In the Arms of an Angel..

18 That's where you are wrong

The cottage Joe took me was beautiful. I just couldn't believe such beauty could exists. The house is in the banks of a river flowing down. It's beautiful.  Breath taking. I just kept staring and marveling it momentarily forgetting my anger and frustration.

"Your welcome" Joe said smiling which I ignored. But suddenly I felt Joe is not feeling his male chauvinist self. What the hell?

He saw me looking at him, quickly took my hand, pressed a kiss and held it and kept looking at the house as he was having second thoughts. I really hope he is having second thoughts.

"This is a place I used to come with mum. Every summer we come here. I haven't come here since she died" and if anything could have surprised me, then that did.

"Joe, we don't have to go there. It is beautiful. You know all this isn't making sense. We both have lives waiting for us back there. We need to go. Let's go"

"No. We are going in" he said finally. There is no way out of this place. And it is started raining heavily. So, I didn't have a choice but to follow him inside.

Joe was not in his element. I don't know why it bothered me. But it did.

"Sit. I will get us something to drink" I saw the coffee maker.

"I don't want that coffee. I want the one you make"

"Well sorry Mr.High and Mighty, all these 5 years you did well without my coffee. So you can survive" I told him.

I went to the kitchen. Damn him, I end up making coffee the way he likes.

"Thanks love" he said it with such a triumph.

"Will it stop raining?"

"Doesn't matter. I think we are stock for over a week"

I am frustrated, but even with that, this place is beautiful. Both the rooms in the house are on the top floor, overlooking the river.

"There is a waterfall, 1 hour hike from here. I will take you there"

"Joe, can we go when the rain stops please? I have to go to work. It is not that I get paid for idling. Please"

"Will you trust me for a week darling? If I say everything is going to be alright, will you please believe me?" he asked really concerned.

"How things are going to be okay Joe? You are engaged to Alina. What the hell are you expecting from me?"

He gave me a sly smile. What does that smile means? It is only making me more angry.

"So what? Alina lend her fiancé for a week. is that it?" again the sly smile. This time my temper really got the better of me.

"Right. May be it is the habit of rich people to toss people like me like a ping pong ball. But guess what I am not interested. I am abducted and kept here my will. I hate you"

I didn't know why but I was crying. Joe reached me but I back off, he had touched me enough.

"Don't touch me" I told him firmly.

He sat quietly and drank his coffee. Then stood up and went to a piano, which was sitting in a corner.

"My mother use to play this piano when we come here. She gave me lessons as well. It is from her I learnt to appreciate good music" and slowly he lifted the lid of the piano, sat and played the most beautiful piece of music I have ever heard.

Anger forgotten, I sat and listened. Once Joe turned my world upside down. I don't want to go through that pain again, especially when he is getting married to Alina. I don't know what he is doing with me. It doesn't seem right. Joe doesn't do things.

"It's beautiful but I am still angry with you"

"I know love. I know" he said smiling.

He played many more really nice pieces. I was so tempted the piano myself. It has to wait.

"Come here, I'll show you how it is done" he said.

"No way. I cant play it"

"Come, let me teach you" he said determined.

I just stood up and went to him, just to see how it is done.

"Come, sit here. I will play this side of the piano, and all you have to do is press these keys. you will know when to press when you hear the music"

He played the music, and I listened carefully. Then we tried it together and it came out really well. I was laughing when we were done. That felt really nice.

As soon as we were done with the music, Joe started his usual grumpiness. He gets that when he is hungry. Something I remember from 5 years ago. I don't know what the kitchen is stocked with.

"Though I am kidnapped, I still have a captives right. And this is an exploitation of my rights. But given no other place for food close by, and I am hungry as well, I will make food. If I am not hungry, you will remain hungry"

"Yes, madam. Understood" he said with fake politeness.

After I made food, Joe came with a big smile in his face. It is his favorite pasta dish.

"I missed this food"

That flipped me off completely.

"Tell me Joe, why all this after 5 years? Why when we both have our own lives to live? why all this now?"

**************************************************

I kept quite. I know she would come to this. Why didn't I call her? Why did I pretend as she didn't exist and went from one woman to another? Was I taking rejection that bad? Yes, I felt insulted she didn't want to choose me over her religion, but why now?

"Why did you refuse me?" I asked her.

"I told you over and over again. My body isn't mine to give you. And is it all mattered to you?"

"God dammit Zahra, you knew it as well as I did, you were much more to me than that hot body of yours. But I was not use to commitments, I lost everything, I was indebted to you. I wasn't myself. When I returned from you, nothing felt like me. I hated that feeling. I hated you for making me feel like that. Things that gave me pleasure before, doesn't give me pleasure after that. Not even now. I felt like I left a part of me with you"

"Oh that is rich. After 5 years, without a call, without a message, and now you say you left a part of you with me. Really?"

"You wouldn't understand it because you didn't live my life" Joe told me irritated.

"Your fiancé hired me to plan your wedding and after 5 years you see me, and then you decide to start from where you had left? I mourned the loss of you Joe. I did. And when I finish mourning, I knew one thing for sure. You aren't worth it" time he knew the truth.

"Why didn't you contact me? If I were so important to you, you could have called"

"Oh, now the blame is on me? Right! Rich boy fighting for his birthright, and a pauper and former maid called to check on him. That would have been an interesting conversation after huge loads of assumptions that will follow" I told him sarcastically.

"Sarcasm doesn't become you Zahra. Drop it. I was a f*cking moron. For a year I tried everything under the moon to get back that part of me I couldn't still satisfy. Then I went from one woman to another. Nothing mattered. My father and Alina's father agreed we should marry. I agreed because I didn't think I am capable of feeling things that I once did"

"And am I to believe all that? Well, nice try. But no. Anyway, bringing me here is not going to help your father or Alina's one. I am glad she didn't toss you out of your ear after what she saw. But furthermore, I don't care. This is not going to end up well either for you or me. I know that much" I informed him confidently.

"That's where you are wrong my love. It is going to end up well for both of us"