HOUSE OF THORNS : EPISODE 21 – 30
HOUSE OF THORNS
Episode 23
Leonard got a cup of Coldstone and walked out of the stand with Valerie, still firmly held in his hand. He walked her to a quiet corner and sat down, gesturing for her to sit beside him.
“You should start digging it now” he told an obviously shy and uncomfortable Valerie. He knew they needed to talk, but he had to take things slowly
“Thanks for the Coldstone, but I’d rather be in my room now. I’m kinda cold and do not wish to sit out” she told him, finding a perfect excuse to get away from him.
“Oh ok! Then we go to your room” he said getting up and pulling her up simultaneously. He had been thinking of what to do to make Valerie relax, but hadn’t really got a clue. He knew deep within him that behind the barricade she was building consciously between them, lay a heart waiting to be loved right. He just had to find a way to that heart
He knew he had some kind of effect on her, but the resistance she had built against him, was dreadful. He could sense it so strongly from his position, that he could tell that anyone 10km away from them would be able to easily tell she was afraid of something.
“No Mr Leonard, I’d really need to run along. I need to catch some sleep, I have someone coming to see me later this night, so I need to be in good shape before he arrives here” she told him, cooking up something so non-existent to be able to send him away.
“Oh! A ‘he’ is coming to see you. Wow! Just wow!” he told her, his eyes glistening in inexplicable anger. “And by wow, you mean?” she asked him, enjoying how ruffled he was getting.
She was beginning to get too uncomfortable with how freely he was flowing around her. It was as if her father had already betrothed her to him without her knowledge.
“Is my wow, supposed to mean anything apart from the wow you know?” He asked her, still trying to put his emotions under check.
“I’m just wondering why you’re sounding offended that someone, ‘a he’ is coming to visit me tonight. I’m your little sister remember?” she teased him.
“And that’s the more reason I should watch over you. It’s the more reason I shouldn’t let you fall into a pit” he declared.
“And which pit are we talking about Mr Leonard?” Valerie asked, stressing the title she had returned to adding to his name, to make him understand just how formal she wished to be with him.
“The pit of falling into the wrong hands Valerie. The pit of doing something else other than what your heart is saying,” he told her as they walked on.
Valerie was holding onto her Coldstone securely, she couldn’t wait to send Leonard away, lock herself in the room and console herself with the Coldstone.
As with other times she’d run away from his presence these past days, she knew she was going to spend a good amount of time crying when he’s gone, but it was a prize she had to pay for falling in love with a man who was already taken.
“Why is he bent on making today more miserable for me. Why is he acting so strangely today? Did he have to make me stand so close to him, I could hear his heart thud? Did he have to smile so brightly my stomach churns?” she thought as they got to the entrance of her room.
“Thanks for the Coldstone Mr Leonard, and do have a goodnight” she told him and walked in before he got a chance to respond.
She had planned to shut the door immediately, to sit on her bed and brawl her eyes out before getting the chance to take her Coldstone, but as she turned around to push the door close, she felt Leonard’s hand pulling her hands off the door.
He walked into the room, kicked the door close and was walking towards her, a mischievous smile on his face. She didn’t like the way he looked at her sacred melons as he walked closer to her.
“For how long are you going to fight this? For how long are you going to keep shutting me out when deep within you, your heart beats in sync with mine?” Leonard asked Valerie as he cornered her to the sofa.
“As long as it takes me to get you off my head. As long as it takes my heart to listen to my head that has been telling it that the one it beats for is already taken” Valerie told him, and he stiffened at once.
“Say that again! Who’s taken Valerie? See, I know you’re not happy with her me being here, I understand you want me out of this room as soon as possible, and you’re doing anything to achieve that, but please Valerie, don’t remind me of what is gone.
Please don’t remind me that I was once married. It hurts so badly that you’re toying with my heart that way” he said, looking all shades of heartbroken.
