Helping Sarah

Chapter 7

Sarah

"Good morning," Michael called to me.

"Hi," I replied as I walked towards him, slightly breathless from the walk and tugging my wayward hair behind my ears. There was enough of a breeze that a few tendrils were flickering across my face.

He was leaning against a car in the parking space closest to the front door of our building, and even to my inexperienced eyes the car looked to be of the rather luxurious kind; sleek and silver grey, with a logo of a winged B on the bonnet, and definitely large enough for a man as tall as Michael to sit comfortable in.

His arms were crossed over his chest, and dark sunglasses hid his eyes though the weak spring sun was mostly obscured by clouds. He straightened when I neared him, smiled at me as he removed his sunglasses.

"Have you been waiting for long?" I asked, halting before him.

His smile grew. "Not at all. This time it's me who's early."

Something flickered in my midst, in my stomach, something nice that stole one of my breaths. It felt almost like... a flutter. Like butterflies.

I almost covered my stomach with my hand as I tried to replace the lost breath. It had been years since I'd felt a flutter there. Not since back when Andrew had been alive. Before I'd discovered him with a needle in his arm.

Well, there had been a tiny version of a flutter there the other day, on Tuesday, when I had sat in that small office in London and talked to this man, when he had listened to me and offered to help me.

It had just been a small flutter, easily overlooked in the relief that had swamped me, and nothing like the full-fledged flutter now that there was no chance of me overlooking.

It wasn't because of Michael specifically. It couldn't be. It was simply because I felt safer with him nearby. As I would with anyone who was willing to help me. Anyone doing the same for me would awaken a flutter in my stomach.

I wet my dry lips. "Did you have trouble finding it?"

"Not at all. I've lived in Cambridge since I started university here. I know the city fairly well."

"That's good." The flutters only grew as we stared at each other, and this time my hand did rise to cover my stomach. But they were nice, the flutters, I liked them. I'd missed them.

I brushed my hair behind my ears just as Michael scratched his jaw. It had to be the feeling of safety that caused the flutters. Just like the tension in my shoulders had unlocked, I had stopped looking round for anyone watching me the moment I'd spotted Michael. Though his jacket and shirt hid his physique, it was plain to a blind bat that he was not a scrawny man, that he worked out regularly. His lean form gave him away, the muscled plane just discernible beneath the open jacket and the thin fabric of his shirt.

Blinking, I moved my gaze away from the little bit of his chest I could see where the two top buttons of his shirt were undone. Up to his eyes instead. Then gestured over my shoulder.

"Come in. I hope you..." My voice tapered off when I saw the curtain flicker in my neighbour's kitchen window. Charlie and I had the ground floor flat on the right side of the three storey building, and on the left lived Mrs Boyce, an eighty-four-year-old widow. We were only on greeting terms, and I was expecting her knock on my door any day now to complain about Charlie being too loud.

Sighing and determinedly not looking at my snooping neighbour, I led the way into the building. All I needed was for Mrs Boyce and the rest of my neighbours to think I was entertaining strange men while my son was at his nursery, but as it was either that or Lenny, I held the door open for Michael and gestured him into the narrow hallway of our home.