Chapter 5: Reconciliation

Chapter 5: The Reconciliation

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I spread out on my bed, I'd never been much of a jazz guy but whatever the Tune-In app had selected on my phone felt... appropriate, easy listening, smooth jazz... I lay there with my eyes shut following the gentle beat and the rhythm of the saxophone with my mind, trying to keep my mind off of everything that had happened...

After quite a while, maybe 10 minutes or so, I could feel myself drifting... Then I heard shuffling from livingroom, then the familiar shuffle of one small blonde girl shuffling around. I saw the bathroom light go on, and a few moments later go off again, then I heard a whisper through my door.

"Daniel..." she said quietly.

"... are you awake?"

I remained silent hoping that she would shuffle away back into the living room, and eventually she did. But my relief was short-lived though as she shuffling soon made it's way back towards my door, this time gently turning the handle of my door and popping it open.

I kept my eyes shut hoping that she would use her better judgement and avoid disturbing me, but no such luck, the shuffle came ever closer towards my bed and stopped. Then I felt the mattress sink as she took her place next to me...

"I can't tell if she's too scared to sleep alone after today, or just hates sleeping on those sofas." I felt that winter warmer flop over my side.

"Can't decide whether I should eject her either... she did have a rough day--" My thoughts were halted as a hand as cold as a can of beer touched by abs and my muscles contracted to counter the sensation.

"Are you awake Dan?" I heard her whisper softly.

"Fucking well am now..." and I sighed.

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"Too cold in the living room?" I said as I put my hands over my face, running them through my hair and spreading them out over the bed.

"No..."

"Then why are you here?"

I felt her tense up as I asked the question, curling up next to me, there was a small pause, then she shyly said "I don't want to be by myself..."

"I thought as much... well you should probably get inside the sheets in that case..."

The hand she put across me abs moved up on to my chest as she shuffled upwards on the bed, her hair touching my arm as she re-settled.

"... Can I stay here?"

"... Are you scared of being in the livingroom?"

"... Yes..."

"... Get inside the sheets then."

"Will you?"

"Nah, I never sleep inside the sheets. You know that..."

"... Can I stay here?"

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I wasn't in the mood to protest, so I folded my arm around her and told her,

"Don't make a habit of it."

She took my arm and did the hug pillow thing, folding her arms and curling her legs around it. It wasn't uncomfortable and even if it was, I was way too tired to care. Beating people up and having adrenaline running tires out every inch of the body, no matter what shape you're in.

But just for fun, I tugged my arm and jokingly made an "arrghh" sound. She uttered the sound a child makes when you try and take something away from them, and hugged my arm tighter.

I smiled, then I curved my hand around and used my fingers to tickle her stomach, she squirmed and made that sound again, then I grabbed the hem of her PJ bottoms and slid my hand inside slowly waiting for her to react, as I began to tickle she took her hand, fished my hand out of her bottoms and held it with our hands clasped.

"Perv..." she said in a sleepy tone before re-adjusting and settling down again, amused I took a deep breath and let out a loud yawn, and within a few moments I fell asleep...

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I woke up around 5 and noticed she had shifted around in the bed a little, her awkward sleeping position had strangled the arm she was clinging onto causing me to lose feeling in it, so much so I could barely move it at all...

"How nostalgic..." I thought as I remembered the scene from Kill Bill.

"Wiggle your big toe," I smiled as I struggled to move my fingers and get the blood pumping around my arm again. With a little patience the feeling came back and the pins and needles were unreal, so I slowly slid my arm out of her death grip, gentle and slow, trying not to wake her, and once it was out I picked myself up off the bed.

"Did it have to be my smoking arm?" I thought to myself. My arm still pretty much useless after the hours of near suffocation she had put it through. I grabbed my cigarettes and popped one into my mouth, then grabbed my lighter and walked out of the room and into the livingroom to my still-playing laptop. I sat down on the colder-than-cold leather sofa, which sent a shiver up my spine as I reclined into it.

