In Your Eyes

18.

"I'm not going up to my room again."

"What?" Patrick looked innocent.

"I'm not going up to my room again. Like the last time you were taking me out, and made me go up to my room before you came and picked me up."

"I have no idea what you're talking about." Patrick sent her a winning smile as he pulled of his shirt. Ellen lost her line of thought when he continued to walk around the room, shirtless, looking for something to wear. She contemplated jumping him, but decided against it. To be honest they had just spent the whole day in bed, and she wanted to go out.

Maybe.

No. She did. She just had to look somewhere else, and everything would work out fine. Patrick turned around, unfortunately before she had had the time to stop looking.

"You're staring at me."

"I am not." Maybe denial would work.

"Oh, you so are."

"Am not."

"You know, I can tell when women are staring at me. There's no use denying it."

Ellen couldn't help but smile. "You can tell, can you?"

Patrick nodded, looking very serious. "I can. Many years of training. Women are staring at me all the time, so you really have nothing to be ashamed of..." He effortslessly catched the pillow Ellen threw at him, shaking his head. "Throwing things now, are we?"

"God, you're so cocky." She couldn't help but giggle.

"Well you would know, wouldn't you?" Patrick winked at her as he turned around to open the closet, an by doing so he missed the second pillow, aiming for his head. "Ow!"

Ellen giggled again. "Shut up and get dressed."

"Mean. You're so mean. You shouldn't be mean to the person paying your food."

Ellen smiled. They were almost back to normal. Or back to what they had been before Jill turned up. Was it only yesterday? Time with Patrick seemed to have a life of its own. Sometimes a minute was an hour, or hours flew by like seconds. At other times, one day felt like two whole weeks. Nothing was really normal about them.

And the keyword was almost. Things didn't feel like they had done before. Of course that was to expect, Ellen thought. Something like that couldn't just happen and be forgotten just as fast. Maybe it was better this way too - even if she still felt a bit of the dread she had felt when Jill approached them in the foyer she had also realized something. She didn't want to run away. She really was in this. She just hoped it wouldn't backfire.

She was so caught up in her thoughts she almost didn't notice Patrick drop down on the bed beside her, now dressed in a blue button-up and khakis. "Um," he said.

"Um, what?" Ellen eyed him closely. He looked a little uncertain, she thought. It was interesting, really, when he looked like that - you could almost forget that he wasn't sure about everything, all the time.

"I've been thinking."

"Oh, really?" Ellen raised an eyebrow. "When?" That earned her a chuckle, and she was relieved to see that he relaxed a little. She didn't want him to be uncertain, but she had come to realize that he actually wasn't very sure of himself. He pretended to be, most of the time, but a part of it was just an act. She guessed living in a love-less marriage for so long did that to a person, and it made her despise Jill even more.

"I, um." He started fidgeting with the sheets, apparently still not all comfortable with the situation.

"Patrick, just blurt it out. If it comes out wrong we can go back and change it together."