(Recap)
I should leave before he spots me, it was obvious he came here to be alone, but the artist in me couldn’t resist, so I took out my camera and aimed it in his direction and took the picture. He didn’t notice me so I took a couple more then he turned while my eye was still looking through the camera at him. Oh-oh busted.
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~{Chapter 3}~
“Violet is it?”
Finding my voice gone once again I nodded. And he turned fully towards me and started walking to me. Oh crap he didn’t like his picture taken.
“Were you just photographing me?”
“Yes…No?” I said making it sound like a question.
He was right in front of me now and I could see the rise and fall of his chest, seen as that was what I was eye level with. He was rather tall, okay I was about five-six, he must have been about six-four or something. The dude could be a basketball player.
“So you’re not mute. I was beginning to wonder. So Violet, what is it then? Yes or no?” He asked, his breath fanning my face, as I was looking up at him. Don’t swoon, Vi… whatever you do… DO NOT SWOON. What did he ask again?
Oh right, the yes or no thing.
“No, I was taking a picture of… of…” I looked around for something, anything really in the direction that he was standing and spotted a tree, just across the river from where he was standing. It was more like a twig with a few leaves hanging on its dwindling branches.
“That tree.” I said pointing to the sorry excuse for a tree behind him and smiling at finding an object to pretend I was taking pictures of. He raised one beautiful eyebrow and briefly turned; then faced me again with a smirk on his face.
“Really? That small decaying shrub?”
I looked at the tree again and okay I have to admit, that tree was a small shrub, that didn’t have much to it, but I’m sticking to this, I can’t turn back now.
“Yes. That small decaying shrub as you call it.”
“May I see it?”
“What?”
“The picture of the shrub you claim to have taken a picture of.”
“Why?”
“I just want to see the picture of the ‘tree’“ He made air quotes with his fingers when he said the word tree.
“Otherwise I’ll just have to take it by force.” He smirked and stared down at me.
I gasped, “You wouldn’t.” Clutching the camera close to my chest. I felt like saying my precious, like Smeegle in Lord of the Rings.
He leaned further in, closer to my face so that we were eye level and said, “Try me.”
He had a very serious look on his face and his eyes took on that deaden look. I really didn’t want to damage my camera. So I scowled at him and reluctantly handed over my camera, huffing as I did so.
“He snatched it from my hands.”
“Careful with that. It cost me a fortune.” He smirked at me and continued his inspection of the camera. He turned it on and looked at the pictures.
“You know you are really good.”
“Thanks I know, now can I have my camera back. I need to get home.”
“But the tree in this picture is not your focal point. I think I’ll delete it.”
“No what are you doing? Give it back. You have no right to delete the contents of that camera. It’s my property” I lunged for it and he just held it above his head, seemingly to be amused at my futile attempts to retrieve my camera from him.
“Come now ducky, no need to fret.” He said as he pressed what I assumed was the delete button on my camera.
I stopped and stared at him in confusion… did he just call me ducky and use the word fret? What century is he from?
“Did you just call me ducky?” He seemed surprised that he called me ducky then he shrugged it off smirking at me and made like he was thinking,
“I think I just did. You kind of remind me of a duck. I think I’ll call you that from now onwards.”
I glared at him and held out my hand.
“Hand over my camera. You deleted your picture, now hand it over.”
“Okay just one more thing.” Then he turned the camera on me and took my picture and then he laughed at my shocked face, and then handed over my camera, still laughing. He had a gorgeous laugh, it was deep and masculine, sort of had a rumbling effect, it made you want to throw back your head and laugh with him. He had dimples and his eyes sort of twinkled, turning a lighter shade, from his midnight blue to an ocean blue, and he had laugh lines, something I hadn’t noticed before, but he used to laugh a lot. It’s funny, I never saw him even crack a smile at school. The effect left me breathless with goose bumps gracing my whole body.
I was still staring at him and then he said,
“Come on Ducky, I’ll walk you to your car it’s getting dark, unless you walked here.”
“No I drove.” I said glaring at him and picked up my pace slightly to get away from him, but not really putting much effort into getting away from him.