"Saturday..." I thought to myself as I was loading up BBC News.

"Today... I'd usually masturbate, take a shower, do my skincare thing and spend the rest of the day at the reservoir jogging and loafing."

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Reading the news about the economy is one of those necessary evils you have to do as you get older. You know you can't do shit about it, but you've gotta know about it. Plus it gives you something to talk about at work. Now normally, I'd just put the TV on and switch over to BBC News 24 but, looking across the room at the fucked up TV, that wasn't really an option.

After reading I loaded up kerrang on low volume and went to the coffee maker. I quickly realized that it was on the casualty list, so I opted for some orange juice instead and left the glass on the counter, before sneaking back into my room and picking out a pair of green cargos and a black sleeveless hoodie to counter the coldness of the sofa.

Picking up the juice, I went back into the livingroom, lit the cigarette, and instead of questing for porn as I normally would, I just sat back and enjoyed the tunes and fumes. After that was done, I took the peace and quiet as an opportunity to fill out the claim form online. As my iPod was unscathed in the attack I connected it up with my laptop and enjoyed.

Before long a small figure came walking in rubbing her eyes.

"Good morning Daniel... Whats that?" She said as she flopped down onto the sofa next to me.

"Claims form," I said as she took the arm she had been suffocating all night and wrapped it around her shoulders.

"Best to get this sorted as soon as possible, I only have 48 hours to make the claim."

She said nothing for a while and just watched as I filled in the list of things that were taken and broken (even if the ring, locket, watch and money were back in my possession, it had to be consistent with the police report). She watched as I filled in a spreadsheet of every item involved, then looked up at me as I saved the file and looked down at her.

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"Oh Daniel..." She said sleepily, breaking out of a yawn.

"You have to be the only person I know who wouldn't be freaking out about something like this... If this was my place I think I'd have had a nervous breakdown when I walked in"

"Yeah, well, my dad always told me to take life how it comes,rather than worrying about the little things..."

She gestured her head at the pile of broken items piled up at the back of the room.

"Everything over there is 'just the little things'?"

"They're just things... The big things are life, death, love, prosperity, family and all that stuff that has no cash value."

"..."

"Thanks for not getting mad about this."

"Why would I be mad? I'm looking on the bright side... Might even be able to afford a few extra things with the policy money."

I sighed. "The only thing I'm pissed about is my coffee table. I fucking loved that thing and I'm sure they don't make them anymore."

She smiled and waiting for a moment, then sat up and said,

"Close your eyes for me"

"... Why?"

"C'mon, just do it... please?"

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I closed my eyes expecting her to go and get something, instead she shifted her leg around to sit on my lap facing me and covering my eyes with her hands she leaned down and kissed me, keeping it for a long as possible and putting her arms around my shoulders. I leaned back on the sofa as a rush of good feelings washed over me and put my arms around her hips to hold her close.

After a moment she broke the kiss.

"I've been wanting to do that since you first let me in here... you're not mad are you?"

I thought for a second staring into her eyes, then smiled and said,

"I don't know... hard to make that kind of decision with just one kiss."

She fluttered her eyes and smiled as I took her head and lay her down to my side over the couch, pressing my lips against hers, her wrapped her arms around my neck and her legs around my waist as we lay there.

Moments later she looked up at me smiling and said, "What now...?"

I smiled and picked her up, looking down at her in my arms, her smiling back and biting her lip, the bedroom was still fairly dark as I placed her on the bed and took my hoodie off.

She unbuttoned her classy pyjamas as I reached into my bedside cabinet to put something on the end of it, then I peeled the sheets back, picked her up again and put her down as I folded the sheets over us. Through mutual cooperation and some heavy petting, my cargos, her PJ bottoms and our underwear were thrown out of the bed as we got low.

 1252318

Oh man he's gonna [have to take a] shower after sex

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We were at it for 3 hours straight, 7 years without a woman and a week without a wank gives you more than an average sexual appetite. On the last fold we were both drenched in sweat, her brow glistening in the early light as she rode hard on top of me, her muffled moans and gasps getting more intense as she shut her eyes tight.

