mouth, then nodded before taking a sip of tea. “I was still stinging from you leaving.”

  An ache shot through my chest, and it must’ve shown in my face.

  “Don’t feel bad about it. You did the right thing. You forced me to confront my fears, and you were right. Tom is my fiancé, and I do need to be open with him.”

  She placed her cup back onto the saucer before leaning back in her chair, her eyes lifting to meet mine. Gill pulled her bottom lip in under her top lip, held it momentarily and then released it, a gesture I recognised from old that signified she was deliberating what to say next. “I told Tom about my…you know, what happened with…” she took a deep breath, “because I found out I was pregnant.”