Bondy hotel room had that warm, heavenly glow about it, with all the lights down low and one of those french jazz composers he adored so much playing just as low and soft as the lights.
He looked tired, but Johnny always looked tired. Sleep deprived chic. Thats what he'd smirked when he'd presented me a brew and I'd told him he didn't have to stay up, that he looked tired, that he should get some rest.
"Darlin this is my aesthetic," he said wandering off, half asleep towards the bathroom.
I heard him turn the taps on, saw the steam start to rise.
He leant up in the doorframe, arms folded across his chest, head leaning to one side. Eyes on me.
I was lying on my side, head resting on my arms, tilted to look up at him through the hair which fell across my face.
"Thanks John," i said softly, surprising myself because i didnt really recognise my voice.
I sounded weaker than I thought I would, shaken. Like a light blinking.
He smiled softly.
"Do you feel better bein home?" he asked and when he said it I smirked, thought I saw a slight waver in his confidence. Like he'd said something he hadn't meant to.
I just smiled, nodded my head though every movement ached. I felt like I'd been awake all year.
"Lots," i said, smiling a little wider when he did too. "Actually," i started then, no longer able to look up to him, knowing that I was about to say something I would live to regret, "I think I felt better the minute I hears your voice on Kittys phone..." i said quietly, embarassed by my own sentimentality. Embarassed to admit how happy he could make me.
For a moment he said nothing, I wondered whether he'd heard me, i hoped that actually he hadn't.
That we could pretend I'd never said it all.
"You're a sweetheat Saff," he chuckled, moving from the doorframe to the bedside, crouching down so that his eyes were level with mine, the small quirk of a smile on his lips when he reached out to push my stray hairs from my face. "I'm glad you feel better love," he said softly, mirroring the quiet, peaceful way i felt in his presence.
I reached out then, to take his hand which hovered at my cheek, to set it down on the bed, just holding it.
His eyes pooled into mine but he seemed preoccupied, he seemed almost distant, like he was struggling with something inside.
He gave my hand a squeeze, stroked his thumb across my knuckles and offered me a wider grin when he stood up, placing my hand down on the bed by my nose.
"What do you wanna eat treacle, I'll call it up on room service," he asked any kind of feeling I thought we'd been about to share fading away with the turn of his back as he disappeared back into the bathroom.
I heard him swear when he dipped his elbow into the water, realised he'd only used the hot tap.
"Dont think i cant hear yous giggling buttercup," he cried out, turning to me over his shoulder through the steam. I could make out his pout. Make out the wounded eyes he was forcing just to make me smile. Make me giggle again.
"I can't help it," i grinned when he came back, picked the phone up off the side, "youre just funny," i sneered up at him and he sneered down at me, face inched from mine when he narrowed his eyes, his nose almost pushing against mine. I felt my heart rise, beating suddenly oh so quickly in my throat. Felt it sink again when he pulled away, kicked his legs up on the bed and leant back beside me.
"What dya like Saffy?" he asked his hand in my hair as he rested his head against the headboard and settled, getting comfortable beside me.
"I don't know," i sighed, another little yawn escaping me.
I wondered whether he'd noticed his fingers in my hair, wondered whether he'd meant for his hand to magnetise to me. Wondered if he even knew what it was doing to me. His hand in my hair like that.
Such a tiny display of affection. Something shared between two friends.
And yet with Bondy i was growing increasingly more aware that we were something more than that. That we were at least skirting round the edge of something more intense.
At least thats what i hoped for now. Thats what i was growing ever more desperate for us to become.
He hung up the phone and i ached for his hand in my hair when he left my side and returned once more to the bathroom. And when he went off to search for extra towels. When he lingered in the bathroom doorway as i stood there hesitant to close the door on him and get changed, all i really wanted was to remain near him. Safe with him. Giggling away with him. Stoned with him.
"Thanks again," i said softly when he returned too many towels stacked up in his hands, his eyes and his cap poking out over the top, painting a smile on my lips.
When he shrugged his shoulders he almost toppled his stack over and the giggle I bit down escaped anyway.
Still when he placed the towels in my lap he offered me another smile, an easy smile. The kind i was used to. The kind I'd always loved on him.
"Saffy love stop thankin me I've hardly done owt,"
"Yes," i said looking up at him as I stood, eyes almost level with his but not quite, "you have," i said my head spinning a little, i had to blink back the darkness which clouded my eyes momentarily.
