After the best nights sleep that I've had in years, I'm cooking my girl breakfast—British bacon and eggs.
With the radio on, I'm happy.
Happier than happy.
Bat shit crazy happy.
Humming in the kitchen happy.
Yeah, I'm humming in the kitchen. Humming along to Anne Marie—a pretty cool British singer that I happened to briefly meet in the Buddha-Bar in Knightsbridge, ironically just a few days ago.
As I'm turning the bacon, I feel warm arms come right around my stomach and a soft onesie snuggling up against my back. "Hey." Stroking Clara's arm with the only free hand that I have, I affectionately greet my, just as happy, girl.
With her cheek pressed against my bare back, Clara sounds so content. "Hey." She coos, giving me an even tighter cuddle as she sighs with dreamy satisfaction. "Mmmm...something smells nice."
Stroking her fleece-covered arm, I smile. "I hope you're a breakfast person. We have bacon, scrambled eggs, baked tomatoes and mushrooms." Showing off a little of my culinary confidence in the kitchen, I flip over the bacon again, enjoying what I'm doing because Clara's arms are still wrapped around me.
Brushing her soft cheek against my back, she happily answers. "If all my breakfasts are like this, I am totally a breakfast person." She suggestively quips, once again giving me a wholesome little squeeze.
Needing to see the face that is so affectionately pressed against my back, I remove the bacon from the hob and put the tongs down before turning my whole body around. Now chest to chest, I'm looking down at the only face who now means anything to me. "Mornin', my British beauty." The need to kiss Clara becomes greater than my need to look into her eyes, so I do what feels completely natural—I kiss her. Our mouths lovingly and tenderly unite as we hold each other with limbs and bodies that yearn to be so affectionately close.
My lips are hopefully showing her all that my heart is feeling.
You're my girl.
You, Clara Thorn, are happiness personified.
My first morning kiss with her, is hopefully the first of many. I know I'm returning to LA soon, but I still want many more moments just like this. "Sleep well?" I ask Clara, not fully releasing her from my sentimental cuddle.
Wanting to stroke the grooves on my defined abs, her fingers pleasingly graze my sensitive skin whilst wearing a small yet seductive smile. "Like a log...you?"
Wanting to do more than just cuddle and kiss, I pour some of my humour onto the smouldering want that I now feel for Clara. "Once I got used to the gurgling and the snoring, I slept pretty well." Is my teasing reply.
Hitting the top of my arm, Clara is laughing. "I do not snore and I certainly don't gurgle." Her eyes are brightly beautiful, just as they always are. And those eyes, now belong to me.
"Honestly, it was like being in bed with a Walrus taking a bath. It sounded just like water going down the drain." My hand starts to swirl around and around, pretending to be the gurgling water.
I love how silly we are together.
I love laughing with Clara.
My life can be so weighted down with such serious shit, I like goofing around with her.
And I think that Clara feels the exact same way, because she's happy to play along with the silly shenanigans. "You'll be wearing that bacon in a minute." She warns me with a flirting little smile.
Grabbing her with my playful fingers, I pull her back against me and start kissing her neck. "Hang on, I stand corrected. It was a spotted Walrus taking a bath." My amorous eyes now roam all over the soft polka dot onesie that she's still wearing. Even in the fluffiest of fleece, she still looks so damn sexy.
Clara is wriggling; laughing and wriggling. "You will also be wearing the eggs." She warns me again, sexily smiling my way.
Our laughter dies down, but my smouldering need for her burns silently on inside of me. I thought I'd forgotten how to laugh, yet I am here, laughing...with her. So I say nothing, I just pull her closer against my possessive body and place my lips where they so desperately want to be. This kiss is plumply placid; preciously placid and passionately subdued.
My mouth, now belongs to Clara.
My body, now belongs to Clara.
My future, now belongs with Clara.
I know she is worried that once I'm back in LA, we will slowly fizzle out. But this, us...this won't fizzle out.
When I kiss Clara, I know my mouth won't ever want any other lips upon them. When I hold her right against me, I know my body will not accept any other person to be held in my arms. I've always said that she's a game changer, and this Rhys Ryan, no longer wants to play games. "I like this." My truth wants to be heard. It wants Clara to hear it and it wants Clara to know it. Resting my head gently against her head, I add more to my truth. "I like us being like this."
