“Love, can I have a pint of Strongbow?” shouted someone from the other side of the bar. Vanessa sighed and rolled her eyes.
“I’ll be back in a minute. Stay here.”
Chapter Five
“So where were we?” asked Vanessa after serving a beer to a large Irish man. “Oh yes, I was asking about cute guys at work.”
“Everyone at the office is much older than me. Anyway, I don’t mix pleasure with work. I don’t want to complicate anything.”
Her friend laughed and passed Sophia the drinks menu.
“That’s too bad, but don’t worry we will find you a romantic date in no time.”
“I’m not –”
“Shut up and choose your cocktail. You need to relax a little,” Vanessa interrupted her.
“Seriously, Vanessa, I don’t want to get involved with anyone at the moment,” muttered Sophia, but Vanessa wasn’t listening anymore. She had turned to another customer who approached the bar. Sophia sighed and looked through the list of drinks. The bar was getting busy and soon Vanessa was too preoccupied with work to focus on Sophia.
“Here you go, darling,” said another bartender, placing a funky cocktail in front of her.
“I didn’t order that.”
“Your friend asked me to prepare one for you. She said that you have to loosen up a little,” smiled the short bartender before disappearing to serve others. Sophia smiled at Vanessa. Vanessa gave her a quick wink.
Sophia sat back and tasted the drink. It was delicious, so she decided to stay and drink it. After a long moment Vanessa shot Sophia an apologetic look, pointing at the queue that had started to mount up at the bar. Sophia waved her hand, telling her not to worry about her; she was happy to observe people around her. She couldn’t understand why she never wanted to go out with Ramona. Since she finished the therapy, she felt much stronger and she was ready to take the next step. While sat drinking, she decided that she was going to stop dwelling on the past. No one was watching her here, so she didn’t have to worry if she was going to be seen by anyone that she knew.
“Can I buy you a drink?” asked a voice behind her.
She turned around, staring at a dark haired man in his mid-twenties.
“I’m fine, thank you,” she replied.
She was sure that he wasn’t Irish, but it didn’t matter because she didn’t need company for tonight. The man in front of her had a narrow nose and bright amber eyes. Sophia thought that he was attractively dressed in a white shirt and jeans. He looked disappointed when Sophia declined his offer.
“I promise I’m not a stalker. You have been sitting here for a while alone, so I thought I would be useful and give you some company,” he said, smiling lightly. Sophia thought that he had good manners and he was definitely handsome. She glanced back at Vanessa, who looked busy chatting to the customers. It was still early and Sophia didn’t want to go home yet.
“You can if you wish, but I’m very boring. I don’t know anyone here.”
He ran his hand through his hair and took a seat next to Sophia.
“You can’t be more boring than me. I have been here a couple of months, but I still haven’t made any friends. My name is Mason.”
“I’m Sophia.”
“So what are you drinking, Sophia? I’m sure that you can’t be sticking to this one cocktail that you’ve nearly finished,” he chuckled and waved towards the other barman. Vanessa winked at Sophia from the other side of the bar, seeing that she had company.
“I’m working tomorrow and it was my first day today, so I have to stick to one. I really need to keep this job,” she said.
“So what do you do if you don’t mind me asking? Like I said, I’m not a stalker at all; I’m just curious to know why a beautiful girl like you decided to move to this miserable city.”
Sophia thought that Mason was charming. She liked the smell of his cologne and she didn’t see any harm in telling him more about herself. After all, she was only having a quiet drink at the bar.
“I’m a student and I’m doing my diploma in Probation Practice, so when this short contract came up, I decided to take it.”
He raised his eyebrow, looking surprised.
“Probation? So you are working with prison leavers?”
“Yes, I am. As I said, today was my first day.”
“This sounds much more interesting than what I do,” he muttered.
“And what is that?”
“I’m a business analyst. I look at numbers all day, so there is nothing exciting about that,” he chuckled and took a generous sip of his beer. Sophia grinned and agreed to have another drink; she felt good and she didn’t want to worry about tomorrow.
“So where are you from then?” she asked.
“From Bristol. If you were hoping to meet a nice Irish bloke, then unfortunately I have to disappoint you because I’m English.”
“I thought that your accent sounded familiar. So what brought you here?”
“A woman of course, but in the end our relationship didn’t work out, so here I’m still here and still single,” he confessed, smiling. “What about you? If someone said that you are an African princess I wouldn’t be surprised.”
Sophia laughed and tossed her hair behind her. Mason was funnier than she was expecting and she was sure that he was flirting with her.
“My father is from Libya, so that’s why I have this annoying curly hair,” she replied.
“Libya, huh? That’s exciting. So far, you are still winning,” he added. “And your hair is beautiful.”
