Still Human jh-2

by Kerry Heavens

  “Danny! Not in here, I’m having a hard enough time standing up.” She laughs.

  “I’ve got you,” I murmur into her wet hair.

  She shakes her head and carefully turns within my hold, breaking the contact my wandering fingers had established. I pout. But then she takes her soapy hands and runs them down my chest, further down over my abdomen and grins as she does. I watch her, aching for her to finish the journey, but then she carefully parts her hands and continues down onto my thighs. I sigh with disappointment and even as she starts retracing their path, I know she will overlook where I want her most.

  “Tease.”

  She just smiles and carries on washing.

  “I’m guessing you threw all my stuff out,” I say as I wrap a towel around my waist. “I’ll text Max and have him bring me some clothes.”

  She looks sheepish and pulls open the bottom drawer. Everything I left behind is packed neatly away. “I couldn’t do it,” she mutters.

  I laugh, picking her up and kissing her. “I love you,” I say as I set her back down on the bed. I rifle through the drawer. “I only have sweats, I guess it’s casual for breakfast.”

  “I thought it was black tie,” she says sarcastically. “Do the boys know you’re coming?”

  “Well, they know I took you out last night and I’m not home, I think they’ll put it together.”

  “Oh God, Max is going to be unmanageable!” She groans, flopping back on the bed.

  “I’ll handle him, don’t worry,” I say pulling her back up. “Now get dressed, the longer he waits, the worse he’ll be.”

  Liv wears sweats too and we are having fun as we finish getting ready. I go ahead of her on the stairs and turn my back to her. “Hop on.”

  “What? No!” she cries.

  “Hop on!” I insist and she gives in, laughing. At the bottom of the stairs, I don’t stop to let her down, I push through the door.

  “Danny, put me down!” she shouts hitting my back as we steam into the diner. Max, Charlie and Connie are waiting, with huge grins and knowing looks when I finally ease Liv down to the floor. “Bastard!” She giggles.

  There is an exchange of congratulatory kisses and backslapping handshakes as if we have just got married.

  “I knew you could do it,” Connie whispers as she hugs me tight.

  “I think you helped,” I reply kissing her cheek.

  “Hey! You two!” Liv shouts. “No whispering. I’ve had enough of all the meddling and scheming around here. From now on everything goes through me!”

  We all laugh.

  While coffee and juices arrive I duck out the back to my car. I grab the little red box from the glove compartment and put it in my pocket.

  On the way back in, I text Jen. I wish I could call her but it’s 5am.

  ‘I have news! Call me later x.’

  I grin as I take my seat beside Liv.

  “So, are we celebrating something here?” asks Charlie.

  “I think so,” says Liv, looking to me.

  I shake my head. “There you go again, with your insecurities! Yes we are.” I confirm to Charlie and hold out my glass. We all chink glasses and I kiss Liv. Everyone makes approving noises around us, stopping short of bursting into applause. It’s a little much, but I feel like these guys are my family now, our family, so it’s great. Liv and I are so lucky to have them.

  After breakfast, Connie leaves to pick something up from the dry-cleaners for Jack and Charlie takes Max shopping. So Liv and I have some time to ourselves.

  “Come with me,” I say to Liv once we are alone.

  “Where?” she says getting up to follow me.

  “You’ll see.” I smirk.

  I help her into the car. It’s not far, but I don’t think she’d make it on foot. She frowns when we pull into the parking lot beside the park and she is even more confused when I lead her down to our tree.

  “Do you remember the last time we came here?”

  Liv hangs her head, then looks up at me and nods. It was that awful day. The day she made sure I would go with my parents. The day I told myself it was soon to be over and I just had to live with it.

  “Why are we doing this today? I thought we were putting all of this behind us,” she says with sadness.

  “We are, but I have to do this first.” I smile, hoping to put her at ease. “Do you remember that conversation?”

  “Yeah, I wish I could forget.”

  “Did you know you’d been offered an interview at UCLA then?” I ask her.

