A Beautiful Forever (15 page)

“Where the fuck are you?!" he complains immediately in
my ear.

“I’m sorry man. We're on our way,” I lie, flipping on the
bedside light as I get up and hunt down our clothes. “It just took longer than
we expected, we’ll be about an hour.”

Shane sighs on his end, “Fine,” he says flatly, “Just hurry,
I’m supposed to be at Coral’s before then, she’s gonna be pissed at me.”

He disconnects without saying anymore, and I get my jeans on
as I move over to Paige’s side of the bed. “Paige, honey, wake up,” I whisper,
gently rocking her shoulder in an attempt to rouse her.

She blinks a few times before her eyes focus on me properly,
“What? What’s wrong?” she asks sitting up and taking the clothes I’m handing to
her.

“We need to get back. Shane needs his car.”

“Oh shit! I forgot about him!” she says, suddenly throwing
her clothes on and stuffing her feet into her shoes.

“I know, me too,” I say as I grab my jacket and hold out
hers. She slips her arms in, and I pause our rush for a moment to kiss her. “I
don’t want to go,” I tell her.

“Me either, but we can’t keep his car forever,” she returns,
kissing me again. I cup her arse in my hand and pull her body against mine,
savouring these last few moments of our time alone. As we pull apart, she sighs
and picks up her bag. I take her hand, and we walk over to reception to return
the key before getting back into the car for the drive back to the flat.

When I said ‘I don’t want to go’, I meant that I don’t want
to go in six weeks. I don’t want to only have that small amount of time with
her. I’ve already spent half my time here getting close to her and now that I
am. I can’t imagine having to walk away.

“Maybe you should take a few days off,” Andrea suggests as I
send yet another customer on their way without having any sort of a
conversation with them that wasn’t related to their hairstyle.

“I need to work at the moment Andrea.” I get to work
cleaning up the fallen hair from the floor.

“Do you need to talk about it?”

I pause my sweeping and look up at Andrea’s concerned face.
We're experiencing one of the rare quiet times in the salon when we have no
clients waiting, and our next appointment isn’t for another hour. So it’s safe
to talk, my problem is – do I want to?

Sighing, I fall into the salon chair, leaning my upper body
weight on the broom in my hand. “I just…” I start, having trouble working out
what to say. I’m trying to let people into my life, but it’s still hard to
share my worries when I’m so used to dealing with them on my own.

“Just what Paige? Talk to me, you’ve been moping around the
salon for over a week now,” she prods, wheeling a stool over so she's sitting
directly in front of me.

“I went to meet a um… relative, the weekend before last, and
it just brought up a lot of… well, shit – from my past. Stuff I wasn’t
expecting to be reminded of, and I’m just trying to work through it all in my
head. I’m sorry I’ve been out of sorts, but I don’t want to take time off – I’d
just spend it thinking, and I don’t want to do that.”

“You don’t have to take time off if you don’t want to Paige.
Your work is fantastic as always. My concern is that you’re not your usual
bubbly self. I’m worried about you as a friend here, not a boss.”

“Thank you Andrea, but I’ll be fine.”

“Well, I’m here if you need me ok?” she tells me and I nod,
appreciating her concern.

I return to sweep my pile of hair while Andrea moves about
the salon cleaning up and preparing for her next client by collecting the
supplies she’ll need for a keratin treatment.

“Why don’t you tell me about that boy of yours while we’re
quiet? Thinking about him sure puts a smile on my face, and you’re the one
dating him!” she laughs.

Returning her laughter half-heartedly, I sigh again. “Elliot
is wonderful, as always. He’s being so patient with me Andrea. I’m afraid I’ve
been a bit distant with him too since he took me out to Cambridge – that’s
where my relative lives; and he was so supportive and so amazing while we were
there. But I feel like we were in this bubble while we were alone that burst
once we got back to the flat and around everyone else. We’re still together,
but we haven’t been
together
since then – if you know what I mean,” I
say, sharing as much as I’m willing to about the details of our relationship.

“Sounds like you two need some time on your own then.”

