DRAMA NOVEL ONLINE HUGE X4: Chapter 14
I take a cab from the airport, reading the driver the address from the luggage tag and watching the streets go past. We eventually pull up in front of an impressive looking apartment building and I get out, taking a look around at the neighborhood.
There are some pretty amazing cars in the lot, and a nice grassy area for residents to enjoy in the front of the building. The entrance is glassy and modern. The taxi driver retrieves my suitcase from the trunk and then I head up the path to my temporary refuge. I haven’t turned on my phone since I landed and to be honest I’m feeling a little scared to. I’m pretty sure mom will have left a very angry message. I may just delete it without listening to it, but I’m most worried that Liam and Callum will have called too. Matty definitely would have told them about our chance meeting and the fact that he’s offered me a place to stay. I wonder what they’ll think about the whole situation.
Maybe they’ll be angry I left. I wouldn’t blame them for that.
Maybe they’ll be glad that Matty stepped in to help me.
Maybe they’ll be weirded out by the idea of me being in their space. If I switch on the phone I’ll find out, but at the moment I just feel like burying my head in the sand.
The lobby smells of lilies and there’s an elevator at the back that I head toward. I know theirs is apartment 3c so I press the button for the third floor. It’s so weird to be dragging my suitcase towards a strange door and even weirder to unlock that door with an unfamiliar key, but it’s opening the door that really freaks me out!
I peer into the apartment and I’m greeted with a typical man-cave. Brown leather sofas, massive wide screen TV, fancy juicer on the granite counters and about fifty pairs of huge shoes on shelves beneath the coat rack. It smells fresh, like an alpine forest in the sunshine and, as I push the door closed behind me, I feel immediately at home. There’s a gorgeous built in bookcase that’s stacked with CDs, worn paperbacks, and trophies. I leave my suitcase standing in the hallway and start to nose around, laughing aloud at some of the pictures on the shelves. Four little boys sitting cross-legged on the grass, four little boys holding ice-creams on the beach. Four grown men with their arms slung around each other’s shoulders as Liam and Callum graduate. A beautiful woman sitting on a sofa with a toddler on either side of her and two babies in her arms.
I get a lump in my throat at that. I can’t imagine what hard work it must have been to have four boys under the age of three. Their mom looks tired but happy. I see her in the boys so much. Mainly in their facial expressions. Something about their smiles comes directly from their mom.
I move on from the photos and chuckle at some of the books on the shelves. Dan Brown and Stephen King I would expect, but 50 Shades of Grey and Men are from Mars, Woman are from Venus I would definitely not! I chuckle, wondering whose reading material they are, then realize they’re most likely something left behind by an ex-girlfriend. My gut clenches with jealousy at the thought of them having other women in this apartment.
Any of them.
That’s a complete and utter revelation to me because I’m not generally a possessive person yet here I am feeling resentful about a fictional woman, and covetous over four men. I shake my head, thinking that I really need to pull myself together.
I shuffle towards the corridor, still chastising myself for thinking such ridiculous thoughts, and open the first door on the right.
Wow.
Liam has some serious taste. His room is something else. Rich. Masculine. Super sexy. A dark wooden sleigh bed in a giant size dominates the room. The wall behind the bed is midnight blue and the rest of the walls are white with black and white pictures in dark wood frames. He has a huge desk in front of the window where I can imagine him on a laptop, lounging back with his hands behind his head, gazing at the view.
It is so perfectly him. I walk around slowly, looking at everything as though I’m an explorer who’s stumbled on an ancient tomb. All the artwork is beautiful photography of natural settings. I love that he’s put so much thought into decorating his space. It’s grown up and stylish and makes me attracted to him even more. I didn’t think that would be possible!
Then I do what I swore I wouldn’t do, and peek in his closet. I immediately get hit by the scent of him and it does funny things to me. Like Pavlov’s dog, but instead of salivating I get hot between my legs. It’s not as neat as the closets you see on those MTV crib-type shows, but it is pretty orderly and there seems to be a little bit of space for me to hang up my clothes.
I go back into the hallway and drag my suitcase into Liam’s room. I have only my vacation things with me so I’m gonna need to head home in a bit to collect a few more of my personal possessions. Not too much, though because I’m not planning on staying for too long. The last thing I want the boys to think when they return is that I’ve moved in for good.
I place my case on the bed and unzip, beginning to sort out the dirty laundry from the clean clothes. I pull out the underwear I was wearing for the wedding and gaze at it wistfully. Who knew it would see so much action? Who knew it would witness the start of such a big change in my life?
I hang a few dresses up in the closet and line my shoes up next to Liam’s much larger ones. I linger, leaning in to smell his clothes again and feel such a pang of longing. This wasn’t supposed to happen. I wasn’t supposed to feel anything for the twins. It was meant to be a fling but somehow they wriggled under my skin and now I’m feeling things that are dangerous.
My phone is on the bed beside my purse and I walk over to get it, holding it and staring at the blank screen. Am I brave enough to turn it on and deal with the fall out of my decision to leave early? I stroll back into the kitchen to get a glass of water while I decide. It’s cool and fresh and makes me feel a little better. Bracing myself, I power up the phone and wait. It takes a minute for the beeping to start. Voicemails. Messages. Emails. It seems that as soon as I turn off my phone I become popular.
My facebook notifications show that Kerry has been uploading photos of the wedding, so I look at those first. I know I’m avoiding the inevitable but I don’t care. The pictures are amazing. Kerry and Dean look so in love, my heart swells for her. There are some of the ceremony and then I flick to one that shows me flanked by Liam and Callum and I want to cry. I look so uncertain in the image and the twins are both gazing at me with smiles on their faces, full of confidence and oozing charm. The way I felt at that moment was so unsure. Unsure about how I felt about life and myself, and remembering that makes me realize that I do feel different now, even just a little. More confident and a little braver. Those are definitely good things.
I finally decide I need to listen to my messages. If I can be the kind of person who wants something and goes for it regardless of the consequences, then I can face up to those consequences.
The first message is mom, as predicted. Her voice is high-pitched from the first word and I delete it immediately. There is absolutely no point in putting myself through that. The next message is Kerry. She’s heard that I’ve left and is sad that she didn’t get a chance to say goodbye. She wants to know what’s been going on and tells me to call her. The next message is Callum. His voice is strained when he says he can’t believe that I left without saying goodbye. He pauses and I wait, my heart pounding in my chest. Then Liam is there. He tells me to make myself at home in his room, to stay as long as I need to, and that the next time they see me they want me to be in a happier place.
When the message ends, I realize I’m in a happier place already. Just being in their space makes me feel content, even though they’re not there. It’s as through the essence of them is enough to relax me.