Tea & Tattoos

30☕

❝Wherever we are together that is home❞

‘’Rise and shine, baby girl!’’ Elliot said in a high pitched voice as he nudged Desiree.

‘’What time is it?’’ She groaned as she covered her head with her pillow, she loved sleep and the previous night she hadn’t had much time to sleep.

‘’It’s six thirty.’’ He told her as he grabbed her from the waist and lifted her up on him.

‘’Jeez why so early, Elliot?’’ She asked him as she stood up and turned around so she was now straddling him whilst frowning at him.

‘’I have a surprise for you, come on let’s go chop chop!’’ He joked as he playfully slapped her behind as she ran off giggling.

☯

They had been on the subway for about quarter of an hour and Desiree couldn’t stop thinking about how amazing the past three weeks in London had been. She had received some brief calls from her mother and Alice but none from her father. Life with Elliot was just perfect, they did have the occasional fight and argument here or there, but other than that everything was fine.

Another ten minutes passed on the subway and she started to think that maybe they were going to visit someone, but who?

A few minutes later they got off the subway and in a taxi, Elliot told the driver the address and sped off.

The driver continued to drive past single-story, well-kept, clapboard houses where kids played in their yards or cycled and ran around in the street. It all looked affluent and wholesome with the houses nestled among the trees.

A few minutes later, the driver turned sharply left, and they were confronted by two ornate white metal gates set in a six-foot-high, sandstone wall. Elliot paid the driver and they got out of the car hand in hand. He punched a number into the keypad and the gates swung open in welcome.
He glanced at her, and his expression had changed. He looked uncertain, nervous even.

“What is it?” She asked, she couldn’t mask the concern in her voice.
“An idea,” he said quietly as they walked through the gates.

They head up a tree-lined lane just wide enough for two cars. On one side, the trees rang a densely wooded area, and on the other there was a vast area of grassland where a once-cultivated field had been left fallow. Grasses and wildflowers had reclaimed it, creating a rural idyll—a meadow, where the early morning breeze softly rippled through the grass and the morning sun gilded the wildflowers. It’s lovely—utterly tranquil, and suddenly Desiree imagined herself lying in the grass and gazing up at a clear blue summer sky. The thought was tantalizing yet made her feel homesick for some strange reason. How odd.

The lane curved around and opened into a sweeping driveway in front of an impressive house.