Bread, Love and Promises (On going)

Chapter 25 Him

The Houghton's Vineyard

"Good morning," Liam greeted as he stepped into the patio.

Startled, Charlotte's head jerked up and she gasped in surprise. "Oh, you're here! I thought I won't be seeing until later tonight." Then she exclaimed in delight, "Good morning, honey."

 "Had a free morning, I thought I would stop by." He gave her a peck on the cheek.

Charlotte quickly let go of what she was holding to give his hand a squeeze. As much as she was hankering for details, she enquired casually, " How have you and our beautiful Alexis been? "

Liam pulled a chair joining her at the busy table - occupied with albums, folders and papers. "All good. Alexis sends her regards."

She watched the smile form in his gaze and she was stoked with what she was seeing. "Awe, she's such a sweetheart." Charlotte smiled too, and peeked behind at the slide doors. "Will she be joining us?"

"She wanted to come, but she has a long class today." It was 'the restaurant experience' day that Alexis was excited about. His gaze roamed the piles on the table and a picture of her caught his eye, he asked, "Are those the photos from the party?"

"Oh yes. This is why I asked you to come, so you can choose which ones you want to give your girl," she chimed and passed a sorted batch to him. Charlotte put her hand over her heart as she commented dreamily, "Ah, you two make the most exquisite couple." Then she quietly basked in the how his features softened.

Drawing the them closer, Liam silently reviewed them one by one. She looked more breathtaking with every photo. His heart shook in his chest as he got lost in her, drinking her image in over and over again. The instants when those pictures were taken surrounded his thoughts, 'his girl'. 

Could he call her that already? His girl? 

The photographer caught them wrapped up in their own moments. The way they were looking at each other, indulged in one another's presence while the rest of the world was hushed to absence around them.

But, him?

He has been asking himself the same question. If he could hang this torturous uncertainty on not knowing how she felt about him, he would have. Yet, those captured moments with her gaze smiling at him, evincing her feelings - drowning every opposing qualm.

The question ferociously repeated itself. Why him?

A hand touched his arm gently and brought him out from his thoughts. "What's on your mind?" Charlotte asked. 

Liam looked at a couple more photos before he paused on the one of when they were dancing, pondering a thought. That feeling that nicked him before revisited him again and twisted his insides. The moments of him observing if there was anything he had that would contribute to the reasons of him being her choice. No matter how he ran it through his head, the bafflement toward Alexis's reactions remained inexplicable. Staring at the photo in his hand, Liam finally asked, "What can you give a person who wants nothing you own?" 

Startled for the second time, Charlotte masked her shock that he would ask for her advise. How she longed for him to include her in anything. From the moment Liam walked into their lives he has been handling his matters on his own. She would've been in complete content with the slighted slither he would've sent her way, just to show him that she got him, that she was there for him and that he could count on her whenever he needed her. For infinite reasons, she adored Alexis even more.

Getting to her feet, Charlotte let her heart swell with a proud motherly moment and embraced his shoulders over his chair. With Liam, less was more, and she hoped that her short reply would give him every bit of the answer he needed. "Maybe it's not the something that she wants, perhaps it's the someone."