I must have wobbled or swayed because he reached out his hand on my lower back, surprising us both and when I finally got my vision back we were standing a little bit closer than we were before. Just enough to leave me a little breathless, kicking myself for ever allowing myself to fall in so deep without ever really noticing until it was too late.
He looked hesitant, his eyes flickering over my face, his eyes pooling with something he couldn't quite work out how to say.
I thought about what Van had said to him when we were still in the hospital. I thought about, "so tell her mate," and I thought about all the reasons he listed that meant he probably never would. Thought of all the reasons I'd never be able to ask him to.
"J.."
"Saff..." we cut eachother off, i wondered if whether in the moment I'd looked just as desperate to get my words out as he had, but his expression changed quickly and just like that he was splitting a self aware grin, running his hands through his hair and stealing his hand away from my lower back stepping away to allow me past and I knew then, that no matter what we said to one another today, neither of us would get to say what we wanted to.
"Be careful ey," he said as I hovered in the doorway, looking back at him over my shoulder clutching my towels to my chest.
"I'm only havin a bath," i smirked trying to brush it off. Trying to pretend I hadn't scared everyone half to death over the last 24 hours.
Trying to pretend my mind wasn't still lingering on the moment we'd just shared. On the almost, the could've been. So desperately wanted to be.
I closed the door, set the towels down on the counter by the sink and leant back against the door. Eyes closed. Full of regret.
I'd never felt like this before.
This feeling of total peace when I was with him. This feeling of total adoration. The serenity which washed over me every time he came close.
Every time i caught his eye and we shared one of those hidden moments, some silent joke the rest of our friends would never understand.
I was closer to him now than I'd ever really been with Rhys, though the two were not comparable at all.
I looked up at the water, the steam filled my lungs when I exhaled, the bubbles in the bath caught the light all shimmers and invitations.
I let out a sigh, despairing with myself. I had to laugh as I ran my fingers through my hair and opened the door a little.
"Johnny..." i said, smiling when I saw him smoking out the window, mumbling along in broken french to another song I only recognised because I'd heard him singing it so many times before.
He turned his head to me over his shoulder, a smoke trail leaving his mouth, drifting up out of the window.
"Alright buttercup," he said, looking at me expectantly, waiting for me to say something else. I chewed my cheek, hesitated.
"Will you keep me company?" i asked quietly, uncertain. Shy.
He cracked a bemused smile, gaze lingering on me and my uncertain smile poking out the almost shut door.
"In the bath?" he frowned, a little chuckle when I nodded.
"In the bathroom,"
"But you'll be..." he started but his confusion only drew a laugh from me. I rolled my eyes all dramatic like, like I he was being ridiculous, like i really didn't think it was a weird request at all.
"Therell be bubbles," i shrugged, a twinkling kind of smile. He bit back a laugh.
"Oh well in that case," he grinned stubbing out his cigarette, one hand in his back pocket as he wandered over to the doorway. One hand resting at the top of the doorframe. He looked down at me, blocking the light from outside, cutting us off from the rest of the world.
For a moment we were held suspended, blinking back at one another, his smirk leaving me spellbound.
I was frozen, just gazing up at him.
"Let me in the love," he said, his voice smooth and low, almost taking the piss. Almost.
I couldn't help my smile, couldn't help the little tingle he left in my cheeks. He was so close and yet not quite as close as I'd have liked him to be.
"Count down from 12," I said closing the door quickly. Slipping my clothes from my body, slipping slowly into the tub, sinking beneath the water, closing my eyes as the warmth washed over me and i felt my whole body relax.
The ache in my bones, in my muscles finally easing, soothed by the gentle wash of warm water.
Even with my eyes closed I could sense his hesitance for the way he opened the door. Slowly. Quietly.
Even with my eyes closed I could sense his preoccupation when he closed the door. Gently, as if he thought he might disturb me.
When I opened my eyes he was sitting, leaning against the door, legs outstretched lazy in front of him.
"You look better you know," he said after a moment, at first I thought he was being serious but then I saw the smile forming crooked, "You've a little colour in your cheeks," he winked causing me to bite back my smile, shrink down beneath the bubbles a little futher. Almost hiding away from him.
It was strange not knowing what to say to him.
"Dya want a cig?" he asked then, i raised my brow but he lit up anyway turning the extractor fan on. "No one uses smoke alarms anymore," he shrugged handing me a cig, watching my light up with eyes like he was watching something else.
I hoped i looked french, elegant. Delicate. That effortless kind of cool.
I knew that I didn't.
