The next four days were a bit of a catch 22, I wanted them to go by fast so I could see Prince, but I hadn't heard from Janet since she took off, so every day that passed, I reached a new level of anxiety. Although my heart was done with her, I still wanted to know that she was safe and not lying face down in a ditch somewhere.
As much as I didn't want to bring any unwanted worry to Janet's mom, I finally broke down and called her. Janet's mom, Ann, was a sweet older woman who was riddled with health problems. Janet often took advantage of her mothers limited mobility and health issues to get what she wanted from her. Ann didn't have the energy to argue with her daughter so she enabled her by just giving her what she wanted, which was usually money. When I spoke to Ann, she said Janet told her she would be staying with me. She never mentioned anything about St Paul to her mom.
After contemplated what to do next, I decided that Ann had a right to know what Janet had been up to these past few months. I told her about the relapse, the lies and the theft. She wasn't too shocked to hear Janet that had stolen money from me because apparently Janet had stolen money from her recently. But when I told her about the jewelry she quickly put the phone down to go check on her own collection. As it turns out, Janet had stolen valuable jewelry from her too.
Both of us came to the conclusion that there was nothing anyone could do but wait until she got back from whatever dingy corner of St Paul she got herself into. After hanging up the phone with her, I ate a little breakfast and planned out my day.
Prince's plane arrived at 2:00 pm, so I knew I had some time to kill during the day. I imagined I wouldn't see him until well passed sun down, since he would have to go home and unpack.
For once in my life, I was all caught up on work, so I didn't have that to keep me busy. I worked on the usual house work like cleaning and laundry until I finally forced myself outside to do yard work. I hated yard work, but with the upcoming fall season, the plants needed to be trimmed back and whatnot.
I spent the entire morning rustling around the yard trimming back all of my plants and pulling weeds. At around 2:30 I stopped working and went inside to take a break. Right when the cold tea I poured hit my dried lips my motivation to finish the yard dwindled down to almost nothing, especially since I knew Prince had touched down in Minneapolis by then.
After a lot of self convincing, I decided that manual labor was the best way to get the eagerness that kept me looking at the clock out of my mind. With my cup of tea empty, I made my way out of the house, picking up the pair of garden shears that had been my tool of choice before the break. Cutting small branches off of the little trees that lined my yard and piling them in a heap behind me, I made fast progress as I zipped around the property.
I sighed a breath of relief when I made the final cut on the last little tree. My eyes admired the trimmed greenery, proud of myself for completing the task in only a few hours, when I noticed I missed a branch on one of the trees. So I sauntered over there and quickly cut the branch. Stepping backwards to look over my work, I lost my footing on a stack of sticks that had been stacked behind me and fell right onto the pile of jagged wood.
My jean shorts were no match for the branch that ripped a 3" hole through the butt. I cried out in pain, instinctively grabbing my own butt cheek. Making my way into the house and up the stairs into my room, I stripped the ripped clothes off of my body and stood with my back towards the mirror, turning to look at the wound.
As I studied the bloodied cut in the mirror, I thought I heard a car door close. I figured it was one of my neighbors so I didn't bother going to check, plus by that time, the wound was starting to really sting so I didn't want to move.
Since I was so focused on examining myself, I didn't hear the footsteps walking up the stairs. "What are you doing?" My heart leapt out of my chest as I looked away from the mirror and towards the door to see Prince standing there with the most baffled face I'd ever seen.
I stood up straight, making me grimace from the pain. "I got a cut and it hurts." I unintentionally whined.
"Let me see." I could see him trying to hide his laughter as he walked up to me to look at my wound. "Ooh, that's pretty bad, here lie down on the bed, I'll get something to clean it."
I took off my shirt before laying down so I wouldn't get the bedspread all dirty. It felt pretty awkward lying face down on a bed, waiting for Prince to come back to clean the cut on my butt, but there we were.
He sat down next to my mostly naked body on the bed and started cleaning my with a washcloth saturated in warm water. "How the hell did this happen?"
"I was doing yard work and I stepped back onto a pile of cut up branches. I lost my balance and fell on top of one."
"Where's your peroxide?"
"It should be under the sink in the bathroom."
He went back to the bathroom to grab the peroxide while I just stayed put, closing my eyes while waiting for him to come back. When he walked back into my room from the bathroom, he spoke with a mischievous tone, "What's this?"
I opened my eyes to find the still sealed vibrator Janet bought in Prince's hand. It was then that I remembered putting it under the sink so Janet would hopefully forget about it and stop asking me to use it.