I grabbed her hips and thrust into her hard on the last stretch. Keeping rhythm with her I rose my abs up and she shook hard, clenching her teeth before letting out one last loud gasp as I shot my load inside of her. Then she flopped down onto my chest using her arms to break her fall, brought her hands into mine and clasped them gently, panting on top of me as I tried to to control my breathing.

I brushed her hair out of her face and back towards her body and bought my arms around to embrace her, holding her close on top of me, there we lay for a while enjoying the moment as our breathing steadied... I looked down and she was fast asleep on top of me, her hands around my sides...

"Amazing," I thought to myself. "7 years later, and still she can take it out of me..." My mind wandered, and I found myself questioning what our current relationship was; or what she would think if I told her that, 'You can't wave a pussy in front of me and expect 7 years of pain and struggle to be forgotten.'

Plus, she owed me for all the trouble I'd put myself through over the past few days...

"Though maybe owe is a bad word for it," I thought to myself, closing my eyes and running my hands down her back...

"But then again, I didn't do what I did for that either..."

"I did it because it was the right thing to do..."

"And because he trashed my house..."

I lifted up the sheet and examined her body again like I did the few nights before...

All those cuts, grazes and bruises all over her body...

Fresh ones from the previous day were there too...

When she was on top of me, I noticed a fresh black bruise on her stomach. Thinking about it now, he must have hit her pretty hard, more than enough to knock the wind out of her.

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I gritted my teeth at the thought and held her close to me, "I'm glad I did what I did... and I meant every word I said... I'd have killed him if she wasn't there to step me, nobody should have to go through that..."

I thought about other things too, like how could she go from the girl who managed to make a complete fool out of me all those years ago to being stuck with a fat deadbeat like that... For a moment I felt sick.

"How insulting," I thought to myself, thinking about how she could go from me to him. I mean come on, she could have at least traded up...

Then I remembered that life seldom goes the way you wanted to, and to have taken that road she must have been pretty desperate... She had to have lost everything because what she took from that place was almost nothing...

And look at her loser mother, look at the way she was raised... she was always pretty cutthroat and I admired that strength, even if I despised it.

Though 7 years later, I finally could see what she really had. It wasn't strength at all...

It was *desperation*.

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She was always hellbent on obtaining things, working every hour god sent, being very careful with her money, saving up to buy expensive clothes and dressing formally all of the time... Yes, that's the trademark of a person who has nothing...

The only "poor person" clothes she had were my old t-shirts, and no one could never get her to wear a beanie or baseball cap. My little sister used to call her *"The Ghetto Snob"*, it was about right... She couldn't embrace who she was then, always fighting with the way she was bought up.

If you heard her mother speak you wouldn't believe she came from her at all. They were worlds apart and her mother hated my guts because she saw me as a threat to her daughters otherwise complete loyalty to her...

In the end her mother won out, her loyalty to me was the first to go, then her respect... You never see those changes when you're in love with someone, you want to believe that they love you just as much as you love them, and I never saw it coming...

The day I came home from work with all of her objectives met, my boxes in front of the door as she coldly demanded I *take them and get out*...

Just remembering that feeling made me extremely angry, almost enough to push her off of me.

I can *never forget* the hell I had to go through to get back on my feet after she had taken everything, drained my accounts and fooled my parents into giving her the money for a car promising to pay them back a few hundred a month...

But most of all, it wasn't the money she took, so much as the trust she broke, along with my self-esteem, and my plans for the future which all revolved around her.

Worst of all, she destroyed my ability to love, and possibly my innocent youthful view of the world...

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7 years later, 7 years wiser, and 7 years of change....

While I worked hard to make a good life for myself, get a decent place and start working towards a better future, constantly investing into myself in every aspect I could, she had walked the path of greed, lies and self destruction... And for some reason, forced or otherwise our paths had crossed again.

