Eastern District School

Chapter 75 - Ride to work

"Well, that's that!" Rose said with a deep sigh as she let her head fall backwards onto the headrest of Rich's car.  It felt as though she had been holding her breath for the past half an hour.  That is how long it had taken her to get out of the questions the two older women had thrown at her. It really had felt like a case of good-cop-bad-cop, Rose thought, with her Nan being the good cop. She was full of praises for Rich and more personal questions than her mother seemed to be after. 

"Do you think they'll come?" Rich asked as he pulled out of his father's driveway.

"Oh they'll come alright!" Rose said with another sigh. "Nan would come just because you will be there. She is smitten with you for some reason. I hate to use the words, but she is well and truly fooled! She is going to hate me," she added as an afterthought, and more to herself than for Rich's benefit.

"And your mother?" he prompted after she hadn't continued. "Or is it a case of that she'll have to come because Sylvie asks her to?" A smile came to his lips. 

"Something like that!" she laughed.

"So what did she say to you about...us?" he asked.

"My mother doesn't say a lot. She aims to leave it to me to try and fill in the gaps. Which is actually easier said than done. I don't usually read between the lines. If you wanna tell me something, I'd rather people would just tell me, not beat around the bush and most certainly not drop hints!" she ended a little more matter-of-fact than she had wanted to. 

It was Rich's turn to laugh then, but he kept his hands on the steering wheel, smoothly turning the car in the road effortlessly.

"Well, I'm sure she would have enjoyed your driving, if she wouldn't have been constantly thinking of ways to get out of telling me the truth." Rose said, more to herself, as she wasn't concentrating on what she was even talking about.

"I think I'll take that as a compliment..." he smiled and risked a quick glance at her.

She caught his gaze and returned the smile before turning away to look out the window. 

"Rich, I have a couple of ideas I hope you'll understand my reasons for them..." she started, her hands absentmindedly turning her phone over and over in her hands, as though she might be washing her hands with a bar of soap. 

"Oh?" he said, his voice riddled with curiosity. "If I can help, I will."

"Well I was thinking that we might take the letters, especially the last two and put them in the red room. I keep trying to call it the negative room....but that doesn't stick...there is nothing negative about that room!"

"That's true. I knew which room you meant though. I think that might be a nice touch, although it could easily be crowded with three of us in there, it was intimate enough with just you and I."

Then was an air to his tone, but something told her not to look back at him then. 

"Do you have another idea then?" she asked. "I just thought of somewhere secluded, without risk of anyone coming in and...interrupting us...she would be sure to run otherwise!"

"I have an idea. Just leave it with me!" he said calmly. Calm enough for Rose to feel confident to risk another glance at him whilst he was driving. 

He looked calm, he sounded calm. How? He might as well have been blindfolded and driving his car at 100 miles per hour. That is the only thing she could think of that would have had an equal effect on her insides. The tense knot in her stomach was especially making her feel sick. The thought of what her mother would say was etching worries that rippled through her body. Although the idea that she was simply setting her hopes too high was equally sickening.