Anything But Perfection

Flawed (16)

Chapter Sixteen

I stared at him as he stood there, just five feet away from me, in all his glory. Our eyes locked and I couldn’t break free of the trance I lost myself in. He wasn’t supposed to be here, yet he was, so close. Seeing him standing there bought all the pain back but I tried to block it all away, just for a little while only. Everyone was here, his family was here and they didn’t know what had happened. They were oblivious of what he had done and what I was going through.

Seeing him there was like a punch in my guts.

He’s here, my subconscious nudged me.

“Uncle Jeremy!” Sophia’s voice came, loud and excited as she rushed past me and towards him. Her voice had managed to break me out of my trail of thoughts and I looked away from his memorizing eyes which were fixed on me.

In a second, Sophia was jumping on him and he picked her up and twirled her around.

“How’s my baby girl?” Jeremy asked, as he held her in his arms and gave her a kiss on the cheek. His voice was oh-so soft and it did all sorts of crazy things to my heart.

“How are you here? Aunt Alison said you weren’t coming,” Sophia asked him as he set her down on the ground. He was smiling at her and for a second, he looked up and our eyes met.

“She was wrong now, wasn’t she?”

Georgina nudged me with her elbow and I jerked, turning to watch her. She had sharp elbows, I decided as I rubbed my right arm.

“What are you waiting for?” she whispered to me. Her eyes were shining with excitement and I could feel it radiating off of her in waves. She wasn’t one to hide her emotions. I knew she wanted to go meet him first but she was giving me the opportunity to go before her.

Oh, right. They don’t know I left him.

“Hey, I thought you forgot my birthday.” I spoke up finally as I walked towards him. Sophia was now in Brent’s arms. Jeremy was smiling at me as I approached him. I didn’t want to hug him but I knew the audience was expecting me to. They would definitely suspect something was up if I didn’t hug him or kiss him.

I didn’t want to touch him.

“Never. There are three significant days of the year I can never forget,” he replied, grinning at me as I leaned forward to hug him. His body was warm against my possibly cold and tense one. Immediately, I was engulfed in his cologne and masculine scent. It bought a wave of homesickness and hurt along with it. The pain of his betrayal. His arms were now around my waist and his face was buried in my hair.

“Really? Which three days?” I asked dryly, my hands secured around his neck. I wanted to get away from him. I pulled away as he kissed my hair. I wanted to slap him for doing it. Still, I managed to smile at him.

“Your birthday and our wedding anniversary,” he replied as I took a few steps back.

“What’s the third?” Brent piped in. He was apparently listening to us because he was smirking.

“My birthday. Duh.” Jeremy said and Brent chuckled. I suppressed a smile which threatened to stretched across my face. I was mad at him. He hurt me. I couldn’t show any kind of emotion to him except anger.

“Hey, joker! You always had a dry sense of humor didn’t you?” Georgina greeted him as I stood beside him. She hugged him ruffling his hair in the process because she knew it annoyed him. However today, he seemed unaffected by it, as if it didn’t  matter.

“Where’s Aunt Helen?” he asked as he made his way towards the kitchen. All of us followed him, me, a little reluctantly. There was a cry of surprise from Aunt Helen when she saw him. He embraced her and then kissed her cheek. He met Nicole then and she gave him a kiss on the cheek. I stiffened, an unwelcome feeling overcoming my senses.