Soldierboy

Chapter Twenty Five

As the weeks went in, Kelly’s hopeful optimism that Danny would be fine, was starting to fade fast.

His disturbing dreams had become more than the one night occurrence.

A few times Kelly had been wakened from her sleep through the night, when she felt Danny’s arms and legs thrashing about restlessly, sometimes, he would be muttering incoherently whilst his face was creased with such anxiety that she would end up shaking him gently out of his sleep to make sure he was alright.

He refused to speak about the dreams now, though he would apologise for waking her up. Then he would sit on the edge of the bed, lighting up a cigarette to calm himself down again, and insisting he was alright

But Kelly knew this was not the case, Danny had now upped his smoking so much, that he was almost going through forty in a day. He was also staying out drinking a lot more with his workmates after work, though he always made sure he phoned her to let her know where he was, which was small comfort to Kelly, who would have preferred it if he would spend the time with her.

But she had an idea he was avoiding her, because he knew she would start questioning his recent behaviour, wanting him to face up to the fact that all was not right, but it was something he was still refusing to admit, much to her frustration.

So now she just let it drop, and didn’t mention it, deciding perhaps she should go along with his pretence that everything was fine, in the hope he would want to stay home and be with her more, than being out drinking with his mates.

But the late nights and his irregular sleeping pattern lately, was starting to take a toll on him further, making him easily irritable as well.

Sunday afternoons were particular something Kelly looked forward to, because they would just go out for a drive somewhere or Danny would take her to an isolated road where she could practice her driving skills with his help.

Usually they would have a laugh, when she would make some mistake, and Danny would then tease her good naturedly about her attempts, but this particular Sunday hadn’t started of very well.

Danny didn’t really seem to want to go anywhere, and was contented sitting in front of the television watching a football match, which Kelly wasn’t particularly interested in.

So when she suggested they go out together in the car as usual, he didn’t appear to be particularly enthusiastic about it, but then he had been out the evening before drinking, and had not returned home until the early hours of the morning much to Kelly’s annoyance, so now she saw this as his chance to make it up to her, because she wanted to spend time with him, so in the end he somewhat grudgingly gave in, and took her out for a drive.

Even though he wasn’t in a very communicative mood with her, Kelly was just happy they were spending time together, and thought he would come around after a while.

Then when they swapped around, so she was taking the wheel for a while, to get in more practice, Danny made no objections, at first she started of fine, but then she forgot what gears she needed to use and got into a bit of a muddle making the car stall as she pressed her foot on the break pedal by mistake.

Danny rolled his eyes in exasperation then turned frowning in annoyance, “For God sake Kelly how many times are you going to make the same stupid mistake, you should know better by now, I have explained to you about twenty times already” he snapped in irritation

It was the angry sharpness of his tone that stung her, because he had never used it on her before, and she was a little taken aback by it, leaving her shaken.

“I’m sorry, I just got a bit mixed up with the gears,” she finally found her voice to apologise, hurt welling up inside her that he was annoyed with her over something they would usually laugh over, and she suddenly lost all interest and enjoyment in what she was doing.