Christian

I sat there and simply looked at her, trying to avoid eye contact so she did not realise I’m constantly staring at her. Her life was written all over her innocent face – so easy to read. Or so it seemed.

Her name was Rachel. She came through the sliding door at the side of the house and Juliet introduced her to the gang when she arrived. From that point on, I couldn’t stop gazing at her. There was just something about her eyes. They were a common shade of green but it wasn’t the eye colour but something inside her eyes, which had me mesmerised. It was hard to explain. Whatever it was, it was encrypted.

That was not the only thing that got me hooked. It was her smile when she truly laughed. I wondered whether she was single.

I got up with my empty beer bottle in my hand and headed into the spanking new kitchen. Juliet and Andy had really done a good job with the new house. There was not a single aspect of the house I’d seen that I didn’t like. At the kitchen bench, Juliet and Andy were putting together food for the barbeque.

“Looks good guys, you want a hand?” I offered.

“No thanks CC,” Juliet answered, putting more ingredients on the salad in front of her.

“You sure there’s nothing I could do?” I asked, grabbing a second beer.

“You could help me not burn this on the barbeque,” Andy said, picking up a play of meat, grinning to himself. I snickered and followed him out through the lounge room – checking out Rachel for the 15th time – through the sliding door to the seating area with the barbeque. It wasn’t long before the sizzling and smell of cooking began wafting around the alfresco area.

“So, you think she’s hot?” Andy asked, knocking me out of my daydream with tongs in his right hand. I’d unintentionally been staring in Rach’s direction... again.

“Uh, um... yeah,” I admitted as he moved the meat around the grill. “You better turn that over or it’ll burn on one side,” I told him, turning back to Andy’s apron-wearing figure.

“Ah shit,” he said, turning over the piece to see that side of the steak was black. I laughed and took over. I did learn a thing or two from my father growing up – a lot more than Andy by the looks of things.

“Do I have a chance?” I asked him, referring to Rachel.

“Huh?” he asked, my turn to knock him out of a day dream.

“Never mind,” I muttered.

What was the point? I didn’t know whether I was ready for another serious or semi serious relationship since Lauren. Rachel comes across as only looking for that. She didn’t look like the type looking for a quick fuck. There was too much behind those beautiful eyes for that.



Juliet

I saw the mark slashed across the back side of her clavicle that she’d obviously not realised was there. It was a deep red and yellow mix of colours and I couldn’t bear to look at it for more than a few seconds whenever I tried. I could tell just be walking into the house things were getting tense between Rachel and Callum (now that I knew his name as he never actually told me when we met). We were having tea one afternoon and Callum was at work. The room was quiet as Rachel poured the flavoured liquid into mugs.

“I know what he does to you,” I said, my tone trying to hide any judgement on her or Callum. I didn’t want her to feel uncomfortable in any way. She stopped what she was doing, silent, presumably thinking on how to respond.

“He doesn’t like you, you know?” She put down the porcelain teapot and sat down, looking very rigid in her seat. “He knows you’re suspicious,” she added quietly, hair sliding towards her face. I nodded slowly at her.

“Are you going to tell anyone..?” she asked. Before I could answer, she butted in, “please don’t!” she pleaded. “If word gets around he’ll find out and be furious. Please keep quiet! You don’t know what he does,” she whispered frantically. “I don’t want to move again...”

“What do you mean?” I asked, leaning further across the table under my nose.

“He makes us move if too many people find out. If he suspects only you do, he won’t make us leave. So please, don’t say anything to anyone else. Not even Andy,” she begged. “I’m sick of saying goodbye and being unfamiliar with new towns. We’ve been here for so long now; I don’t want to leave so I’m begging you: please, keep it to yourself.”

I looked at her for a long time. It was sheer desperation lacing her voice. Nothing else.

“I won’t, I promise,” I told her. I saw the relief wash over her. “But, I have to make a confession,” she became anxious again, “Andy already knows. Both of us suspected it before I introduced myself. I assure you we haven’t told a soul,” I explained. She took a quiet breath before nodding.

“We’ve been... having a lot of... arguments lately,” she said quietly.

“Have they been getting violent?” I asked her.

“Some of them,” she admitted, avoiding eye contact. There was gloominess throughout the house.

“He doesn’t start out violent,” she paused, “unless, he’s in one of those moods. But when it comes to petty arguments, once we have a few it just overflows and he lets loose,” she confessed.

“It’s not right,” I told her, grabbing her hand. She looked at it, puzzled and somewhat surprised that I was touching her. She didn’t answer – I don’t think she knew how to. But to be honest, I didn’t know how to keep this conversation going. I didn’t want her to feel guilty or to get emotion.

“I’m not going to give you a lecture,” I whispered, “but you always know where I am... if you want to talk or for anything else you need, you know, about anything,” I told her.

“Thank you,” she gave my hand an uncertain squeeze, like she hadn’t squeezed someone’s hand in years. It killed me inside to know that was most likely true.

---

Rachel

I laughed nervously at something Juliet said. Andy stood next to her with his arm around her waist. She looked so comfortable... so happy. I had Callum beside me, standing tall and proud like he always does with his hand around my waist possessively. He was a hawk in the flesh and I was a shy owl who tried to camouflage into my surroundings as best I could. I tried to look as natural as I could but I didn’t know what natural felt like anymore.