I knew that the bags under my eyes were deeper and darker than usual, that when I blinked you could see the bloodshot around my irises. I knew my lips were chapped, my cheeks hollow. Maybe I'd been blushing but that was the only colour to grace me.
"You're still all shaken up arent you darlin," said Johnny shifting closer, resting his arms at the bathside, his sleeves a pillow for his head. His hair fell across his face, his eyes looking ul at me. I wondered if he could see me struggling to breath.
"Yeah," i said but it sounded more like a sigh, "Its just a bit, you know... I don't really feel like a person,"
He took my hand, which was wet with water and when he ran his thumb across my palm he shaved a layer of bubbles away. The gentle squeeze of his fingers around mine was warm, tender.
"Why would someone even..." i started but he cut me off.
"Some people are cunts," he said, not quite sighing, his frustration seeping through. I split a grin, amused by his bluntness and we faded into a calming sort of quiet once again.
I closed my eyes, he held my hand.
We simmered in a comfortable silence, quietly tuning into one another and our gentle sighs.
Every now and again one of us would say something to wind the other up, we'd revel in how easy it was to make the other laugh and as time elapsed I felt us return to the usual, comfortable closeness we'd always shared. The easy way we could just be together.
"Heaven or Las Vegas," he said a little later, when I'd just broken through the surface, soapy water sticking my hair to my face, my shoulders and back. The bubbles were beginning to burst, beginning to fade, but he didn't seem to notice and I didn't really mind.
"What?" i asked with a small smirk on my lips, had he realised hed said that out loud?
He opened his eyes, looked up at me, a little lackadaisically.
"Thats a song that reminds me of you..." he said letting go of my hand only so he might walk his fingers up my arm, along my shoulder, to press his index to the tip of my nose with the sort of small smile that triggered mine. Only mine wasn't soft it was gleaming and bright, a real grin, all dimples and shining eyes. I almost asked why but when he got there first he left me stunned, touched.
"You're much brighter than the sun is to me," he said, thumb caressing my cheek in a moment of affection I would relive after he'd pushed himself up from his resting place beside me and closed the bathroom door behind him.
He didnt give me the chance to reply. He just left me there, little bubbles burting around my thighs, knees hugged to my chest, simmering with something like hope.
I shrunk back down beneath the water, listened to sound of Bondys music playing in the next room, refracted through the water, low and distorted. Only then, hidden beneath the little waves my body had made, did I allow my grin to split, my eyes squeezed shut. Only then did I allow the bubbles and the butterflies to take over my whole body for a moment.
When i broke back through the water i splashed the walls. Still smiling.
I was overcome with the sweetness of him. The strange way he had of saying everything and yet nothing at all. Always only sort of letting you know. And yet in my heart those words were enough to let me know.
I ran my fingers through my hair, blinked the soap from my eyes and when I finally stood the lightheaded rush left me alone.
I wrapped myself in my towels and i sat with my head against the door, listening to him through the wood and the walls.
I'd been about to stand up, about to wrap myself in this fluffy white dressing gown we'd both joked earlier made you look like a noel fielding off to challege the tundra, when I heard someone knocking on the door.
Heard Bondy shout come in.
Heard Benji say hello and pull out a chair at the table on the balcony.
"Alright lad?" Johnny sounded tired when he spoke and Benjis reply was muffled. I could smell their cigarette smoke drifting through the open door, back into the bedroom.
"Hows saff?" he asked and Johnny said something like better, and then he cracked a laugh and i pictured him screwing his face up, all despair and regret and when Benji asked him what he'd done, his own tone full of knowing and concern Bondy winced through his words.
"I think Ive fucked it," he sighed and I felt a frown forming on my face.
"More so than you usually think or what?" Benji sounded like he was laughing a little and i felt a flurry of nerves flutter through me at the thought that they might have had similar conversations before.
"I just quoted the fuckin cocteau twins to her..." he said quietly cringing. Id never thought Bondy would be the sort of lad to second guess the weird shit he sometimes did. I bit back a smile listened to Benjis laughter until finally it began to subside and i heard Bondy groaning. "What the fuck am i meant do Ben?"
For a minute they were quiet. I wondered what sort of hidden look they were giving eachother.
And then Benji spoke and he broke my heart and he made it difficult for me to get up the courage to open the bathroon door.
"Ask yourself why you haven't told her..." he said and when he heard the handle of the bathroom door he stood abruptly, offering me a small smile and a nod. "Glad you're feeling better Saff," he said not once looking back at his friend who was stood just behind him, his cigarette smoking itself stale.