I was annoyed that he not only man handled my precious camera, but he actually deleted pictures. Those pictures where my property. Okay so technically he deleted pictures of himself, but he was standing in a public area, so therefore I was totally allowed to take a picture of him. I think I’m more upset that I won’t be able to drool over that picture later on… wait I just thought of something. I installed a backup catch on my camera just incase images got deleted by accident, I could have saved it, he maybe didn’t know about the backup catch. The picture could be sitting in the recycle bin or something… Yes. Doing a mental high five with myself, I will scour the camera’s memory to find it. Wait… Why am I so happy about this fact? I’m starting to sound like a psycho stalker.
“So what were you doing here by yourself?”
“Huh? What you talking to me?” I asked slightly in a daze. He chuckled a little and said in a duh tone,
“You see anyone else Ducky?”
I glared at him for calling me ducky again. He just grinned sexily at me with his hands in his pocket.
“My name’s not Ducky and I came here to take pictures for my photography assignment.”
“So you want to become a photographer. What kind? A male model photographer?” His smirk grew as my cheeks redden.
“No, for your information I’m applying for a nature photographer at national geographic after I’m furthering my studies.”
“Sounds interesting.”
“I get to travel around the world, see different animals in their natural habitat. I get to capture things that are rarely seen. It’s all I ever wanted to do. It’s beyond interesting” I smiled to myself just thinking about being submerged into a jungle or forest and seeing a thousand different animals, insects, trees. It’s what makes a sad world filled with death and disappointment, beautiful.
“You’ll do well. I could see you are very good.” He was smiling softly at me and I smiled back at him.
“What are your plans for the future? Anything you’re passionate about?”
His smile disappeared immediately, his face taking on that cold and distant look. His dark blue eyes got a shade darker, losing its light heartedness it had a moment ago, as the edges of his mouth grew grim he said,
“No plans.”
“What do you mean no plans? Don’t you want to do something with your life?”
“No.”
He kept his gaze ahead as I looked up to him. He still wore that expressionless mask. He seemed to be upset, I didn’t want to ask because it was none of my business but under that hard exterior, you could see a glimmer of emotion, sad and longing.
I wasn’t watching where I was walking and I stumbled. Brilliant this is so going to hurt the last thing I remember thinking was, how embarrassing.
I closed my eyes before my face hit the floor, I prepared myself for the impact, but it never came. All I felt was hands wrapping themselves around my waist and being pushed up to a well-muscled chest. I breathed in deep, without opening my eyes and smelled a delicious masculine scent that had me taking another deep breath.
“Are you ok?” I felt the rumbling of the sexiest voice I had ever heard and nodded my head without opening my eyes. I just kept holding onto him, because if I let go, I knew I would be falling, figurative and literally speaking. I couldn’t look at him, mostly from embarrassment from almost rolling down the freaking mountain face first and I know that if I looked up into his eyes I would be a goner and there won’t ever be going back.
He kept his hold on me, not even tempting to move away, I said in a shaky voice,
“Thanks. That would have defiantly hurt.” Fudge, I sounded out of breath like I ran a mile and was that my voice? It sounded husky, and my chest was rapidly moving up and down in beat with my breaths.
“You welcome you need to be more careful.” He set me aside and I quickly scrambled out of his embrace, taking a deep breath of the fresh mountain air to cool my out of control nerves and hormones. What is it about this guy that gets me so hot and bothered, other than the fact that he is uber hot.
I looked around trying to center myself and get a grip, and that’s when I noticed that we were already by my car, but there was no other car, just mine. How did he get here? The town was miles away and his home in Lakewood was even further away. How did he get here, did someone drop him here. I turned to him and asked,
“Where’s your car?”
He looked at me with his hands still in his pocket and said, “It’s around the corner, over there.” He nodded his head in the direction his car was parked. Then I realized that I had never found out what he was doing here,
“Hey I never asked you what you were you doing here?”
“I heard this place had a lake and I needed some fresh air you know?” He said, staring straight into my eyes.
“Ya I know… missing home?”
“Ya, this place is a little bit different than Minnesota, but the same in some ways. It’s… nice.”
“That’s right you’re from Minnesota, the land of ten thousand lakes. It must be really nice there.”
“It is.” He said sadly and then he looked up to the sky, like he was searching for something.