  She nods.

  “Why didn’t you tell me about it?”

  “We’ve been through this Danny. I didn’t think it was what you wanted.” She’s getting frustrated. “I was embarrassed that I’d taken it so far, when it seemed like it was the furthest thing from your mind. So I told you you should go, to make it easier for you.”

  “But you didn’t want me to?”

  “No.” She sighs. “Can we drop this now?”

  “No, because you’re not letting me say what I want to say, just like that day. You went on and on and I thought I’d got us all wrong if you wanted me to leave so badly.” I look out at the view, remembering how I felt when I walked away from here, it was the beginning of the end. “I came here that day to do something so stupid. I would have made a total mess of things, just so you know, so I think you did us both a huge favor. But I still wish I hadn’t had to be without you so long.” She looks at me, not understanding. “I was going to give you this.” I pull the red box from my pocket and place it on her knee.

  Her mouth falls open and she looks from the box to me.

  “I’m not asking you now,” I add. “Trust me, I’ll do a much better job. But I was going to back then. I’m showing you because I just need you to know that you weren’t the only one that came away from this in pieces.”

  “Are you serious?” she stutters.

  “Painfully.” I sigh. “I thought that you somehow knew what I was planning and you said all that stuff to stop me, so that you didn’t have to turn me down.”

  She stares at me in disbelief. “I would have said yes,” she whispers.

  “I know. It’s taken Jen over a decade to convince me of it, but I realise that now.” I laugh. “But we were kids and it was twelve years ago, by now we’d have had kids, you wouldn’t have your business, I’d be doing a nine to five, if we had made it this far, we’d hate each other. It was for the best.”

  She reluctantly nods in agreement. “I honestly had no idea,” she says.

  “I know, and I didn’t know you’d thought about coming with me. We both did everything wrong, we could have saved each other a lot of heartache if we’d been braver. But who's to say we would’ve been happy? There’s no sense in beating ourselves up. I just wanted you to know where my insecurities came from. When you left me in LA I thought it was happening again. I thought you saw the road we were on and freaked out.”

  “That’s why you didn’t come after me,” she says almost to herself.

  “I was a real mess.”

  “I’m sorry.” She takes my hand.

  “Don’t be.” I smile. “We’re here now.” I lean in and kiss her.

  When we come up for air, she looks back at the box on her knee.

  “I can’t believe you left here with this still in your pocket. You must have felt like shit.”

  “No worse than you, I bet.”

  “God, we were stupid.” She shakes her head again. But there’s no point in dwelling. She snaps herself out of it. “Can I see it?”

  “I want you to have it. But remember, I was eighteen, clueless and broke.” I laugh.

  She opens the box and smiles. “It’s beautiful, Danny.” She takes it out of the box. “Can I wear it? On a different finger, I mean.”

  “If it fits. I had no idea what I was doing.” I take it from her and slide it onto the ring finger of her right hand. Amazingly, it isn’t a terrible fit. She looks at it. It’s a thin band of white gold, twisted
like a rope and the threads of the rope are studded with tiny diamonds. It’s no engagement ring, but it’s so pretty and it looks better on her hand than I ever expected.

  “I love it, thank you.” She kisses me.

  “I love you,” I reply, holding her tight to me.

  "Thanks for bringing me here today." She says after a while. "This means so much. We can put it all behind us now." I watch her twiddling her ring and think about the real one I have sitting in a box in my desk drawer. I smile briefly to myself, I can't wait to hit her with that.

  I lift her hand and kiss the ring on her finger. "Let's get out of here. I need to go change for work."

  I bring a crate of bottles out of the cellar and catch a glimpse of Liv through the doorway. I watch her showing Connie the ring, she seems so happy. I wonder if she has called her mom. Which reminds me, I should call mine! Not to tell her about the ring, I could never explain all that to her now. But she’ll want to know that my big move has turned out to be worth it. With that, my cell vibrates in my pocket. I dump the crate on the bar and look at the screen, it’s Jen.

