At No Time || Bruno Mars

63

Trystan had been right—Peter would not have been able to handle everything at once. He thought he would have been fine, capable of receiving all that had been hidden from him, but what was written, as brutally honest as her pen could convey between the leather covers of her journal, proved he could not.

He had not even been able to visit her the next day, unsure how to face her, uncertain of what to say. His thoughts and words muddled together in sentences that even he could not comprehend, perplexed as he thought he knew that woman the best. He thought the woman he had held, professed his love to so much and so carelessly and so often that they had created a  life together, was someone he knew in and out. But a lot had changed when they had not been together, and that journal had been proof of that.

Peter was slow arriving to her house on Wednesday. The entirety of Tuesday had been filled with him rereading the pages of the booklet over and over again, to make sure he had not gone crazy and what was said was what she had actually written.

The leather bound diary was in the passenger seat of his rental car, not appearing as innocent as he had once known it to be. He remembered wishing he had been granted access inside of it, wanting to know what was stored in the recesses of Trystan's mysterious mind, but now, he almost wished he had never touched it.

When he pulled leisurely into her driveway, she was already sitting out on the front step, wearing a plaid button-up and jeans. Her attire did not appear as tiresome as it had on Monday, but her face was still free of its usual amicability. There was a colorful woven bag settled next to her, and her hands were clasped together as she looked off into the distance, almost as if it was unbeknownst to her that Peter had arrived.

He grabbed her journal and unhurriedly removed himself from the car. It was not until he closed the door that Trystan seemed to come out of her trance, jumping at the sound and her eyes catching Peter's.

"Hi," she greeted quietly and slowly stood, stuffing her hands into her pockets.

Peter nodded in return, finding it difficult to keep her gaze as he stood before a woman he did not completely know.

Neither said anything for a moment, the sounds of wind and leaves rustling filling in the spaces where they made no noise.

"Did you read it?" Trystan questioned suddenly, her line of vision dropping to journal in his hand.

He handed it back to her. "Yes."

"Then . . . come on." She stooped down, dropping the journal into her bag before taking it into her clutch. "Let's go."

Confused, Peter stood in place as he watched her make her way to her own car. "Go where?" She had not mentioned they would be driving out to any place, and he was not sure if he wanted to be told anything else outside of the confines of her home.

Trystan opened the driver's door to her vehicle before turning to look at him. "My place."

Peter wiped a hand down his face and sighed. "Trystan, I'm really not up for the "mysterious" shit, all right? Aren't we already at your place?"

She looked at him squarely and answered, "No," before getting into the car. She closed the door, put on her seat belt, and waited for him to join her. He stared at her for another moment before finally relenting. He ambled to the passenger side of the car and entered stiffly.

After putting on his own seat belt, he queried, "Where is your "place"?"

Trystan turned the car on and reversed out of the driveway. "You've been before."

"I have?"

She nodded. "You liked it there; I did, too, and still do."

From her pattern of speaking, Peter figured she would not explicitly tell him exactly where they were to go, and even after all he read in her journal, he trusted her enough to believe they would arrive safely to the destination and not end up in a ditch somewhere.