Sarah had left their brief ren-de-vu a little dazed after dealing with his minor break-down in the restaurant. It had taken a few minutes before he had conjured up enough strength to form a sentence, but he eventually got round to describing his situation to her. He was leaving town for New York. As he was forced to put so bluntly, his mother currently resided in a specialist hospital for the terminal cancer she had developed. There was nothing he could do but, as he had said, “sit back and watch time slip away.” It was from his words, somewhere underneath her skin; Sarah had felt her emotional strings being pulled at. She had gone there with the intention of listening to his reasons for breaking up with her, yet there was a far bigger picture to look at. Michael was clearly in the agony anyone in his situation would be in
Yet it was in this state, that she realised, the night’s ordeals were far from over. After all, Justin was bound to still be up at this time, she was yet to deal with him.
Angela’s Porsche ran smoothly down the highway, the warm air circulating around the stuffy inside of the car. Sarah’s bare back, stuck uncomfortably to the leather and her cheeks had a definite pink tinge to them. As much as she didn’t want to step inside the house, she had to get out of the car. That and the fear of leaving a single sign that would tell Angela Sarah had used the car, was becoming more and more inevitable.
Sarah could only see a single light being omitted from the mansion and she guessed it meant Justin was still in front of the TV. She couldn’t help but feel bad. He looked so out of place.
She wasn’t greeted with the normal, irritatingly cheery ‘hello’ from Angela. Instead, the void of silence from the dark mansion chilled her slightly and turning the lights on, only gave a little extra sense of security. Flinging her coat over the stand, she made her way through the house, opening windows here and there to evaporate the stuffy atmosphere. Justin clearly hadn’t been thinking when he had turned the central heating on.
Finally arriving at the living room, Sarah found Justin sprawled across the sofa in front of the TV asleep. He had his shirt unbuttoned; apparently forgetting he had turned on the radiators in a roasting house, and Sarah couldn’t help but stop and stare for a moment or two. She remembered vaguely Angela talking about his ‘toned, muscled body’, but Sarah had really only been half listening to that conversation. Now it had her full attention, wishing he had had time to take off the remainder of his shirt before falling asleep…
Sarah mentally scolded herself and proceeded to turn of the television. He wasn’t at the top of her favourite list of people right now. No matter how good he looked with his shirt off, it shouldn’t change her perception of him.
At the sound of her own stomach rumbling, Sarah opened the freezer and shoved a random packet into the microwave, before making her way sleepily up the stairs to change into her pyjamas. Only now her stomach reminded her that the drama of Michael’s speech had caused her to forget about diner. She hadn’t eaten since twelve o’clock that afternoon. Throwing on the closest comfortable clothing she could find, she bounded down the stairs in the sudden realisation that the indicator to show that the food in the microwave was ready, made a shrill ring that was sure to wake Justin. After everything that had happened he was the last person she wanted to talk too.
It was too late. She arrived in the kitchen, only to hear to her the ringing of the microwave. Justin was already awakening from inside the living room. Pulling out the lasagne, she groaned as Justin made an appearance in the kitchen, his shirt still hanging loose, his face looking weary. Making his way over to the freezer, he picked another ready-made meal and shoved it in the machine. Sarah doubted he even noticed she was in the room. Taking a seat, she ate she disgustingly un-fresh meals Angela insisted on buying, and watching Justin pace around the counter, groggily humming something out loud, occasionally running a hand through the mass of curls sitting on top of his head.
After a long streak of silence, Justin grabbed a fork from the drawer and turned to take a seat at the table, a little taken aback at the sight of Sarah.
“What are you doing here?”
God, he’s charming, Sarah thought to herself. A traditional ‘hello’ really wouldn’t have gone amiss right now.
“I just got back from my date. You were asleep, so I didn’t bother waking you up.”
Sarah laughed to herself at how nice she was being. No doubt it would irritate him further if she could prove she was able to rise above the immature attitude he currently had by being rude to her.
“He broke up with you didn’t he.”
A flash of confusion swept across Sarah’s features. How did he know any of this? “No he did not break up with me. His mother’s ill, so he’s leaving town. And anyway, it’s none of your business…”
“So…actually he did break up with you,” he concluded, shoving a forkful of cheese into his mouth.
Sarah felt her temper bubbling to the surface. He had had ten months to talk to her and of all the times he chose now. That and the fact he was curious about things that had no concern with.
“No, he did not! Now would you excuse me, I’m going to bed.”
Sarah attempted to squeeze past Justin’s chair, but his purposeful refusal to pull it in was blocking her way.
“Would you kindly move your chair? It’s in my way,” Sarah managed to get out with a horrible forced politeness.
Justin mumbled something inaudible and continued eating his lasagne. Sarah couldn’t believe this was happening. He was rude enough to ignore her and now he was purposely irritating her. Sarah was failing to understand the boy.
“Justin, could you please move your seat.”
Justin looked up triumphantly at her. “See, all you had to say was ‘please’ and I would have moved.”
Sarah threw her plate violently in the dishwasher and muttered to herself as she left the kitchen. So what if they had finally managed to talk. It didn’t mean anything if this was how things were going to turn out.
Sarah was awoken suddenly by the sound of her bedroom door being swung open violently, a streak of light from the hallway illuminating her bed. Her eyes peered over at the alarm that read 4:03am and she let out a moan. If she had forgotten to close a window somewhere, her door had probably been blown open.
Throwing back the covers angrily, she pulled a jumper on and stood up shivering. The night had definitely turned colder.
The room was suddenly thrown into light as the switch was turned on and a figure entered. Sarah shrieked for a moment when she realised it wasn’t Angela, and it took her brain several second to register the boxer clad figure was in fact Justin.
“Justin, what the hell are you doing!”
Justin peered round at his surroundings and began retreating back into the hallway, shutting Sarah’s door as he left. Sarah stood bewildered for a moment before her confusion turned to anger. Was that supposed to be some kind of joke?
Swinging open the door, she traipsed into the hall, still smothered in sleepiness. She would deal with this and head back to bed immediately. Just because Angela had left it didn’t mean there wasn’t work to be done in the morning.
“Justin!” she called out to the figure walking down the hall.
He turned and held up his hand to shield his eyes from the light. He was surprisingly very awake. “Sorry. I thought it was the bathroom. Honest mistake.”
Judging by the smirk on his face, Sarah guessed his actions were anything but honest. Was there nothing this man would stop at to irritate her? Surely he had some sort of limits.
Flicking the light back off in her bedroom she fell asleep with an added stress she most definitely did not need.