The bell rings above the door as a potential walk in client
enters, so I nod my head, agreeing with Andrea’s comment. “I’m working on it
Andrea,” I say before moving to greet our new customer with as much enthusiasm
as I can muster.

Ever since we came back from Cambridge, Paige has distanced
herself from everyone and everything. It’s a little hard for me to handle
because our time together there was amazing, and I want nothing more than to be
with her again, but during the drive back to the flat this melancholy descended
upon her, and I don’t know how to fix it.

We’re still together in a sense, but not much more besides
hand holding, hugging and a bit of kissing have gone on. I’m trying to give her
space, but I feel like if I leave it too long, that space will become a great
gaping void that I won’t be able to cross. There is this sadness in her now,
greater than the one that was there before. I think that maybe she had gotten
her hopes up, thinking that when she met her real dad, she’d finally have a
parent who loved her. But seeing her mother there ruined it all for her, so
now, that hope is gone.

I want to fix it for her, but I know I can't. She won’t talk
about it, and I can see that her troubles are constantly on her mind. I thought
we had turned a corner when she told me about her family, but now I feel like
she only shared a tiny piece of herself with me and is keeping the rest locked
away. Perhaps it’s all buried underneath that tattoo.

“Elliot, I think that weights bench is clean enough now,”
one of my co-workers, Natasha says to me. I snap out of my thoughts. I'm at
work, and I’m supposed to be preparing for my next client but instead I’m in a
daze, thinking about Paige.

I check my appointments and notice that I am supposed to be
training Agy. Taking a walk into reception, I see her standing around chatting
to a couple of other women.

“Oh here he is!” she exclaims happily as I approach. “The
light of my life. Isn’t he lovely girls?” she asks the ladies she’s with.

I smile, not really paying attention to their response and
lean down to kiss her cheek.

“Let’s get started, hey?” I say to her.

She waves to her friends and follows me to the treadmills where
I get her to warm up. Once I have her walking at a comfortable pace I hop on
the treadmill next to her and start to run. I take the speed higher and higher
as I lengthen my stride, running as fast as I can without the risk of falling
off, a gentle hum from my pumping blood fills my head and makes me feel a bit
calmer.

“A little tense today are we?” Agy asks, her eyebrows rising
as she watches me run.

Glancing over at her, I nod, “You could say that,” I reply.

“Girl trouble,” she comments, knowingly. “It always is.”

Slowing the treadmill, I look over at Agy with her wavy grey
hair cut close to her head, blue eyes, that have lost a lot of their light, and
slightly weathered skin, I feel a fondness for her. She’s probably the kindest
person I have met in the UK, and right now; I need an understanding ear.

I slow to a stop and hop of the machine, wiping my face with
a towel as I move closer, Agy watches me with her kind face, you can tell she’s
expecting me to spill my guts, and she’s right; that's exactly what I'm going
to do.

“It’s Paige,” I start, “we had this amazing day together a
couple of weeks ago, and now she’s back to pushing me away. It’s like we take
one step forward and then two steps back. I’m trying to be patient with her,
but time is running out for me. I want to be with her Agy. I want our
relationship to keep moving forward. I’m willing to come back here to be with
her, but I'm petrified that when I get back – she might be gone.” 

“Have you asked her to maybe go back with you?” Agy asks. We
have moved on to stretching now, so we’re sitting on mats as I help her limber
up.

“No, she’s already said she’s staying here indefinitely. I
don’t think there’s anything for her back home.”

“There will be once you’re there.”

I shrug my shoulders – I don’t know if that would be enough
for her. “I just get this feeling that she is viewing our relationship as a
short term thing. I know she feels the same way I do. I'm not imagining it, but
she won’t talk to me. She's not really letting me in. It’s hard.”

“Elliot, you are such a lovely young man. I can’t understand
why any woman wouldn’t want to jump through hoops to be with you. If she is
worth it, and you care about her deeply, then you need to make that clear to
her – do whatever it takes to make things work. Take her out so you can talk –
just the two of you, tell her you don’t want it to be over when you go home.
You can’t leave things unsaid Elliot, believe me, at my age, I’m an expert on
things left unsaid.”

