the girl on the bench

Chapter 6

I'm nervous to get to my bench today. What if she is there? After I insulted and embarrased her last night. I wonder if she'll even come. She said she would. I take the long route to the bench which involves stairs. The view is spectacular from this vantage point. The only issue is the stairs. I'm out of breath after only doing one flight. Another two to go. I'll need to take a moment when I get to the top to catch my breath. I see a flock of seagulls flying across the sky. They're not the prettiest of birds but they are still fascinating to look at. I get to the last set of stairs. I hear squawking and watch the birds fight mid-flight. Suddenly I feel myself kick the stair and I topple forward knee first unable to stop myself. I roll myself to the side so I'm sitting on the stairs. Blood is trickling from my knee where it hit the stair and I'm thankful I decided to wear shorts today. Fuck. I take a moment to catch my breath. The pain comes in full force and I practice bending my knee to gauge the level of damage. The pain isn't too bad so I pull myself up using the railing. I make it up the stairs and I know my bench isn't too much further. I wish I had tissues or something on me to stop the blood that's trickling down my leg now.

When I reach my bench, I can see it's empty. I hobble over and sit down. I stretch out my leg so my ankle rests on the ledge in front of me. The blood looks like it's stopping now, at least I hope so. I sit for a couple of minutes before hearing "Holy fuck!" I turn around to see G standing about two metres behind me. "Are you OK?" she says walking over and sitting beside me. She peers into my knee. "Yeah, I just fell" I say casually. I shrug not wanting her to know how painful it is. It's not about me feeling weak or vulnerable I just don't like the fuss. The sharp pain has stopped now, it's just a dull throb. "Can you even walk?" she asks looking genuinely concerned. Her brows are furrowed and she looks into my eyes. "Yeah, I should be right to get home I just need the bleeding to stop" I say laughing briefly, she doesn't laugh with me. "No, no, I can clean this up for you. We're going to mine, I've got some first aid stuff" she says as she pulls out her phone. I touch her hand closest to me with mine "Really, G, I'm fine" I say and she looks up at me. "I've been with girls long enough to know that the words 'I'm fine' actually mean the opposite". I laugh not knowing exactly what she means by that sentence. "I've ordered an Uber and we're going back to mine to fix you up" she says sternly. "Lucky you got here or I could have bled out and died!" I say jokingly trying to lighten the mood. Before she can even react, a car rolls up, winds down the window and yells out "Georgia?" She waves her hand at him, "One second" she says to him. She stands in front of me and holds out both her hands. I take hers in mine and she helps me up. I wince when I put pressure on my damaged leg and she furrows her brows at me. She doesn't let my hands go. "G, I can walk, it's OK" I reassure her. We make our way to the car and she opens the door for me and I get in. She runs around to the other side and gets in beside me.

The drive to her house takes no time at all. "Thanks man" G says to the driver and gets out of the car. I take in her house "Impressive" I say when I get out. "Share house" she explains and she opens the gate for me to walk through. "No one's home now though" she says. Sometimes when she says things, I don't have any clue if she is meaning something else completely. I don't know her that well yet. She leads me to a bathroom and instructs me to sit on the closed toilet. "Wow, G, even for a share house this is very upper class!" I say as she kneels down and busies herself in the cupboard underneath the sink. She takes her white hoodie off to reveal a navy t-shirt. I can't help but look at her stomach as her hoodie lifts up her t-shirt. Luckily she doesn't see me check her out. She pulls out a bucket of first aid supplies and some cotton pads. The blood has trickled down my leg now so she begins cleaning that first. "I haven't even asked, what do you do for work?" I ask her as she wets the cotton pads and kneels in front of me. "I... uh... I'm a musician" she says calmly. Her left hand holds my calf and I am so thankful that I shaved my legs this morning. I wince and inhale sharply as she dabs at my knee. She looks up at me but continues. When she pulls the pad away, the cotton pad is full of blood. She gently pats the wound with a newly dampened pad. "Is this OK?" she says looking up at me. I look into her eyes which I now notice are a blue/grey colour. They're incredible. "Sophie?" she asks me still looking at me and I snap out of my daze. "Yeah, that's fine" I say now blushing. She furrows her brows. I hope she didn't notice me staring. How could she have not noticed? Bloody hell, Soph, there's still a chance she's in a relationship and I don't want anything like that. Really. Why is she being so nice to me? She hardly knows me.