All Areas Accessed - Sequel to Access All Areas

Chapter Twelve

Tap! Tap! It's late, so I gently tap on Clara's door with the noisy beats of my heart in my ears, cutting through the quietness of the night. I just hope that I'm not scaring her. I think she's still up, because soft lights can be seen through the downstairs curtains from where I stand on her darkened stone doorstep. Listening, I keep my baseball cap really low on my forehead, not wanting anyone to recognise me should they happen to be passing by at this pretty late hour. Tap! Tap! I gently tap again, worried that Clara now won't open the door to me at all. But then to my right, I hear a gentle rapping on the downstairs window. With my head turned but hanging low, I look towards the sound. Clara is looking at me, only a pane of cold glass now separating us. Quickly closing her curtain, I wait for her door to finally open as I shove my nervous hands deep within the front pockets of my jeans. As soon as her door is opened up to me and the light of her home hits my shadowed face, I feel the need to hurriedly explain why I am here beneath my baseball cap. "I'm sorry...I needed to see you."

"Come in." Is all that Clara says, her expression so very slack with the shock of my very unexpected late night arrival.

Unable to take my eyes off her, so inwardly ecstatic to see her again; I can't help but smirk at her amusing choice of nightwear. "Cute." I'm referring to her polka dot onesie, the one that makes her look too damn adorable right now.

Looking down at it, she smiles with sweet embarrassment. "Thanks." Closing her front door on the coldness of the night, she then shyly pads her bare and dainty feet out of her small and chilly hallway, into her much warmer feeling lounge. She's been watching a film, so grabs the remote and pauses it before snuggling up on her couch. "Why do you need to see me?" She's cuddling her knees that are tightly bent against her chest, cuddling them because she's just as nervous as I am.

Slowly sitting beside her on the couch, all of my movements are thoughtfully done. I've had this conversation all planned out in my head, but my mind now seems totally blank with silent worry. "I figured some stuff out." Taking off my cap and running my fingers through my hair, it gives me just a few important seconds to articulate all that I've figured out today as I gaze into her waiting eyes. "I have figured out that I am someone who doesn't want for anything...but I want you, Clara." Sage upon teal and teal upon sage, our eyes are deeply locked in a mutual stare. "I don't know how this might work, but I'm willing to give it a go, if you are?" I don't have all the answers, I only have what I feel. All I am asking from this beautiful woman, is for a chance. " Reaching out to touch her, because I need to feel her womanly warmth, my hands rest on Clara's elbows that are still sitting on her bent up knees as I shuffle in just that little bit closer. "Say something." She's not saying anything, she's only staring at me. I just want her to say something...anything!

From between her stunned lips, a quiet question soon slips out. "Are you wanting us to try and be together?" Her voice is shakily just as stunned as her overwhelmed stare is.

Wanting her to believe me and all that I say, my cherishing fingers begin to lightly brush across the velvety skin on her right cheek. "Yeah, I do." Now smiling, I need to say more. "I can't go back to America without knowing that you're a part of my life, Clara." Taking hold of both her hands, I cling to the growing hope that she'll want what I do, in the same way that I'm now clinging to her fingers.

Yet Clara is still running scared. "You are leaving, Rhys. I thought you had already left, but now you are here. But soon, you'll be leaving again. We barely know each other. When would we see each other? I live here. You live there. I work here. You work everywhere!" She suddenly stops dead, needing a second to make me understand. "You're Rhys Ryan." She wants to be with me, I know it, but who I am, scarily stands in her way. Gripping my hopeful fingers with her far less hopeful ones, her next words are weighted with such raw emotion. "We have so much against us, Rhys."