“Your age? I thought you were only twenty one!” I joke,
lightening up the mood.

Laughing, she taps me on the arm in good humour, “Oh Elliot,
what am I going to do when you leave? I’ll have to train with one of the boring
ones,” she pouts.

I hold out my hand and help her up off the mats. “Good thing
I’m coming back then.”

My heart skips a beat when I walk out of work and spot
Elliot in his usual waiting place. I feel both frightened and elated upon
seeing him. He is so beautiful in my eyes, that it makes me feel like I'm
dreaming him up. But I can touch him, so he has to be real.

As if I need to prove it to myself, I place my palms on his
chest as I lean into him and tilt my head up for a kiss, he smiles down at me
and wraps me in his arms before tilting his head towards mine to greet me with
his mouth.

Under normal circumstances, I’m a decent height, but with
Elliot being well over six feet, I feel fairly small around him, I like that.

Smiling as he takes me by the hand, he leads me to the
station entry instead of towards the exit.

I look up at him, confused. “What’s going on?” I ask,
trotting along after him.

“I’m taking you out. I want you to myself tonight,” he tells
me, his eyes twinkling mischievously.

“Ok, well are you going to tell me what we’re doing?”

“Something touristy,” is all he’ll tell me.

I lean into him and go with it. We have barely had a moment
alone together since Cambridge, and truthfully, I haven’t made much of an
effort to be alone with him. I’ve been selfishly brooding and keeping him away,
while I’ve been secretly afraid of what he means to me.

The motel room seems like so long ago and the intensity of
what I felt when we were together, scares me. It’s like my life is dependent
upon being with him, I’ve never felt like this before.

Sitting together on the train, I rest my head on his
shoulder, squeezing my eyes shut as he plants a kiss on the top of my head.
It’s such a small and loving gesture, but it feels like everything to me.

Today I realised that I only have a month left until Elliot
goes. I’ve just wasted almost two weeks while I focused on my own problems,
I’ve been taking his comfort, but I haven’t been giving him anything in return.
I’m determined to make this last month, the best month possible, I don’t want
to live my life wishing I had spent more time with him.

“Elliot,” I say to get his attention. I hear his voice hum
through his chest in response. Lifting my head to meet his face, I take a deep
breath. “I’m sorry I’ve been so distant this past couple of weeks.”

“It’s ok Paige; you've had a lot of your mind.”

I shake my head like I’m trying to rid myself of my worries.
“Can we pretend like none of that happened and focus on now? Let all that
‘past’ crap fall away and just be together? – we don’t have very much time
left, and I want to spend as much of it with you as I can.”

He presses his lips together in a tender smile and reaches
up to caress my face with his thumb, my eyes flutter closed for a moment as I
lean into his hand. I take his hand in my own as I open my eyes to continue.
“I’ve been thinking Elliot – Shane and Gavin are going next week, and um… they
haven’t found roommates yet… so I was thinking that maybe… we, could share a
room? We could just change the listing and get another girl to room in with
Naomi and another guy to room with Brian…” I suggest nervously, my stomach
churning like I might vomit – I’m suddenly gripped by the fear that he might
refuse me.

Elliot’s smile breaks into a grin as he pulls me towards him
and kisses me. “I think that’s a wonderful idea Paige,” he whispers, “I would
love nothing more than to room with you.” Relief washes over me as we kiss
again.

“Alright, it’s time to tell me where we're going,” Paige
says as we exit the train station at St Paul’s and start to walk up the street.

 “I’m taking you on a ghost walk,” I tell her as I open my
eyes wide for added emphasis.

She laughs, clutching tighter onto my arm. “Is this a ploy
to get me so scared I can’t sleep alone tonight?”

“It might be.”

This Ghost walk only runs on Tuesday nights. It might be fun;
it might be lame - but a lot of haunted places are actually pubs, so we can
always beg off and go to dinner instead if we’ve had enough. At the very least,
I figure it might be a good way to learn a bit more about London. Besides the
bus tour I did on my first day here, I really haven’t done any sightseeing, and
I’m sure Paige hasn’t done any at all.