I felt Callum’s hand tighten slightly along the curve of my waist and I shrunk away from the conversation, looking away. Whatever I was doing – the laughing – he did not approve of. I heard laughter coming from across the room. I looked over as Callum talked to someone – forcefully, as always – to see a tall man with dark hair, a head band and a gorgeous, innocent smile. He reminded me of a happy child – a child who was never down. In some way, he managed to make the room look a bit brighter.

Juliet and Andy invite me to so many lunches where they and their friends hang out together. It had been 2 weeks since Juliet and I had that talk. It was the first time Callum had insisted on coming with me to lunch at their house. Things were getting worse.

When I was with Callum, the day seemed to drag on and on. I just wanted to go home, but I didn’t. Not when Callum was to come home with me. Throughout the time we were there, standing around with the others in the lounge, I’d look over or listen to the guy laughing whenever I felt lonely or bored. It made me look at things without dullness. I think he noticed a couple of times. He didn’t seem irritated by it.

“Food’s ready!” Juliet announced, placing the last plate of food down on the long table in the living room. I went to head in that direction but Callum’s hand didn’t loosen from mine and didn’t let me drift off. He held me back and brought me close to his body, his breath coming down onto my face.

“What the hell is with you?” he growled lowly, holding tightly onto my hand. We were alone now; everyone had headed into the living rooming.

“What do you mean?” I whispered, trying not to look like a deer in headlights.

“Why are you fucking staring at him all the time?” his grip tightened.

“I, I’m not. If I am,” his grip tightened further, “I didn’t mean to,” I heard a low snap. I held my breath, my lips as securely sealed as I could manage. This wasn’t the first time he’d broken my fingers.

“We’ll finish this at home,” he pushed me towards the laughter and conversation within the next room, pain rippling throughout my hand as my fingers had a hard time unravelling from his. I was so stupid then. I whimpered. It didn’t even matter that no one else heard or that it wasn’t loud.

“You will bloody regret that,” he muttered, strutting into the adjoining room and joining the others.

Christian

It wasn’t just my imagination. It couldn’t be. I snuck another look at Rachel and she happened to be looking in my direction. I smiled a no-teeth smile and turned back to Jinx and Sammi. I was that nervous I didn’t even notice whether she smiled back. I wasn’t one to have butterflies in my stomach, particularly over a girl across the room. This was new to me.

“Food’s ready!” Juliet declared and I was the first into the dining room. I was starving and hadn’t eaten since breakfast.

I skipped breakfast nowadays. That was something Lauren and I always used to do – have breakfast together. I couldn’t bear to have a real breakfast now. If I tried, I would think of her, the break up then I’d feel sick and not hungry anyway. I had my food on the plastic plate in front of me and was about to choose a seat. I looked around, seeing me friends and their girlfriends around chatting about anything and noticed neither Rachel nor the man she was with here.

I sat down where I was with Jake to my left and no one to my right. I took my first mouthful and watched the man waltz into the room. He came across as a total douche bag. Rachel followed behind him, looking miserable and somehow defeated.

“Don’t you, Rachel?” Juliet asked her, including her into the conversation she was having with Andy. As soon as Juliet said her name, the look on her face vanished. It because a wash of normality and neutralism.

“What?” Rachel wanted to know what they were referring to.

“You like roast chicken, don’t you?” Juliet asked.

“Oh yes,” she smiled. I didn’t believe in that smile whatsoever.

“I don’t think you realise how obvious you look,” Jake said next to me. I suddenly became interested in my food. He chuckled beside me.

There being no other seats, Rachel sat next to me after gathering some food.

“Oh, I forgot to mention, everyone,” Andy announced, “there are more drinks in the esky just over there,” he pointed to the esky against the far wall. “Enjoy.”

Along with some others, Rachel stood up to get one. As soon as the guy she was with saw she was leaving the table, he got to his feet too. What the hell? The woman is capable of doing things by herself.

“What would you like?” she asked him, “I’ll get it for you.” The man pursed his lips.

“A beer,” he replied coldly, returning to his meal. She went over to the esky.

The thought of beer floated in my head. That sounded like a good idea. I stood up and pushed out my chair as Rachel walked towards me. She tripped on the leg of someone else’s chair and fell, me catching her wrist as she was about to go down, one of her arms making a circular motion forwards towards me as she did so. She was breathing hard from the near fall as she stood up straight.

“Thank you so much,” she told me, my hand still holding her wrist. She looked down at my hand and I looked too, noticing her fingers weren’t... completely straight. I let go and she looked into my eyes. They were bruised, having just been broken.

“No worries. You’re welcome,” I told her, sounding like a robot, looking at the can of coke and the beer being held against her body by the other arm. Her other fingers weren’t broken. She smiled briefly at me, briskly passing me and sitting down. She knew I knew.

I grabbed my own beer and as I went back to my seat, the man stared me down with hatred. ‘You have touched my woman’ plastered across his hard face. I knew it was him. I glared back: ‘You physically hurt a woman. You broke her fingers.’

Notes

Subtitle description credit: Another shot (demo) by Lostprophets

Sorry it has been so long since I've updated. School has been really hectic and this is the year it all counts. Apologies and I hope you enjoyed it.