BEST FRIEND’S BROTHER

“I really don’t know,” said Sasha. “I guess maybe it’s some secret admirer like you said who doesn’t know how to tell me how he feels… something like that. The person didn’t even say anything in the note”

“Awwwn that’s cute and mysterious,” said Tilly, and Sasha was indeed very grateful that Kaleb, If he was indeed the one who had sent it, hadn’t put anything else in the note. It would have been really messy if she tried to explain to Tilly that something had happened between her and her brother -who had a girlfriend by the way. She had to try not to forget that part, but she found herself asking Tilly, “What do you think about Kaleb’s girlfriend, Claire. Do you like her?”

Tilly frowned, “No I don’t. In fact I don’t see what Kaleb sees in her. She’s very obnoxious and in a very weird way, but that’s Kaleb’s business not mine. It’s not like he will listen to me if I say anything. I hope he keeps her far away from me. She’s too nosey for my liking. Why do you ask?”

Sasha looked away. “Oh nothing.” she said hurriedly. “I was just asking, that’s all. Just curious. Let me take a shower so we can go see that movie.”

For the rest of the evening Sasha was like a cat on a hot tin roof. Distracted. The following day at the food truck, another flower delivery arrived. Sasha’s heart stopped. It was like groundhog day. She went into the truck with a palpitating heart and shut the door firmly behind her. Another bunch of flowers. Slightly different, but as extravagant as yesterday’s. Her hands were sweating as she repeated the process of opening the envelope and taking out the card. This one read: ‘will…’ConTEent bel0ngs to Nôv(e)lD/rama(.)Org .

By the end of the week, Sasha sat at the table in her sitting room and felt a little numb. The smell of flowers was overpowering in the tiny room. A vase sat in the center of the table abundant with blooms. And also on the table in front of her, neatly lined up in a row, were the five cards that had accompanied a different bunch of flowers every single day of the week.

All together, they now made sense: ‘I will see you tonight’.

But of course she’d known what the full meaning of the cards was when she’d received the fifth one that morning. All day she’d experienced a fizzing in her veins and a sick churning in her belly. She’d vaguely thought of going to the cinema, or seeing if friends wanted to go out, anything to avoid being at home where she was sure he was going to call. An awful sense of inevitability washed over her. She wasn’t ready for this. She would just have to make him see that and send him on his way. But still…the gesture, the flowers, and his obvious intention to go through all that trouble just to send her a message that he wanted to see her, was nothing short of overwhelming.

Her phone rang shrilly in the silence and she jumped violently, her heart immediately hammering. Her mouth was dry. It was Tilly, “Hello?” she said, trying hard to keep her voice calm.

“What’s this thing I hear about you receiving more flowers from that secret admirer person?” Tilly asked.

Sasha sagged onto the arm of her sofa. Tilly was always guaranteed to raise her hackles. “How did you know there were more?” she asked.

“Miriam told me” Tilly replied, “And I’m surprised that you didn’t. Since when did you start keeping things from me, Sasha?”

“Because there’s nothing to tell. Nothing is going on.” The betraying vision of her house full to the roof with flowers made her wince. She hated lying to her best friend this way. “Look, if anything worth telling happens, you’ll be the first to know, and I’m going to kill Miriam for not minding her business”

“Oh please” said Tilly, “You don’t have to be mad at her. I think I was curious so I asked her too many questions”.

Sasha heard her doorbell ring and she automatically went to answer it. “Like I said, there’s nothing to tell.”

The anxiety was making her stressed and she knew her voice was rising. She struggled for a minute with the habitually stiff lock, and tucked the phone between her neck and shoulder to use both hands. “I am a fully grown woman and I can see who I want, go where I want, and have sex with who I want whenever I please so can we stop talking about this?”

The door finally opened. Her words hung on the cool evening air as she took in the devastatingly gorgeous sight of Kaleb Luthor just standing there, turning her inner-city enclave into something much more exotic. Her heart-rate soared. She’d almost forgotten all about him in the space of the last few seconds, and the high emotion Tilly had been evoking. In her shock she lifted her head and her phone dropped to the ground with a tinny clatter.

Kaleb swiftly bent and picked it up.

An irate voice could be heard: ‘Sasha? Sasha!’

Sasha couldn’t take her eyes off Kaleb. She took her phone back, lifted it to her ear and said vaguely, “Tilly. I’ll call you back, OK?”

Words resounded in her head: too late to escape now.

———-

By the time Sasha had stepped back into her house, followed by a tall, dark and imposing Kaleb Luthor, the shock was rapidly wearing off. She crossed her arms and rounded on him with a scowl on her face. Once again he was demonstrating that ability to suck in the space around him and make everything seem more intense-dwarfed. She tried to block out the fact that he was quite simply the most handsome man who’d ever stood feet away from her and looked at her with an intensity that bordered on being indecent.

“That phone call was a conversation that shouldn’t have had to happen. And it was all your fault.” she scolded.

He inclined his head slightly. He looked huge in her tiny sitting room. “I apologize, but, as all I heard was the intriguing last sentence, you’ll have to forgive me as I don’t know what I’ve done. And we certainly haven’t had sex yet.”