Are We Out of The Woods Yet?

Part 10

The following day, Joe was in the Woolpack again. Aaron was doing his best to avoid looking at him. That was until he called him over. "Aaron!" Aaron forced himself to look at him. As soon as he laid eyes on him his feelings of jealous pain rose. "Hey, remember me?" Yeah, I do can you kindly get the fuck out of here? Is what Aaron said in his mind, in reality however he just nodded his head. "I need to talk to ya." What? Why? Did he want to know Robert's favourite food? Because he had no idea what it was they'd never really talked about anything other than Katie and affairs... He made his way uneasily to the bar, he leaned on it, his body screaming not to settle but to instead, preferably sprint away. He knew this conversation was going to injure his already damaged psychological health.

"If you want to talk about Robert..."

"Oh, yes I did. How did you know?" Aaron focused on the shiny wood of the bar, it'd been polished that morning but now it had been spoilt, you could see where drinks had been served throughout the day. From when over-filled glasses had spilt slightly over the rim, the liquid, trickled down to leave its stain behind, a ring around the base. The only trace of a former customer being there.

"Just guessed." He shrugged, tracing a ring with his index finger.

"Well it was a pretty decent guess." A realisation hit Aaron. Robert had taken forever to leave the bar on Sunday. He must've left his number and address with this guy, that's how he got here. How else? He'd never seen him in Emmerdale before, he'd conveniently appeared after Sunday. Without being aware of what he was doing, Aaron lifted his head to stare at the guy, studying. "Uh Aaron?" Aaron blinked rapidly. "You were staring at me a bit intensely then."

"How do you know my name?" He needed some answers. Some good reason for Robert moving on so fast. He cringed at himself as he became fully notified that he was thinking like a bitchy ex.

"Robert told me all about you." Joe had the advantage and he knew it as he watched Aaron shuffle his feet and slide his elbow in uncertainty of what to do with himself at the perception of Robert talking about him to another man.

"What did he say?" Aaron croaked. Aaron had his eyes on the bar so Joe had time to wiggle his eyebrows and grin slyly. He would play with him.

"I didn't come here to talk about that." Just as he'd wanted, Aaron's eyebrows lowered, the undeniable agony at not knowing what his lover had said about him had already possessed his thoughts entirely. "I wanted to ask about you."

"Me?" It was clear Aaron was only half listening.

"I know that you and Robert..." He'd say his name as often as possible, to wind up his client. "you and Robert were an item at one point."

"No...we were just having meaningless sex." It hurt him to admit that. He'd seen it as more of course, but when it came down to it had it really been anything meaningful to Robert?

"Ah, yeah, that's what Robert said."

"What?" Aaron swallowed his pain then lifted his head enough to observe the man in front of him.

"Has he ever hurt you, in any way?" This guy was saying everything and nothing. It was extremely distressing.

"Why are you askin' me this stuff? What's in it for you?" Oh more than you know, Joe thought.

"Because..." He feigned sighing mournfully. "He hurt me once." Aaron's eyebrows raised.

"You mean you've known each other for a while? Longer than two days?" Joe chuckled.