  “I need to take this,” I tell Max showing him the screen and he nods as I head out the front door.

  “Jen!”

  “Tell me good news, Danny!” she says enthusiastically.

  I laugh. “I’ve got her back.” I sigh. The feeling of relief washes over me again, just being able to say it out loud.

  “I knew you could do it.” She squeals.

  “I couldn’t have done it without you.” I can hear Scott speaking in the background.

  “Scott says well done too.”

  “He’s just happy he won’t be hearing anymore about it you mean!”

  “We’re both really happy for you,” she says. “So your night out was a success?”

  “You could say that.” I smile remembering what happened after we got home. Twice! “Oh and I gave her the ring.” I add.

  “The ring?” She gasps.

  “Oh, no. The first ring. I told her all about it.”

  “And what did she say?”

  “She was shocked. She told me she would have said yes.”

  “I told you!”

  “I know, don’t worry, I’m not that guy anymore. We talked about everything, it’s a clean slate.”

  “That’s fantastic, Danny. So…what’s next?” She doesn’t even try to mask her meaning.

  “Easy tiger!” I laugh. “Give me a chance. I’m not giving her two rings in one day.”

  “Well when then?”

  “I have a plan, but we’ve had enough excitement to last a lifetime. What I want is some normal for a while. Don’t worry, you’ll be the first to know.”

  “Good. So, are you moving back in?”

  “I don’t know, we haven’t discussed it yet. I’m off tomorrow, we can talk about it then.” I look up to see Liv sitting by the window, watching me. I wave and she blows me a kiss. “I gotta go, Jen.”

  “I know, I miss you,” she says reluctantly.

  “I miss you too. Talk to you soon.”

  “Okay, bye,,” she says and cuts off.

  I walk up to the window and put my hand on the glass, Liv smiles and places hers against mine on the other side of the glass. Smiling, I head back into the bar.

  A kiss wakes me. I stretch and smile, wrapping my arms around Liv. This is bliss, I don’t want to open my eyes.

  “What time is it?” I mumble.

  “Does it matter?” Liv replies. “You’re not getting up today.”

  “Hmmm, I like the sound of that.” I grin, prising my eyes open and turning to face her. “Good morning.”

  “Good morning. Sleepyhead. Why didn’t you wake me when you came in last night?” “You were dead to the world.” I smile, brushing her hair away from her eyes. “And I was dead on my feet.”

  “I tried to stay awake for you, sorry.”

  “It was just nice to come home to you, even if you were asleep.” I lean over to kiss her. “What did you get up to while I was working? I hardly saw you.”

  “I know. Connie was giving me a hand with some stuff I couldn’t manage on my own, in the afternoon.”

  “I could’ve helped you.” I frown. “You shouldn’t be overdoing it.’

  “I have a broken ankle, the rest of me is fine!” She laughs. “Anyway, I saw you for dinner, so don’t sulk.”

  “I know, I just thought I might see you in the bar.”

  She looks away.

  “Hey, what?” I ask.

  She shrugs one shoulder. “I just find it hard to be down there at night and not be part of it. It makes me feel pathetic.”

  I offer her a comforting smile. “It won’t be forever.”

  “Yeah” she says quietly. “It’s okay during the day because I have time for all the admin I usually have to cram in. But at night, everyone is heads down, working and I feel useless and lonely. I prefer to be away from it.”

  “I understand.”

  “So do you want to see what Connie and I did?”

  “Sure.” I watch as she gets up and goes to the closets on the opposite side of the room. I prop myself up on my elbows. She opens the double doors on the left side to reveal that it’s completely empty. I frown. “Where did you put it all?”

  “I got rid of most of it, and put the rest in here.” She opens the double doors on the right. “For someone that only ever wears jeans and a work shirt, I had a stupid amount of clothes…and this…” she gestures grandly to the empty space, “is for you.” She takes a small bow. Then a look of uncertainty crosses her face. “Err, for whenever you decide to come back…IF, you decide…no pressure.”

