Page 96 of Grand Love
Nina
It’s been two weeks.Two weeks since he kissed me, and you’d think it never happened. He comes to his PT sessions and basically does his own thing. I give him some lip and he gives it back, but then he goes home. He doesn’t offer me lifts, he doesn’t linger when he drops or picks up Ellis. I’d call him out on it, but truthfully, I’m just glad that we can be in the same room without going at one another.
With Ellis at Mason’s for the weekend, I’ve found myself cleaning the apartment from top to toe. I’ve barely slept and when five a.m. rolls around, I climb out of my bed and slip on my sweats. I’d run alone, but I know Joey has been avoiding me and I want to get him out of his apartment. He’d be a total recluse if I let him.
“Joe!” I whisper, shaking his shoulder.
“Hmmm.”
“Wake up!” I shove him harder.
He groans, rolling away from me. “Please, go away.”
“No, get up, we are running. I’ll get you water.”
“Coffee.”
“You can’t run with coffee.”
“I hate you.”
“No, you don’t.” I smile, slipping off to his kitchen and filling a water bottle. “You’ve been avoiding me,” I say loud enough so he can hear me.
“No, I haven’t.” Joey appears in the kitchen doorway in a sleepy state. His hair is wild and flops down onto his forehead, and he is in only a pair of black boxers. He is skinnier than he should be for his size, skinnier than when I first met him. I always worry about him. He has no family here to look out for him after his mum passed away a few years ago, and his brother lives in the states. From what I can gather, he blames Joey for his mother’s death. Joey will rarely talk about it and I’m okay with that. Although I know he can look after himself, he’s happy being independent and I can relate to that. But it doesn’t mean it doesn’t get lonely. Add in his mental health issues and it’s enough to have me checking in on him.
We all need someone in life.
“You have but I forgive you. I did kick you out for Mason the last time you came over.”
He smiles up at me. “You did, I was pissed about that actually,” he says it as if he is only now remembering and I instantly know we are okay. “But that’s not why I was avoiding you. I really have been busy.”
“Are you eating enough?” I ask casually, tightening up the bottle top. “You’ve not been up to mine for tea in the last few weeks.”
I’m smothering him and I can’t help it. It’s as if when Ellis isn’t here I look for someone to cling onto.
“Nina, it’s five forty-five. You aren’t lecturing me on food right now. We’re either running or sleeping.”
“Sorry, I’ve been up for hours,” I complain, turning and heading for the door. “Get dressed. I’m going to stretch.”
* * *
The benefitof not being able to sleep in has to be experiencing the city before it rises. Delivery men hustle to unload the trucks, clanking and clanging in their steel toecap boots, but otherwise, in the small little side streets, the city sleeps. With the cold morning air, not many fools venture out on the gleaming, icy pavements.
“I think I have a studio,” I blurt out, needing to run the idea by someone. I should speak to Lucy and Megan, but if I fail, they will smother me in their pity and I can’t stand it. I know Joey deals with knock backs all the time in the photography industry, so I feel a little more comfortable telling him. He won’t expect big things.
“Yeah? Where?”
“Above Logan’s gym.”
“Really? That’s great! Are you going to start teaching again?” We stop at a fountain, catching our breaths.
“Not yet. It needs some love. There’s painting to do and equipment to clear. The floors are a mess too. But it has potential.”
“When was the last time you danced?”
My heart seems to wake with his words, catching up with the rest of my body and beating a little harder than it did moments ago. “It was a few days after the studio sold, at the penthouse.”
“Shit. It’s been what? Over a year. You need to get back into it, throw yourself in, else you never will.”
