Red Carneau

Chapter 7

Grell tossed and turned, she had gone to bed a while ago but was still wide awake, unable to sleep. She couldn't stop thinking that in one day she'd be leaving, leaving Will and going back to her normal life, her nightmare of a life. It was the last thing she wanted but she had no other choice.

She's thirsty so after what felt like an eternity of staring at the ceiling, Grell decided to get up and go get herself a glass of water. She puts on her glasses before grabbing her silk red robe from the bathroom and puts it on before leaving the room. She didn't bother with turning on the lights, the last thing she wanted was to wake up and bother William but when she passed by the living room, she realizes that he's not there. She wonders where he could be, before realizing that he's probably still working. After getting that glass of water, she leaves the loft, getting in the elevator and makes her way downstairs to Will's shop.

As suspected, she finds him sitting at his desk, wrapping a bag of bird seed in bubble wrap.

"Shouldn't you be sleeping, Will darling?" Grell asks, moving from the elevator door towards his desk. As expected, William jumps a little in fear, not expecting anyone to be up at 4 in the morning.

"I need to finish packaging those orders so I can take them to the post office tomorrow." William says, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose and looks up at Grell as she takes a seat on the chair in front of him.

"You shouldn't be working over time, it's not good for you."

"I have a lot of things to do and not enough time to do it." William responds and Grell feels guilty, because it's her fault that William spent most of his day out with her, revisiting her home town.

"I'm sorry." She says
William looks up from his package and frowns, "It's not your fault." He states, because it never crossed his mind that it could be Grell's fault that he hadn't had enough time to do his job. "What are you doing up?"

"I couldn't sleep." She answers. Will doesn't ask her anything more because he can only imagine what is going on in her head. Since he's discovered the truth about Grell's husband, William has tried to talk to her about it on countless occasions but each time he failed miserably. Even though he tried not to think about it, he was aware that Grell's stay was coming to an end so he could only imagine what kept her up at night.

He thinks about asking her about it, telling her that he knows everything but once again, he fails and does nothing. Instead he goes back to packaging his order in silence, Grell doesn't talk either, she just watches him and he finds out that he likes it, even if they are not talking, it feels the silence feels comfortable.

It takes William one more hour to finish packaging all of his orders but Grell finds out that she doesn't mind. Normally, she'd be bored out of her mind to say still and do nothing but she actually enjoys watching him work, anything is good as long as she can stay by his side.

It's 5am when William finally gets up from his chair and for the first time since Grell's came in the room, he looks at her, really looks at her. Her hair is in a loose braid, she's wearing a red silk robe and she's sitting with one leg crossed on top of the other, making her robe slide up enough to reveal her milky thigh. William has to rip his eyes away from that sight because he doesn't need to start having inappropriate thoughts right now.

"We should go upstairs." He says, clearing his throat as he walks to the elevator. Once it arrives, William let's Grell get in first and they go back to the loft.

"You should probably go to sleep, you must be tired." Grell says once William closes the front door.
He isn't sure if it's the sad tone in Grell's voice, or the fact that he doesn't want to part from her yet but he feels courageous. He grabs her hand and squeezes it once, before pulling her down the hallway.