“Where are your parents?” I don’t know what came over me but I was never this bold or chatty and I just blabbed the question out like some three year old with verbal diarrhea. I gave myself a mental slap, way-ta-go Vi.
“Gone.” He said it like he was talking about the weather or something.
“Gone? As in another country or something?”
“No gone as in dead.”
I didn’t know what to say, because I remembered when my dad died, that what I heard the most was I’m so sorry for your loss, I hated it when they said that. I mean why are they sorry, it’s not like it was their fault he died, but I nodded and thanked them.
“You miss them?”
“Sometimes.”
I nodded my head, but before I could respond my cellphone started ringing the song Hit Me Baby One More Time by Britney Spears.
“Damn it Vicky.” She’s always changing my ring tone to something stupid, I heard Ethan chuckling from where he was standing and I turned and gave him an apologetic smile as I answered the call.
“Hello.”
“Violet. You have to get to St. Mary’s. It’s your mother.” It was Amy’s mom, and she sounded stressed and on the verge of tears.
“Is she okay?” I asked already digging through my bag for my car keys.
“She passed out and hit her head on the side of the coffee table.”
By now my hands were shaking uncontrollably as I pulled my keys out of my bag.
“I’m on my way.” Then I hung up.
“Is everything okay?” I heard Ethan ask and without turning to face him I said,
“It’s my mom, I have to go.” The keys fell out of my shaking hands and onto the ground. I bent to pick them up and tried to put them in the keyhole and they fell to the ground again.
“Shit.” I cussed as I bent down to pick them up again. But before I managed to pick them off the ground, Ethan grabbed them and said,
“I’ll drive you don’t look fit to drive in your current condition.” I couldn’t think, all I could think about was my mom, was this it? Was this the last time I would see her? And I left her alone… in her fragile condition; I left her alone with Lily. Oh lord, poor Lily, she must be so scared.
“Violet, get in.” Ethan was holding the passenger’s door open for me; waiting for me to get in. I must have zoned out thinking about my family.
I quickly got in and in no time he was in the car and off in the direction of the hospital.
“You take a right-“
“I know where the hospital is.”
“Oh right.” I whispered back
Oh Lily, I wonder how she’s handling all of this. I wasn’t there. I wasn’t there for her or my mom. If my mom dies and I wasn’t there…
“Ducky don’t cry, everything’s going to be okay.” I looked over to Ethan, I hadn’t realized that I was crying and he was looking at me, concern clear in his handsome features. He gave me an attempt at a sad smile and faced the front again.
I never said anything, but swiped at the tears that didn’t want to stop. I hated crying in front of people, mainly because I looked hideous, with my nose taking on a bright red and my eyes going puffy and my face paling and not to mention the endless amount of snot, that without fail followed. I pulled a tissue out of my bag and tried to blow my nose inconspicuously, dabbing and trying to give tiny blows into the tissue, because let’s face it, the guy sitting next to me is beyond hot and seeing my ugly mug after crying has lowered my chances of attracting him.
I heard him chuckling and I looked over at him, he glanced over at me and said,
“You can blow your nose properly. It will not change what I think of you.”
What did that mean? What does he think of me? Is it good or is it bad? I blew my nose in one solid blow; if I was going to do this I might as well go all out, no point in delaying the inevitable.
Urrgh, what am I doing? I’m worried about what a boy will think of me when my mother is in the hospital and my baby sister could be traumatized with the image of my mother being hauled away to the hospital in an ambulance half dead. I’m a bad person…
I felt the tears building up again, but the sight of the hospital got me even antsier to get out and just run into the building like I was being chased by crazed rabid dogs.
I felt a hand covering my fidgeting hands; I’ve been twisting my hands and hadn’t realized it. I looked down at the hand covering mine and then looked over at Ethan. He kept his eyes on the road when he spoke.
“You’re going to hurt yourself. Everything is going to be okay.” I knew he didn’t know about my mother, but when he said it, it made me want to believe him even though I knew that nothing will ever be okay, not while she was sick and slowly dying. His thumb started stroking over my knuckles unconsciously and I felt myself relaxing as he held my hands in his big calloused ones.
He had barely stopped the car, when I sprang out and started to practically run to the hospital, I barely remembered that he still needed to park the car. I turned to tell him where to find me, or something of that nature.
