REDEMPTION (Ongoing)

20. WARMONGERS

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Theresa Young
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I CONTINUE TO LOOK on, transfixed as one looks at some mystical dream of the afterlife- Hardin's face soft, unapologetic.

"I- I should leave."

I fumble with my stuff and turn around to make a run for it, nervously.

"No, wait!" His fingers halt my escape, binding around my wrist, his skin warm against my freezing one.

I turn around, looking down at the point of contact and Hardin releases it, making me look up to his face.

"I mean, will you please at least wait until dinner?" He requests innocently.

I can't find in me to refuse him to his face and leave, especially since he has gone to such lengths to just cook me a good meal.

I made it perfectly clear where I stand, and there was no need to be so cold as to disregard such a personal undertaking.

I nod reluctantly and he smiles a slow, relieved smile.

After watching my face for a few seconds, he returns to the food, finishing it in calm silence and an elegant flair. Though he never assumes the earlier cheerfulness again.

We sit, opposite to each other across the small table, eating quietly. I feel partly responsible for bursting his bubble of exuberance.

"It's really good." I appreciate in a low mumble.

Finally a shy smile spreads across his face as he looks up, "Of course it is."

I shake my head with a tiny chuckle and I'm aware of his eyes on me, when I hear a buzzing vibration break his reverie.

I glance at my phone quickly, but it's not the one this time.

Looking up, I notice his eyebrows scrunched together in a thoughtful line as he held his sleek, black phone in one hand, peeking down at it in irritation.

"Just give me a minute, I need to take this."

"Yeah."

I watch him as he pushes his chair back, stands up and walks away to invisibility smoothly. I don't even get to hear his hello to whoever it was.

Could it be Lily?

I brush the thought aside as trivial. Even if it was, there was no need to get so worked up over a phone call.

I look down at my plate, shuffling through the contents with my fork.

It's wrong that for someone such as Hardin himself, who I had been detesting enough to want to leave right away should leave behind such a feeling of dullness when he walked away from an unmeaningful dinner.

But it did.

He's pretty much the life of every party now, and when he's gone, he kind of takes it with himself.

Not that this was a party or I craved that life in any way.

I wonder if it would be rude to go on eating without him, but then if I wait, that only means my visit prolonging.