Valerie was shocked at the effect of her words. She didn’t imagine that those simple words of hers could get Leonard so heartbroken.
“I’m sorry if I have said the wrong thing, but the truth is that I do not want to get between you and your wife. I know how much you love her, and I’m not willing to be the one who keeps you from going after her” she told him honestly.
Leonard let go her hand he was holding. He had expected her to ward him off, he knew she’d like to make him see how sad she was with the things he had told her the day his wife left him, but never did he imagine that she’d scorn him with his ex wife’s betrayal
“Which wife are you talking about? What love are you referring to Valerie? You know exactly what transpired between Vivian and the roguê they got into my house to do their dirty deed. You know how that sight had affected me so badly that we needed this vacation to see how we could get things back to normal.
You also know that she not only got pregnant as a result of the abominãble act she had engaged in, she wanted me to live the rest of my life looking at a child whose cursëd father is the reason I’m battling with getting along with a woman I once called wife.
How can you imagine that I’d have any feelings left for a woman who in her se!fishness didn’t care about how the trauma of seeing her with another man was affecting my well being.
How can you imagine me ever having a thing to do with her again, when I couldn’t get it on with her from the moment I saw her under that roguë?
Common Valerie, you’re smart enough to calculate and deduce that if I couldn’t get it on with her after seeing her just once, then I’d never be able to breathe clean air around her ever again I’m the present situation we found ourselves” he told her, matter-of-factly.
She was looking at the floor, not saying a thing again, her face faltered severally as she looked up at his face and looked away. She just didn’t like the way her resolve was getting weak.
She had willed not to allow him have.a chance to talk about the night his wife left. She didn’t want to ever think about the dance they had.
She had planned to get any of those numerous guys that have been chasing her to become her boyfriend. That way, she would be able to keep Leonard out of her mind.
And for the past few days, she had successfully stayed away from him, and she could tell that he too was trying to maintain his distance. What changed then? She mused
“Valerie, in this poor heart of mine, there’s only you in it. I’ve tried so hard to shut the gate to my heart after Vivian dealt me that blow, but you see, I had no way of sending you out of it, for you have already found a permanent abode there, before I knew it” he told her.
“Enough! Enough of these sweet talks
Mr. Leonard. I do not like you. And if you have any feelings left for yourself, you shouldn’t have any fantasies of holding me in your heart. I do not like you, I have never liked you, and I’ll never like you” she told him in a hurry, determined to make him go away.
In her heart, she could visualize Leonard getting back with his wife. Although she had sometimes imagined the impossibility of Leonard getting back with his wife when he couldn’t get it on with her, she still felt it was too early to be sure Leonard has gotten over her.
From those home movies she always watched, the man would eventually make up with his wife, apologize to his girlfriend for having wasted her time, explaining how he had to uphold the sanctity of the holy matrimony.
“Valerie, please don’t make this any harder for us. You know I like you, and even though you’re trying so hard to act otherwise, your heart speaks volumes of the love it holds inside” Leonard told her.
“What love are you talking about?” she asked him, not happy with herself as she kept allowing her hands to be moved at will.
“This love” he said, pulling her slender hand over his chest “This feelings that you can hear so clearly. This love that my heart speaks for just you. Please Valerie, let’s cast our fears aside and hope for a better tomorrow. Please be my girlfriend Valerie” be begged her, while still holding her right hand.
“No, Leonard! I can’t be your girlfriend” she bemoaned. “I just can’t. I don’t want to wake up tomorrow and see that it had all been but a dream. So no matter how sweet this dream is, I’m not going to be a part of it!” she told him resolutely, and made to walk away, but then Leonard shocked them both.
Yes, he shocked Valerie, including himself. For as soon as the words left Vivian’s mouth, he sealed it with his lips.
“No Leonard..” she was saying, but her legs were getting weak, and her body flustering heavily, as he deepened the kss.
HOUSE OF THORNS : EPISODE 21 – 30
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