And Clara's truth also wants to be heard. "I like this, too." She sweetly replies, wanting me to hear and to know hers. "I am going to miss you." Her truth becomes tinged with a hollow sadness, a sadness that also needs to be heard and known.
Adoring her jawline with my fingers, they move lightly across her pure skin as my eyes take her as my precious and willing hostage. "Not as much as I'm going to miss you, Clara Thorn." Needing to remember every exquisite inch of her beautiful face, my eyes memorise every perfect detail of it. "I just want you to know that although miles and miles will separate us, I've never felt more close to anyone." More and more of my truth reveals itself to her. "Everyone thinks I have everything, but I don't, Clara. I have been waiting for someone like you to come into my life, and now that you have, I'll do everything I can to make this work. I know it's not ideal, it's far from it, but I know we can do this." When I say we, it sounds so right. We, just has a soul-filling ring to it. Needing more of that beautiful face of hers, my hands hold it within their appeased palms. "I don't want you to think that I'll be on that plane later today, and forgetting you as soon as I am up in the air. I want this. I want us. I want you, God I want you more than I've ever wanted anything before." My lips now ache for hers, so parched of her promising mouth. Closing my eyes, I press my mouth against the mouth that I'm going to miss so damn much.
Just like my eyes have memorised her face, my lips are now memorising the sensation of this kiss. Soft and perfectly entwined, I don't want to forget this kiss.
Clara's lips now alluringly hover just a breath away from mine. "None of this is going to be easy, but I want to be with you as well. If we are doing this, Rhys, we have to be committed and we have to trust each other." Her eyes start searching mine; searching soulfully deep. "Can I trust you?"
Of all the truths that I've laid bare to Clara, this has to be the barest.
She needs to know that I'll be faithful. That they'll not be any leggy brunettes, blondes, redheads, sassy fro's, strolling from out of any of my rooms ever again. She needs to hear that and I need to promise her that. Using my finger, I stroke the sexy seam of her fretful lips. "You can trust me, Clara."
Blinking back at me with the most adorable look of relief in her eyes, Clara smiles. "And you can trust me, too." She happily tells me, smiling more this time.
I already know in my heart that I can trust her, just as I know that I can trust myself.
No one compares to Clara.
No one.
If my dick so much as twitches in the direction of another woman, I will strap the traitor down myself.
All I want is Clara.
All I need is her.
No more wooing and screwing for me. Those Rhys Ryan days are very much behind me. Content and happy, I earnestly hold my girl in my satisfied arms before turning my attention back to our cooked breakfast. "I need plates!" I jovially tell her.
As Clara starts getting everything ready, I start dishing up. On the radio, I hear Charlie Puth playing in the background. Damn that guy always releases such catchy tunes, so my beyond happy self, starts singing along. Once the food is all plated up, I carry them out to where Clara is. "Breakfast is served." I'm almost singing out what I say as I place our food down onto the really small table that's in the corner of her lounge area. Grinning across to my very British beauty, I gift her with my very own version of cooked British bacon and eggs. Happy and hungry, we both eagerly take our seats. Just as I'm about to cut into my baked tomato, my mobile phone rings in the pocket of my jacket that's still somewhere on Clara's couch. I told Slam I would call him in the morning when I wanted picking back up, so I bet it's one of the guys checking in with me. They all knew that I was planning on seeing Clara last night, whoever it is, is just probably wanting to touch base with me as my mood yesterday was far from where it is now. "That's probably one of the guys wondering where I am." I explain without a care in the world. "But first, I'm having breakfast with my girl." To which, Clara gratefully smiles. I think she likes that I'm putting her first.
Over breakfast, I wanted to find out as much as I could about the jaw-droppingly wonderful Clara Thorn. In articulate but brief detail, she told me about her family, work and friends. With passion, she told me more about her love affair with photographing old and decaying buildings. I love that about Clara. I love how she can see the beauty in something that time has naturally degraded beyond repair.
And it was while we sat and ate breakfast, that I knew I wasn't ready to say yet another goodbye to Clara.
I had surprised her last night.
I intend on surprising her again today.
Although Clara thought that our breakfast together would be the last time that she would see me for a while, I have other plans.
Goodbye is something that I just can't bring myself to say or do.
I'm not ready.
Clara's not ready.
So, I won't.