Bite Shift

7

Twenty minutes later, I sat at his kitchen table. It was one of those cute breakfast nooks that looks like a corner booth in a sweet little country restaurant. I always wanted one. Somehow, in the home of a single guy, it worked. I wore an Aerosmith tee shirt and black men's pajama pants. I had to pull the drawstring pretty tight on the waist to keep them from falling down but they were actually darn comfortable. I might just "accidently" take them home. It made me realize how long it had been since I had pulled a man's shirt on. Heck, it had been a long time since I was even alone with a man.

Rhys had wrapped his wrist in a white roll gauze bandage. There wasn't a spot of blood on it. Considering how it looked at the hospital, I thought he would need stitches but if it had already stopped bleeding, he might be okay. I would look at it in the morning.

"What a night," I said, just trying to break the silence. "I am starting to think it was all a weird dream. Maybe something was wrong with those cucumbers."

Rhys sat at the other side of the table and looked at me. He looked like he was about confess something heavy. Love? Murder?

"Kate. I have been thinking about how to start this and I honestly don't know. This is my first time. I have been alone for so long I guess I never thought this would happen so I never thought of what to say after."

"Whoa, Rhys." I put both hands up between he and I. "I am honored but, honey, I don't want to be your first anything. I am sorry if I gave you the wrong idea but..."

"It's already done, Kate. I can't take it back. I am so sorry. I saw you there and I didn't know what to do. I just couldn't watch you die. You're my only friend and you have kids and you're a good nurse and a good person and you're so young." He put his head in his hands. It looked like his head was too heavy to hold as he rested his forehead against shaking palms.

"Slow down, Rhys." I stood, leaning over the table, and laid my hands on either side of his face; lifting it up to look at me again. "You saved me so I don't know why you would apologize. I don't know what you did but I know I would have died if you didn't find me. I will forever be grateful for you and what you did."

He forced his head out of my hands and looked away to his right. "Don't say that until you know everything. You may hate me soon and never want to see me again. I keep thinking about that. What if you never want to see me and you despise me and I have to live with that for eternity?"

"Goodness, Rhys. You sound so dramatic. I couldn't never hate you! I...."

"Stop." That one word was so unlike him. That syllable filled the room and resonated in every part of me. I sat again, powerless against that sound, and the power beneath it. He turned to me once more but his dull eyes were bright emerald green. A light shone behind them and captured me. In that moment, I would have done anything he said.

Then the gaze released me. His pupils faded to the brownish-green of river water in the summer sun. I remained still. Something inside me knew that what I was about to hear would change my life forever. Fear overwhelmed me as my heart slid down to my stomach. I don't think I want to hear this. Let me go home.

"You have to hear this" he said without pause. A direct response to my thought. "You can go home once you hear this and decide".

He lowered his sight to the table top. I watched him gather his courage and straighten his spine. When he looked up; I knew he was ready.

"I need you to listen to me. Listen to all I have to say. Once I am done, you can ask questions, laugh, hate me, run away.....whatever you need to do

. But, listen to me first. Promise?"