Gone (18 page)

“So I was thinking, we could paint it white and then let Emily loose with her paints and artistic flair.

Emily has a frown furrowing her forehead and mum looks completely perplexed.

“Why don’t you ask Josh to paint it?” asks Em.

“Paint what?” Joshua slips back into the room and it feels like he has never been gone. He walks right up alongside me until the skin of his arm is touching mine causing the hairs on my arm too stand to attention and mesh with his. “Wow.” He turns and stares at the walls which have giant strips of paper hanging off them. “You have been busy!”

The thought hits me immediately, and I can’t believe I didn’t think about it before. Joshua knows his way into this room, via a drain pipe which means he used to know the person who owned it. For whatever reason the owner of the giant pink wallpaper is no longer here but I have ripped it off the walls with no regard. Sometimes I truly wonder if I have a brain at all.

Joshua is staring at the walls, his green eyes burning. I can see his Adams apple bob in his throat as he swallows repeatedly.

I untangle his clenched fist and slide my fingers into his. “I’m sorry. I did not think.”

Surprisingly he turns to me with the widest grin I have seen yet stretched right across his face, his white teeth glint and his face look so open, honest and happy, I want to kiss him. And I do. I can hear Mum give a little gasp as I tiptoe up and plant a kiss on Joshua’s lips. For a split second he smiles against my mouth and squeezes my hand.

“This is perfect,” he says. He turns to the closest wall and finishes yanking off a strip of paper I have left hanging. “Roses are so not your thing.”

“
Rebecca, I don’t understand. You are going in a few days, why do you want to decorate. I was going to make this into an office for your father.” Mum is looking at me, her expression still muddled. First there was the wallpaper, then there was the smiling and hand holding, then the kissing. It’s a miracle she is not on the floor dealing with a ‘my daughter is normal’ heart attack.

For some reason her words make my eyes sting, and I notice Joshua’s back stiffen. I think about my dad using my room as an office and am not sure I like the idea at all.
My room?

“Well surely, I’ll come home during the holiday’s wont I?” 

Mum’s frown deepens a bit. “I don’t know, will you?”

“Well maybe, if my room is not covered in roses.”

Emily steps in between us. “We had better get these roses down then.” Em, goes to stand near Joshua and whispers something which he nods his head at.
That’s not annoying at all.

“I’m going to go and make some coffee, anyone want some?” Mum walks towards the door, clearly this situation is beyond her.

“Two sugars,” Joshua turns and blinds her with one of his super wide smiles. “Oh and, Bex, we are going to need to go and get some white paint.”

“That’s okay, we have some in the shed.” Mum adds.

“Excellent, let’s get going.”

An hour later the five of us, yes Dad has also joined in, have removed every single spec of rose wallpaper. Joshua is doing this weird thing with my parents where he is actually making conversation with them. He has realised that Dad is a graphic designer and they have been talking software programs, design ideas and god knows what ever since.

I tune back into their conversation when Dad laughs out loud at something Joshua has said. To my complete shock Dad walks over to me and then puts his arm around me giving me a squeeze, explaining to Joshua that I don’t know anything about art and that I shouldn’t be let loose on the blank walls.

“I know, Mr. Walters, that’s why Em and I are going to do it.”

Dad waves his hand at him. He has already told him to call him Andy twice.

“You’re going to paint my walls?”

Ooh that sounds a bit dirty.

Joshua’s lips twitch like he may be having the same thought. “Yep. Come on, we’ve got to let this dry. Lets go for our surf lesson and then come back later and do more.”

I wait for Dad to step in and tell me I have to clean up my mess or something, anything, but he just laughs and says. “Have fun. Do you guys want dinner later?”

To which Josh says, “I have plans to take Bex out tonight if that’s okay.”

Plans?

Dad says, “Sure, why not.”

Excuse me?

Josh says, “Actually we need to leave really early tomorrow to drive along the coast to the place I want to take her, about six in the morning.”

Six? Is he mad?

Dad says, “Well, Josh, why don’t you stay in the spare room tonight so you don’t have to get up too early to come and get her.”

At this point I realise I drowned in the sea last night and this is not real.

“Thank you, that would be a huge help.” Joshua turns to me sending me a wink and reaches for my hand. “Shall we go and get some stuff from the studio Bex?”

“
Rebecca.”

Joshua grins and raises his pierced eyebrow at me.

Sadly I have nothing else to say. Nothing. My come-backs seem to have been seriously crippled. I follow him down the stairs, aware that there is dead silence in the room we have just exited which means they are all standing there wondering where their daughter and sister is, and do you know what, I am wondering where she is too.

Joshua

Surf Lesson No #2

I hold her hand the whole way down to the beach. Something feels different. When I walked in and saw her pulling the wallpaper off the wall I thought that maybe she had flipped. Maybe the crack that has been present in her countenance since I first met her had finally broken. I’d only been gone for half an hour, but half an hour away from Bex is beginning to feel like an age. Anything could have happened. Her Dad could have mentioned about that prick’s party that left her tainted and scorned. Whatever it is about those bangles could have tipped her over the edge. But no. She just doesn’t like wallpaper with roses on it, and to be truthful neither do I. That paper has always given me a headache.

We don
’t really need to go to the studio, or to the beach but my need to touch her and kiss her was getting too intense to ignore. While her parents seem to be accepting of me, I don’t think they would appreciate me kissing her, using my tongue to explore her mouth and my hands to explore her skin while they are in the same room. The beach will be a welcome respite from my need to touch the girl made of the sun.

