August 4, 1175
After all these months, Isidro knew Riona's tread when he heard it. He didn't have to turn around to know who had just joined him in the inn's kitchen. He'd been avoiding her all morning--he'd left the room after a wasted hour of trying to get to sleep and had been mindlessly wandering the village since--but what was the point? He had to talk to her sooner or later. "Morning."
"Morning." Her voice was mere muttering, but it was still hers. They were alone. "Do you want to talk about it?"
That would be the first thing out of her mouth. Jaw clenched, Isidro pulled his hands out of the basin and grabbed the towel off of its bar. "Not particularly."
Behind him, the door shut and its lock clicked. He supposed he didn't have any say in the matter. "Look, if I provoked you--"
"You didn't." His hands dried to a raw red, Isidro replaced the towel and turned away from the basin. Riona's gem-like eyes glistened in the glass-filtered sunlight--an effort indeed, considering all the grime on the window. "You did something stupid. That didn't give me any right to react the way I did."
"You're not angry, then?"
He shook his head. "Not at you, no. I wouldn't advise trying that on anyone else, though--not if you're not sure he wants it, or in case he takes it the wrong way. Likewise, I..." He what? Somehow it seemed insufficient to say he wouldn't do it again. "I'm sorry. I didn't plan on going through with it, but I shouldn't have scared you like that. I hope you'll forgive me, but if you can't, then--"
She cut him off with a squeeze of his hand. Young or not, she had a funny way of knowing just what to say without actually saying it. "Let's just not let things get strange between us, all right?"
Strange. That was a funny thought. "Things have always been strange between us."
"Then let's not let things get normal."
Normal. She didn't even know what 'normal' was. Was it odd that he envied her that?
"Walk with me. I need to show you something."
NEXT CHAPTER:
4 comments:
Yikes, not even a week into this new schedule and I'm already missing days :S
I had a fairly packed weekend--particularly yesterday, which was weird since that was a day off from my job--BUT I have tomorrow off, so I can say with about 95% certainty that Ashelia at Dusk Part III will premier Monday, August 8, 2011.
Well, that was semi-awkward. But semi-awkward conversations in the morning is a better result than what she could gave gotten trying that with just about any of the other guys.
*could have gotten* ugh too early in the morning
It certainly could have been worse :S
Fortunately(?), the awkwardness isn't going to get a chance to linger...
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