  I laugh. “Come here.” She comes over and I have to resist pulling her on top of me. I have to keep reminding myself I could easily hurt her. She sits on the edge of the bed, apprehensively.

  “You don’t have to,” she says. “I should have asked first, sorry.”

  “Stop it!” I say as I sit up and wrap my arms around her. “I want to. I’ll do it today.” I kiss her neck. “I thought you might want to wait a few weeks, slow things down.”

  She turns to look at me. “Perhaps we should, but you’re going to end up being here every night anyway. What’s the point?”

  I nod in agreement. Looking at the empty closet a thought comes to me. “So when Mark lived here, where did he put his things?”

  Liv smirks. “In the spare room.” She laughs.

  “Well I could put my stuff there, you didn’t have to do this.”

  “No! Mark just lived at ‘my’ house, I want us to live together. Properly.” She squeezes my hand. “But whenever you’re ready. If you want to slow things down, I don’t mind.”

  “You know I don’t.” I say kissing her again.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Danny

  You know what you’re doing.

  It’s over a month since I moved my stuff over from Max’s place. Liv hired two new members of staff and I work less, so now we can spend some evenings together. I finished my project and I’ve been freelancing for Charlie’s firm. I thought about taking a vacation, but that's artificial life again, we need normal, it really suits us. Liv’s recovery has been on hiatus, due to this screw that still needs to be removed and that’s the reason I’m awake so ridiculously early watching her sleep. Today, I have to take her to the hospital to have her second surgery and I’m worried sick about it.

  She has been really anxious, she can’t face a setback after so long. She’s convinced that she will be worse off tomorrow than she was yesterday. But this has to be done so that she can get back to normal. I don’t think this will set her back, that’s not my concern. I’m just worried about handing her over for the surgery. The day of her last surgery was awful. Seeing her like that…well it’s something I never want to go through again. I arrived in the middle of it all, while she was in surgery. Frantic with worry having been alone on a plane with no updates and when I did get to see her it killed me. Her face was all ban
ged up and she was still unconscious. I stroked her face gently where she had no bruising and sat beside her silently. Then when she started to wake up, I had to leave in case she saw me. I didn’t see her again for days, I just had to live with that image, while hiding away and taking rejection after rejection.

  Well this time, I’m driving her, I’m sitting by her bedside, I’m bringing her home and I’m taking care of her. I think everyone understands what this means to me because we’ve had no interference from Max or Connie. They just accept that I will be taking care of her. My stomach turns over again at the thought of her being wheeled away and put to sleep. She'll be okay, I just don’t like it. I watch her sleeping peacefully now, she is so beautiful. Then the silence is broken by the alarm.

  “Hi,” she murmurs as I shut it off. “How did you sleep?”

  “Badly.” I kiss her forehead and get up to run the shower.

  “How about you?”

  “Okay, considering.” She stretches and turns to watch me. “I just want to get it over with and be home in bed with you watching films.”

  “By tonight you will be,” I tell her as I return to the bed and scoop her up.

  “Promise?” She smiles wrapping her arms around me.

  “Promise.”

  I carry her to the shower and, as is now our routine, hold her steady while we help each other wash. I want her back to normal as soon as possible for lots of reasons, but I will miss this time, where she needs me.

  We dress quietly, both lost in thought. Then we head straight out. Liv can’t eat or drink and she has to check in by 8:30 am, so we have timed getting up to only leave time for a shower. We didn’t want to be sitting around thinking about the surgery or food, we just want to get it over with. I haven’t eaten since she last ate, partly in support of her, but equally because I’m too tense to eat anything.

  At the hospital, she is luckily first on the list so there is no waiting around for her. I have to kiss her goodbye virtually at the door. Then it’s just a waiting game. For almost two hours that seem like days, I read the old magazines and pace around, then finally I’m told she’s been brought out and I can see her.