“Don’t worry I’ll find you.” He shouted before I could say anything and I nodded and ran inside.
I ran right up to the nurses’ station and said, “I’m here to see Rose Spenser. She came in here with a head injury.”
The nurse typed something on the computer and said room 502 dear. Fifth floor.” I nodded and ran towards the elevator, pressing the button more than what was necessary, I paced in front of the door, while I waited for the elevator to open. What’s taking so long? I pushed the button a few more times and then I heard the welcoming ding of the elevator door as it opened and I rushed inside, but before the door closed Ethan got in. The door closed and it felt like I couldn’t stand still for a second, I wrung my hands again and paced a little, looked up at the progress of the elevator as the lights to the floor slowly light up.
“Come on, come on.” I whispered under my breath but Ethan heard me.
“Calm down Violet.”
Calm down, as if it was that easy. I gave a frustrated breath and glared at him and tried to stand still and started pacing again. Ethan snatched my hand again and held on so that I couldn’t pace anymore.
“Stand still will you, you’re giving me a headache watching you.”
“Sorry, how inconsiderate of me for giving you a headache, while I was freaking out over the fact that my mother is in the hospital with a serious head injury.” I glared at him, as I said sarcastically.
He sighed and said, “Apologies. It is I who was inconsiderate; of course you’re in distress over your mother.” He smiled at me, and squeezed my hand.
He really baffled me; it was like he was two different people. Who apologizes’ like that, it’s so old English, sometimes he acted like an arrogant jerk, then sometimes like now, he acted like Jane Eyre’s Byronic hero, Mr. Rochester in the eighteenth century. It was like he didn’t belong to this time.
The elevator dinged open, but instead of letting my hand go, he held on to it and we walked hand in hand towards room 502. I checked every door for the room and when I neared, my breathing became heavier. I saw Carol White, Amy’s mom and she looked like she had been crying and she was sitting next to a sleeping Amy.
“Carol.” I said as I neared her. She looked up and an array of emotions played across her face, but the ones that struck me most was sadness and pity. I hated it when people looked at me like that, like they were silently saying, ‘Poor girl, soon she and her sister would be orphans.’ I hated it, but said nothing, because it would be easier to grin and bear than to make a scene which would most likely end up me feeling sorry for myself.
“Violet.” She got up and hugged me, Ethan let go of my hand. I hadn’t known we were still holding hands until I felt the emptiness at the loss of the connection.
“How is she? What did the doctor say? I asked as I pulled out of the embrace.
“It’s not looking good Vi, the doctor says that the … disease is progressing and that she would need to remain in hospital until…” She didn’t have to finish the sentence, I knew what she meant, and I nodded, glancing towards the room and said,
“I’m going to see her. Carol, thank you for being here. Is Lily okay?”
“Anytime dear. Lily was a bit shaken, but has calmed down since Rose woke up.” She gave me a sad smile and I turned to Ethan,
“Ethan I-“
“It’s okay Ducky, go ahead, I’ll wait here.” I nodded at him and I took a few deep breathes as I walked into the room.
My sister was lying on the bed next to my mom, still awake, most likely not wanting to sleep after what happened to my mom. My mom was hooked up to machines with tubes running all over and a bandaged that covered most of her head. She had never look so fragile and yet she was awake telling Lily a story, one of her talents was that she could tell the most unbelievable stories you have ever heard and the way she told it, you couldn’t help getting transported into the fantasy world she spoke of. My sister looked so engrossed in the story she was telling, her eyes were wide with excitement and she gasped when mom told her about the near death stunt the hero went through to reach his beautiful princess at the top of the tallest tower, with a hundred monsters behind him. I smiled, trying to etch this moment into my brain, to remember this moment forever, to recall this scene when the inevitable sadness would come in the days ahead.
I heard Lily’s tiny voice call out, “Violet the hero is close to the tower, the princess is going to be saved.” I smiled at her excitement and walked over to my mother’s bedside. I leaned down and kissed my mother’s cheek and gave her a sad smile and held onto her hand.
Speaking to Lily as I sat on the other side of the bed, “What did I miss?”
Lily began telling me what I had missed and I just laid next my mom, hearing her reassuring heart beat as well as the beeping of the machines.