Teach Me Something // LH44

Chapter Six

"So, you have to tell me all about your hot date!" Jenny announces as she falls onto my bed, messing up my neat system of marking that I had been strategically using to distract myself from exactly that question. Although I was already coming to the end and knew this was coming no matter what. The light streaming in through my window was considerable but when I got home last night I saw Michael's coat and shoes by the door. This morning I had decided to vacate the communal areas so I could avoid this embarrassing inquisition in front of another person. I'd heard him leave 45 seconds ago and so her presence in my room wasn't surprising nor startling.

"I'm home and marking my books... how hot of a date can it have been?" I ask, hoping that it is a rhetorical question that will throw her off a little as she sighs and pouts at me. I was avoiding the question because the truth was that it was hot. It was really hot, all the way down to the chaste kiss that ended the evening.

"That's what I was afraid of... you got my hopes up when you weren't back until one am though," she says wrinkling her nose and turning over on the bed away from my books as I swat her with the one in my hand and try to restore order to my system.

"Yeah... well I mean, the conversation was really interesting. He was nice... he asked me to meet up with him again today," I divulge shyly, going back to the notebook in front of me as I continue marking, ignoring her as she lets out another heavy sigh.

Too heavy... she was being dramatic and I didn't know why.

"Why wouldn't you? Was he not very hot? Normally when people say that the conversation was interesting that is what they mean. However, it occurs to me that you've been out of the dating game so long I'm not sure that you know what it means," she points out apologetically. I can't help my laughter as I close the book and look at her, knowing I wasn't going to get away with this very easily as I close the book and turn to pay attention to her. I was going to need full attention to not disclose any meaningful details.

"Trust me... he was hot, I just. He is just very different to me... maybe, probably, too different," I tell her with a shrug and she sighs and scrunches her nose up at the words.

"Opposites attract darling. Did you like him?" She asks again and it's my turn to sigh but not in the way she did. Mine is more about not being sure what to say. I'd sort of gotten myself in a mess with the whole not telling her it was Lewis thing, but I didn't want to relent now knowing full well that she would steal my phone and throw me into going out with him... against my better judgment.

"Yeah... there was a lot to like," I say after a couple of moments of hesitation and she smiles warmly at me as she stands up, dusting off the dress she was wearing before moving to the door and I think I'm about to be left in peace before she pauses as she's about to leave.

"Then give him a call - what's the worst that can happen?"

That's what I keep asking myself, I think as I give her a thin smile and turn back to the books in front of me, almost finished marking them and making a decision at that moment that my work was going to come first. Honestly, I feel like a lot can go wrong... being married and divorced before you turn 30 tends to make a person skeptical and so I'm naturally predisposed to think the worst. All exacerbated by the potential person being a multi-millionaire star who is on television screens most weeks.

When my marking is done I find myself staring at my phone the entire time that I get ready. I must unlock it almost fifty times and each time I do it shows the contact that was most recently added to my phone last night. A simple Lewis.

I groan as I let the temptation get the best of me and press call, realising that curiosity was part of the reason I was calling.

Part of me is hoping that it's a wrong number. Or that it will ring out because he's busy... or just quite literally any scenario that will prove me right about this being crazy. Yet when the phone stops ringing and a familiar voice comes through, a smile is on my face and there's relief in my chest that makes me fall back onto my bed.