"Oh, Janet bought it for us but I didn't want to use it so I hid it from her."
"You don't like using this stuff?"
"Well, it was already after I was kind of over everything with her, so you know, I just wasn't into it."
"So would you use it with me?"
"One thing a time please." I said pointing to my butt.
He laughed before pouring the cold peroxide onto a cotton ball and dabbing my cut. "It's not as bad as it looked before. You won't even need a bandaid." He bent over, placing a kiss on the cut before sitting back up. "There. Good as new."
I sat up, without putting any weight on the injured cheek, "Thanks...and hi." I stared into his nurturing eyes, finally being able to take in the view I'd missed so much. That familiar flutter in my stomach started up instantly when he placed his hand on mine, lightly rubbing the back of it.
"Hi." A sweet smile lined his mouth before he closed the gap between our faces, placing a kiss on my waiting lips.
Then Prince moved his pucker to my shoulder, where he left a wet kiss. "I wasn't expecting you until later on tonight." I said, feeling self conscious about my disheveled appearance.
"Well, I wanted to see you. I didn't think you were gonna get all Paul Bunyan on me though." He unsuccessfully tried to hold in a laugh while pulling a leaf out of my hair.
I lowered my head, attempting to pick the dirt out from underneath my nails, "Yeah, I should probably take a shower, I'm kinda gross right now."
"Yeah, I know, I just kissed you on your ass." He scrunched his face.
"Hey!" I nudged him in his arm, before getting up, walking into the bathroom and turning the shower on.
As I waited for the water to heat up I stood in front of the mirror and picked the leaves and sticks out of my hair.
Prince walked up and leaned against the door jam behind me. I watched him in the reflection of the mirror as he tried desperately to hide his amusement on my behalf. "How embarrassing, I look like a caveman and look at you." I motioned my head towards him, causing him to look down at his meticulously dressed self.
"If I took it off, would that make you feel better?" He questioned, looking at my reflection in the mirror.
I didn't really think he would do it, so I nodded yes. He picked up his left leg and pulled his heel off, shrinking down to my height. "I was just kidding, you don't have to."
"No no no, I'll do it if that's gonna make you feel better."
The water was warm by now, so I left him naked and alone in the bathroom while I opened the shower door and walked in.
He walked over to the counter and leaned against it crossing his arms, "So what happened with Janet?" He raised his voice over the running water. The shower glass started fogging up, making it hard to see him.
"Oh," I remembered that I postponed that conversation until he returned, "she stole five hundred dollars, which was all of my emergency money, and about half of my jewelry from me. Can you believe that?" My fingers ran through my hair, attempting to detangle it.
"Yeah I can. That's what junkies do. I told you you should've broken up with her." Not an ounce of sympathy rolled off of his tongue.
I rolled my eyes, "It's not that easy... But whenever she comes around, if ever she comes around, I'm gonna end it for sure."
"Mmhmm..." He didn't sound convinced.
I grabbed the loofah and swirled Cherry Blossom body wash over it. "The most upsetting thing is I feel totally betrayed by her. I mean... I let her stay in my house, I feed her, I give her money and then she goes and steals from me? It's just frustrating I guess."
"I would imagine. It seems like she's been using you for a while now. Just make sure you stick to your word and don't give her any more chances."
"Of course I'm not gonna give her another chance. I'd be an idiot to take her back." My hand gripped the loofah tightly and began running along my skin, cleaning the day's work off of my body.
"Sure Bambi."
"Watch, you'll see." I felt annoyed by his unconvinced attitude. But my attention was suddenly shifted to a strange noise that caught me off guard, it almost sounded like the lights were humming. But I quickly ruled that out since I'd just had my house rewired the year before. Whatever it was, that buzzing sound was starting to raise my curiosity.
"What's that noise?" I asked, hoping he heard what I heard.
"What noise?"
"You don't hear that? It's like a buzzing noise." I paused what I was doing, trying to figure out where that sound was coming from. "It's like bzzzz."
"You must be going crazy because I don't hear anything." He scoffed.
I hummed in response and concluded that I couldn't investigate further until I was done with my shower since I was apparently the only one that could hear it. So I hurried up and finished washing the remaining dirt off of my body. When I opened the shower door, I saw Prince standing there, with an erection and the that vibrator in his hand.
"Ugh, You seriously had me thinking I was hearing things." My wet body stepped onto the bath mat.
He chuckled then waved it back and forth, "Can we try it out now?"
I couldn't resist him, even if I tried, "Come on..."