It Took The Death of Hope

Chapter 34 - Catching Up.

The Following Day;

Dylan Taylor...

Ash and I were chilling out in the back room of the bus. I would be lying if I said that this wasn't exactly what I needed. Charlie was up at the front of the bus with my brother playing computer games.

Charlie - the man has me all kinds of confused if I am completely honest. One minute I think that he is interested in me and then 2 nights ago, he had gone out on a date. A fucking date that didn't see him come home until the early hours of the morning. Now, I am not a stupid woman - I know that meant he had fucked said date. I hate that it bothers me, but it does, and it cuts deep.

Why?

Because I am falling for the man. How could I not? I mean he has been there, every step of the way in getting me away from Ken. Honestly, I had been intent on doing it all on my own but Charlie...well he just inserted himself in the situation. Not that I am ungrateful because that certainly isn't the problem. I just feel raw and exposed and with these growing feelings; I feel more alone than I ever have.

Is that normal?

"...Dy, what's wrong?" Ash asked handing me a cigarette before lighting one for herself.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean you are distracted, and you look like someone just killed your puppy!"

Was she right? Was I too transparent? I know that I have been trying to bury my feelings. I mean no good can come from pining for a man who just isn't romantically interested in me. I know that he is my friend, that isn't the issue – it's just; I don't quite know how to look at the man and not imagine the future we could have.

"I'm sorry honey, it's nothing..."

"Why don't you let me be the judge of that?" she asked softly.

"How do you do that?"

"Do what?"

"Make me feel the need to confess my deepest and darkest secrets?" I asked her.

The truth was it has always been easy to talk openly with Ash. I don't have many female friends, mainly because I hate all the drama, but with Ash - she seems to hate it as much as I do. In fact, I have seen the way she will avoid drama if she can help it.

And she sure has had plenty of it as of late. But that wasn't her fault and, give her, her due - she is working really hard to rectify that fact.

"Well since I started studying, I have found some of the tools way too easy to use...I guess this is one of them..." she blushed a bright tomato colour.

"No, you were like this before you started studying," I explained. After her attack she had confessed that she wanted to help other women who were in the same situation or who have gone through what she has and she enrolled in an online school program that would get her the proper qualifications for what she wanted to do.

I already knew that she would be amazing at it.

"Ok quit stalling, missy!" she smiled.

"I know you know how it feels to be attracted to someone and unsure if they feel the same..."

"Charlie?"

"Am I really that fucking transparent?"

"Only to me honey, because I have had that same look on my face, I have felt those same gnawing doubts and I have definitely felt the same overwhelming fear that if they find out and don't feel the same, you will lose them altogether!"