Sophia blushed, and couldn’t help but to smile. It wasn’t every day that people told her that she had beautiful hair. She warmed up towards Mason after talking to him for the next few hours. He seemed funny and down to earth. He told her about his experiences in Ireland and about his life back in England. When she finally looked at the time, she was surprised to see that it was already eleven o’clock. It was time to call it a night; she didn’t want to push her luck. She told him that she needed to get her beauty sleep.
“Can I be really forward and ask for your phone number?” he asked when Sophia was just about to leave.
“I won’t give you my number. If fate allows our paths to cross again then I will, but not now. I’m sorry,” she said.
She enjoyed herself a lot with Mason but she felt that she wasn’t ready to give her personal information to a stranger whom she had just met, even if he was a hot, dark-haired man. Mason was staring at her, looking disappointed.
“Okay, let’s leave it to fate,” he said after a moment.
“Deal. It was really nice to meet you,” she said, grinning.
Mason suggested that he was going to walk her home, but Sophia declined his offer. She said goodbye to Vanessa, who was still busy, and went home.
She went to bed straightaway with a smile on her face. Her night went really well; she met someone and didn’t run away. Maybe she was never going to see him again, but at least she made some progress. Sophia wasn’t sure why, but she thought about Harry O’Donaghue. She wondered if he was out with his friends tonight. She smiled to herself, thinking that she should separate work from personal life; this wasn’t healthy at all.
***
As the next few days passed, Sophia shadowed Susan who knew how to handle difficult clients. She was slowly getting used to the system and all the necessary paperwork. The job of probation officer wasn’t easy at all and she would probably have to face new challenges in the future. Elizabeth, who was currently off sick, was planning to come back in September, so Sophia was going to see a few of her clients.
Soon Sophia followed her everyday routine. She got up in the morning, had a quick breakfast, showered and was in the office for half past eight in the morning. She attended a few group sessions, which helped her to understand the dynamic of the office, and then she sat with Susan whilst she was conducting the reviews.
Vanessa was very busy at the bar, so she didn’t keep asking Sophia to go out, whic
h left Sophia with most evenings to herself, so she decided to start running again. She used to enjoy it very much, but after the therapy she didn’t have enough confidence to go out alone.
Vanessa had a date with a loud Irishman whom she met in the bar on Sunday and she was looking forward to that. As Sophia suspected, she hadn’t seen Mason again and Vanessa didn’t sound happy when she told her that she didn’t give him her number. Vanessa insisted that this was a perfect opportunity for Sophia to go out and meet someone. She couldn’t explain to Vanessa that she just wasn’t ready for dating. She was afraid to say that she hadn’t even had sex yet. Vanessa didn’t know about Sophia’s dark past and she wanted to keep it that way until she was ready to share the secret.
Sophia’s parents didn’t call. She wanted to speak to her mother and ask her if everything was all right, but she kept putting it off. She didn’t like this kind of silence. She wasn’t expecting that her parents would just accept that she was away from them for over three months. She had bad feelings about this, but she wasn’t going to be paranoid about the fact that her parents didn’t want to talk to her.
On Sunday Vanessa had a phone call from her boss; she had to take an extra shift because the bar was busy. She had to cancel her date with Paul and left the apartment early, looking really pissed off. Vanessa had been looking forward to her date all week.
Sophia wanted to take it easy before the intensive week ahead of her. When she thought about her upcoming review with Harry O’Donaghue, something inside her stomach turned. She knew that he would be a difficult client, but she had to snap off from her gloomy mood and just deal with it.
The beginning of the week passed too quickly. Sophia had a chance to conduct reviews by herself, as Susan was confident that she didn’t need any more shadowing. She felt good when she was giving advice to people. Susan was happy with her progress and with the fact that she was enjoying her job. She still had a lot to learn, but she knew that this is what she wanted to do in the future, helping others so she could forget about her own life.
When she came to work on Thursday, she wasn’t looking forward to her review with Harry O’Donaghue. She had to go through with it, even though she expected that he was going to make it tricky for her. Susan briefed her on what she was supposed to do with him and muttered something about a home visit. Thursday was manic for Sophia; a few people were off sick and she had to cover other people’s appointments. She didn’t have much time to prepare. When the receptionist told her that Harry was waiting for her, her stomach lurched with uneasiness.
Chapter Six
“Tell him to go through,” she told Marry-Ann.
Sophia took a few deep breaths, hoping that the meeting would go smoothly. She quickly logged into the system as she heard the knock. Harry was standing in the doorway, staring at her like he was trying to calculate what she was thinking. He frowned and arched his left pierced eyebrow.
She felt an odd unfamiliar sensation in her stomach and her pulse increased. When he walked in, he didn’t smile or acknowledge her at all.
“Please take a seat,” she said, feeling that her voice gave her nervousness away.