Walking across the sand in silence I skim the beach looking for people that I know. I have made enough small talk today, I just want some alone time, well, alone with her.

The beach is busy but it is just holiday makers enjoying the warm August sunshine. No one is on my rock so I guide us through the towels and laughing children until we get to the spot that is close to becoming ‘ours.’

“Don’t we need boards, if this is a surf lesson?” she asks, breaking the silence. Laughing I pull her down onto the sand in front of the rock. We don’t have towels or a blanket but the sand is warm to touch and we are hidden from the view of the rest of the beach by the position of the rock. As soon as she is on the ground I lean her back into the sand and slide one hand along her body from her thigh to her shoulder. I move myself so I am pressed all alongside her.

“We don’t need boards.”

Bex giggles a little, her eyes opening in shock at the sound. “So what sort of lesson is this then?”

I move myself closer still until my body is practically on top of hers. “No lesson.” Sliding one hand under her neck I weave my fingers into her hair, and tilt her face up to mine so I can gain full access to her mouth.  I start with a slow kiss, teasing the very edges of her lips with my own, she wiggles herself against me in response running one firm hand down my torso and stomach which makes my stomach quiver in anticipation of her touch. I know I want her to go lower.

This is not what I had planned with her. I was never going to give in to my intense need
to be with her. But now it feels like something has changed. Hunger and need are burning in my veins and I can feel the same radiating off her.

What is the change?

Her warm breath mingles with mine as our mouths hungrily explore each other. It feels like I am going to drown in desire. Our bodies are so tight together, there is no way she won’t be able to feel the effect she is having on me. I pull away a fraction trying to get any thought into my head other than ‘Must shag now.’  “Bex.” I try to say her name normally but it comes out like a low croak.

“Don’t you dare,”
she kisses back.

“Dare what?”

“Stop this.” With that she moves herself one final centimetre so she is pressed right up against me and I can feel myself straining to move against her body, preferably with her, and inside her.

I hold myself still as she creates some steady friction with a subtle movement from her hips.

Shit.

“No, way. Not on the beach.” I catch hold of both of her hands and pull them up above her head moving my body away from hers slightly. It doesn’t help hugely. I can still feel the blood pulsing.

“I think you may need a dip in the cold sea, Joshua.” She bites her lower lip and the action nearly kills my limited self-control.

“I think maybe we both do.” Ignoring the glaringly obvious bulge in my boardshorts I jump away from her body and pull her up after me. In one easy move I lift her from the sand and sling her over my shoulder, making sure to keep my back turned from the rest of the beach so I don’t scare any children with my monster erection. I charge for the sea, my feet sinking in the sand as I splash into the water.

“No!” she screams.

It’s too late, not that I would have listened anyway. I dump her in the water and wait for it to ease the fire I have burning.

“Joshua,” she sputters as she comes up from under the water and reaches a hand for me.

“Sorry, but you know that sort of behaviour is illegal on a beach?”

Pulling as hard as she can on my hand Bex tries to drag me into the water with her but she can’t move me, laughing I lift her clean out of the water, and she slides both legs around my waist as I walk us back into the deeper depths out of view.

“That was mean.” she says the words against my mouth.

“So were you.” I am teasing. Obviously.

“Were you not enjoying it?” I know she is not talking about splashy time in the water.

“Believe me I was.”

“What are you scared of, Joshua?”

Losing you.

“I’m not scared of anything. I just want it to be right. I think you’re amazing and you deserve to have someone show you how it can be.”

“Are you the guy for the job, Joshua?”

I watch her for a moment, the sun glistening off the water droplets on her skin as I think of my response.

“I am the only guy for the job.”

Two hours later I have covered Bex in small trails of sand that I have trickled from my hand onto her skin. Bex is ticklish in various places, something I didn’t know, but I am storing the information away for use at a later time. The beach has emptied and there is only us and a family with two young children left.

“Do we need to go home yet?” Bex has her eyes closed against the late afternoon sun, a sleepy smile playing on her lips. Moving myself a little closer I use the palm of my hand to slide over the skin of her thigh and brush off the sand I placed there.

“It’s your room we are decorating?” I leave the words dangling there. Truth be known I am unwilling to move from the beach. I want to lie here until the sun has faded and stopped glowing on her body. Then I want to move myself right up into her space until she makes me feel like she did earlier. “We could go to the pub, if you fancy it?” I suggest instead of initiating some skin on skin contact.

Bex opens one eye. “You want to go to the pub with me?”

“Sure why not?”

“I thought you just liked to hide behind rocks with me.”

“Well that’s true. I like to do that too.”

“I’ll think about it.” She shuts her eye again but her lips curve at a smile.

“I’ll buy you a cheese and pickle sandwich?”

This makes her open both eyes and lean onto her elbows. “If you are offering a cheese sandwich does this mean it’s our second date?”

I start to grin. “Maybe. Do you want it to be?”

Bex frowns slightly as she weighs something in her mind. “I need to know what base we are reaching before agreeing.”

“Third, max.”

“
Then I’m gonna need chips with my sandwich.”

Jumping from the sand I offer her my hand. “Agreed, come on, the pub does the best cider in Cornwall.”

“Ugh, cider.”

“I’m going to spank you for saying “Ugh”
to cider.”

“Now, Joshua, spanking is not technically third base. Do we need to clarify this?” She starts to giggle and run across the sand.

Seriously, she thinks she can make it across the sand quicker than me? Six paces later I rugby tackle her to the ground, pinning her to the cooling sand with my hands firm around her arms. I slide one of my legs in-between her thighs and she watches me with burning hot ambers, not blinking or breaking eye contact.