Page 45 of Melting His Grumpy Heart
Jake said nothing. The silence stretched between them, taut and thrumming with tension. Jake exhaled, a sound so soft Ru almost missed it.
“Downstairs,” he said, turning to face Ru, his expression somehow both guarded and resigned. He pushed his fingers through his hair. “I need a drink for this conversation.”
In the living room, Jake poured two whiskies before he sat on the opposite end of the sofa to Ru and stared into the glass, his shoulders stiff looking and hunched.
Ru said nothing, gripping his own glass tight to stop his hands from shaking.
“I don’t regret it.” Jake’s words were sudden and abrupt, cutting through the silence. “What happened between us. I need you to know that.”
The knot in Ru’s chest loosened slightly. “Okay,” he said cautiously. “Good. Because from where I’m sitting, it’s felt a lot like regret since we woke up.”
Jake’s gaze remained glued to his glass, avoiding Ru’s eyes. “I don’t know what comes next. Or whether there should even be a next.”
“There doesn’t have to be.” The words felt like glass in Ru’s mouth. “If that’s what you want.” Ru cleared his throat, attempting to clear the wobble in his voice. Maybe one moment was really all it was to Jake.
Jake’s eyes finally lifted to meet his, something vulnerable and conflicted in their depths. “I didn’t say that.”
“Then what are you saying?”
Jake’s gaze drifted to the fire. “I don’t believe I’m meant to be with anyone. I’m solitary by nature and that’s not a good foundation for… anything else.”
Ru took a sip of the whisky, needing the quick hit of Dutch courage. He put the drink down on the coffee table, the glass clattering from his trembling hand. His heartbeat quickened, his mouth going dry with apprehension.
“Why do you live out here on your own, Jake? Why did you leave the army? Who was it who hurt you?”
Jake’s fingers tightened around his glass, knuckles whitening with the pressure.
Ru clamped his lower lip between his teeth, afraid suddenly he’d asked too much, pushed too hard. “You don’t have to tell me. Not if you’re not ready.” But he had asked, and it was too late to take the questions back.
“You’re right, I’m not ready.” The bitterness in his voice made Ru twitch. “But if not now, then when?” He looked at Ru, his eyes bright and feverish, with anger and pain. “If the rain keeps up, the roads will soon clear. Unless the storm returns. You’ll continue onto Bobblecombe, and then go back to London.And this,” he flicked his hand between them, “this will become something that happened during a storm. A memory, nothing more.”
The stark assessment hit Ru hard in the chest. Is that what Jake thought? That once the roads cleared, whatever connection they’d formed would simply dissolve like the snow, become nothing more than an anecdote, a brief interlude in otherwise separate lives?
“Is that what you want?” Ru asked, unable to keep the hurt from his voice. “For this to be just a memory?”
“What I want,” Jake said carefully, “and what I believe possible are two different things.”
The words hung between them. Ru’s pulse quickened, hope and apprehension mingling inside of him. Before he could respond, Jake continued, his voice dropping to barely a whisper.
“You want to know what happened,” he said, each quiet word measured and steady. “About why I live here alone, and why.” He took a deep breath, releasing it slowly. “You want to know about him.”
Him.
Ru felt himself poised on the edge of something significant, a story that would illuminate the shadows he’d sensed in Jake from the beginning. Whatever Jake was about to share, it was the key to understanding not only Jake’s withdrawal, but to understanding Jake himself.
Jake sat up straight, squaring his shoulders as if preparing for battle.
“His name was Phil,” Jake began, the four simple words opening a door to a past Ru had hammered on.
Outside, the rain continued to fall, little by little washing away the snow, transforming the landscape. Inside, Ru held his breath, watching Jake’s face, waiting for what would come next.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
“I met him in London. It was just a random night out when I was home on leave. Some pub in Soho a mate had dragged me to.”
The memory surfaced with unexpected clarity. The crowded bar, the wall of noise, Phil’s smile cutting through it all. Jake’s thumb traced the rim of his glass, round and round, the only outward sign of the tension building up inside him.
“He was a software engineer. One of those jobs you can do from anywhere with a decent internet connection.” Jake stared into the fire, unwilling to see whatever expression might be crossing Ru’s face. “He was smart and quick witted. Fun to be with. And so different to the men I spent my life around. Which should have been a clue,” he added, bitterness tainting his words.