She had to pull herself together fast and forget about the anxiety that clawed up her throat. He wore a plain blue T-shirt and jeans that hung low on his hips, and a tattoo was peeking out of his sleeve. She registered that it was a large eagle, mostly covered by the short sleeve. Sophia moved her eyes towards his arm, looking at his tattoos and feeling a warm tingle up her thigh. His brown eyes locked with hers for several seconds and his nostrils flared. Harry’s eyes still reminded her of melting chocolate. They were deep and intense, seeing right through her.
“How are you today?”
Her voice was still husky. She was shuffling papers, pretending that she was looking for something to distract herself from staring at him. She didn’t want to show him that he intimidated her. Yet again, the room seemed claustrophobic, filled only with his scent.
“Fine, I guess,” he responded, not taking his eyes off her.
“Tell me what you have been up to, Harry?”
“I don’t want to talk about me, Sophia,” he replied. She kept her eyes on the computer screen, but there was no answer there. His voice was thick and she still hadn’t dared to meet his eyes.
“Unfortunately, Harry, that’s why you are here, so I can help you not to make any more mistakes. Don’t you care about your life at all?” she asked and paused, finally looking at him. “You’re living with your mother at the –”
“My mother had nothing to do with what I did,” he cut her off with anger. Sophia was finding it difficult to focus on her questions. She kept staring at him, admiring his beautiful features and wondering if he had any more tattoos.
Straightening her back, she decided to take a different approach. The voice in her head shouted to focus on something else and stop thinking about his body.
“Harry, why are you doing this? I’m only trying to help you, so I don’t understand why you’re giving me a hard time here. Let’s just play with the system and then we can finish this meeting quickly,” she said.
He didn’t respond; instead he stared straight at her lips. She was probably flushed and her heart was hammering in her chest, but she wasn’t going to show him what kind of effect he had on her. A lustful gleam passed through his eyes.
“How about a deal, Sophia? I’ll tell you something about myself and then you tell me something about yourself?”
The cold shiver whipped through her spine when his tongue caressed her name. She was going to lose this battle. Her body was sending signals to her brain telling her that she was enjoying his game.
“Fine, Harry. So are you going to answer my questions if I tell you something about myself?” she pressed.
“Of course I will,” he replied, smirking. “Let’s start with Drug Intervention Service. I have been on every session. I’ve been a good boy, doing my community service and looking for work.”
Sophia was making notes because she wanted to distract herself from his intense gaze. At least he was cooperating now.
“So how is the community service going?”
“It’s my turn now, Sophia,” he whispered, leaning towards her. “I’m interested to know where you are from. Somewhere in England, I bet.”
She didn’t have to answer, but she thought that if she was going to play this game with him, she could wrap up this meeting quickly. She liked his soft Irish accent. Sometimes she had trouble understanding Susan, but she caught every word when Harry was talking.
“From London,” she replied. “Now tell me about your Drug Intervention Course?”
He looked at her with reluctant admiration.
“No. I don’t see any benefit to it, plus I don’t take drugs so it’s pointless.”
“But you were caught with –”
“Are your parents from London?” he cut her off again, flashing a smile. Her heart gave a giant thump. His voice was sending a distinct tremor down her spine. She was trying to ignore her racing heart that flickered between her ribs.
“I’m part Libyan, because of my father and my mother is British. Is that satisfying you?” she asked, pursing her lips. Her anxiety and depression flared up when anyone brought up her family. Those painful memories from when she was on her break flashed through her mind.
My mother shouted at me all afternoon because I’d said that I didn’t qualify to go to art classes, the same ones that my cousin Jessica took. She didn’t get it when I told her that I didn’t like art and I was more interested in sports.
“You’re ungrateful and spoiled. You don’t deserve me as your mother,” she snapped when I was walking upstairs to my room after a long argument. It hurt that she didn’t appreciate that I had completely different interests. She was paying for my tutorials and in the end my grades weren’t even good enough to apply for that Art College.
My father wasn’t impressed with me either. He had to add how unappreciative I’d become.
It didn’t help when my mother constantly complained that I never listened to her. I was afraid that they wouldn’t understand my aspirations and dreams. They didn’t want to listen when I told them that I had won every race at school and that the coach wanted to take me into a running team. My parents didn’t believe that sports were good enough for me. I wouldn’t be like Jessica, admired and praised by everyone around her.
After that fight I felt as though I was walking through a white fog and I was slowly falling into deep water. I was drowning again, and I was choking when these dark feelings of anxiety were pulling me away from my own body.
I purposely left the kitchen knife on the table in my bedroom. It was sharp and I knew that the relief would be incredible. I went to the bathroom, holding the knife in my hand. I locked the door and took my trousers off.
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