"What'll you do now?" I thought to myself, as I gently rolled her off my and pulled the sheets over her, peeling the condom off my dick and throwing it into the wicker bin. I briefly entertained the thought of throwing her out.

But smiling, I shook my head, walking around the bed.

"Nah, you're not that type of man. Anyway, she's still responsible for fixing what she destroyed..."

I walked into the bathroom and started the shower, jumping in as the water got warm enough and going straight for the dove body cleanser. I decided to make it a quick one, just to wash the sweat and sex juice off me.

As I stood with my palms against the tiles I caught myself thinking about her, wondering if I ever could give her a second chance... My mind scoured it's archives, looking for any instance I'd encountered where someone redeemed themselves after fucking up so badly.

I decided as a show of good faith and to show that I'm placing a little bit of faith in her; Instead of calling her by her name, (a name that made me cringe at the mere thought of it), *I'd give her a new one.*

Yeah, it was silly and childish, but hey, if it worked it might encourage her, and it's not like I had anything to lose...

I thought of calling her "Akon", but I laughed the idea off... That would stick out way too much, and she might catch on if she thought about it too much...

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While I was still deep in thought, the shower curtain suddenly opened. There stood the little naked blonde, looking a little groggy with her disheveled "after-sex" hair.

"You know, you're supposed to stop in bed after sex, it's the rules Daniel..."

I stood staring at her, taking my hands off the wall as I'm sure it looks weird to anyone watching. I turned to face her and flicked some water at her.

"Oi!" she said, rubbing arms with her hands "Cold!"

I stood silent for a moment, before offering my hand, and saying,

"C'mon, the water's warm. After all that happened, I don't think I really have to stop you from seeing me naked anymore."

She hesitated, before taking my hand and carefully stepping in behind me. I took the shower head off the holder and handed her the body wash before reaching around her and rinsing her head to toe.

She lathered up and as I washed the remainder of the suds off of me and handed her the shower head, she grabbed my arm and whimpered,

"Please stay..."

"Alright, but if I get hard we're ignoring it, my water bill will go through the roof if this carries on."

She smiled as she took the shampoo and worked it through her hair, turning to me and gesturing for me to help her rinse with a smile on her face.

"Should we talk about it?" she said, facing away as I rinsed her hair.

"About what?"

"... The reason we're both standing here..."

"If you want to, I've actually been giving it some thought..."

"... So what do you think we should do now?" she said, turning to face me as I handed the shower head back.

"Well, I think it would be a massive mistake to put a label on anything right now... maybe just take it as it comes, theres still a lot that needs to be worked out before we even think about that kind of thing."

 1254264 (OP)

"Britt..." I said, lightly tapping the tip of her nose with my finger

"Britt?"

"Yeah, Britt... What do you think?"

"... What do you mean?"

"Remember when we were out on the balcony you asked if I'd ever call you by your name? Well how does a fresh new one sound? At least it's a massive step up from using things like "Hey" or "You", and I thought it might put you at ease... I still don't like saying your given name, but--"

"Okay... Britt!" she smiled and nodded. "I can live with that..."

"I meant it as just for something I'd call you, y'know, like a nickname..."

She smiled and put her arms around my waist.

"Britt..." I heard her speak softly. "Thanks Daniel... for everything, I promise I won't let you down..."

She looked up into my eyes and said,

"If it takes me years, I'll show you I'm not the same person I was back then... With a little luck, I'll be able to get you to open up to me one day!"

And with that she squeezed my waist with her arms, and after a brief moment of silence, we went into the bedroom, dried off, had some breakfast and set off to check out the reservoir, like the good ol' days...

 1254274 (OP)

And that's pretty much the Cool Story of how one Tuesday Night, a blond girl rushed into my apartment, and Britt returned into my life...

I still don't know if letting her back in is such a good idea, only time will tell.

Hey, maybe a few months down the line, we can do this again and I'll call it

I'd probably be sleeping in a high school sports closet all day and eating Snappy Tomato Pizza while posting what happened at night.