Tears stream down my face. I know I should be getting in the car now, but I can’t bring myself to leave the house. I’m safe here, and I don’t have to pretend to be okay. Out there, I’m completely vulnerable, especially with Josh.
I want to call Mereki. I want to tell him to come back to me. I want him to hold me in his arms and tell me that the last five years have just been a rough patch to end all rough patches and that we are going to be okay. Is that too much to ask?
I pick up my phone and drop it again like it’s on fire. I can’t call him. He won’t answer. The bastard won’t pick up the fucking phone. Anger rises in my belly, and I scoop up the phone again, tossing it across the room. To my irritation, it doesn’t make contact with anything hard and just slides across the carpet and bumps limply into the couch.
Returning to the bedroom, I catch sight of myself in the full-length mirrored doors of the built-in wardrobe and sigh. I am a mess. Puffy, red eyes, a blotchy face, slumped shoulders. I am dishevelled in my melancholy. Perhaps I can call Josh and tell him I can’t make it today. Then what? I mope around the house all weekend, missing Mereki? I’m so pathetic. It’s all I ever seem to do. It’s a good thing he keeps going away for short work stints, I tell myself.
“I can’t do this,” I say out loud to my reflection in the mirror. I hate the sound of those defeatist words, and I hate the person I see staring back at me. I barely recognise her anymore from the strong, resilient survivor I was as a child. I’m now just a breathing shell of a person shuffling my way through a miserable existence. “Something has to change.” I narrow my eyes. “You.” I point at myself in the mirror. “Need to sort out your shit, and you need to sort it out quickly.”
I’m dancing on dangerous territory here, and I have no idea how I feel about it. One thing I do know is that nothing changes if you keep doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result. That’s the definition of insanity, and I know I’m walking a fine line.
With that pep talk spurring me on, I pick up my bag, leaving my home and my comfort zone in my wake.
It takes me an hour and fifteen minutes to arrive at the Cat and Mouse. Despite leaving later than I planned, the traffic was light, and I arrive just after nine. I might even be the first of the group to arrive, so I take the opportunity to get a coffee and use the facilities. Holding my takeaway coffee cup, I wander out onto the back deck.
“It’s beautiful here, isn’t it?” Josh asks.
I hadn’t even realised he had joined me; I was so entranced by the forest surrounding me. I meet his gaze and smile, nodding, before taking another sip of coffee. “How long have you lived here?”
“Ten years give or take,” he replies. “The land has been in our family forever, and my father would bring us here for camping weekends when we were kids.”
“And you like it here more than the city.”
He nods, then sips his coffee and says nothing further. I peek up at him over my coffee cup and stare at his profile. He appears lost in thought, and it gives me a moment to appreciate his strong jawline. There is something incredibly calm about him. He appears so self-assured and at peace with his life. I could be making wild assumptions. I, of all people, know how to put on a happy face, but I can’t shake the feeling that this man is content in his own skin.
He meets my gaze and holds it for a few seconds until I’m forced to look away. He peeled back a layer of my defences with just one intense look, and I feel exposed despite the multitude remaining. “We better head back out the front in case others have arrived,” he says, a warm smile lighting his hypnotic eyes.
I nod, turning on my heel and heading back through the cafe, tossing my half-empty coffee in the trash, and out onto the gravel verge to where my car is parked.
Zoey, Brooke, Tennyson, Kaye, and Eric are all assembled out front standing by two cars. They must have shared, and I’m struck by how much of a loner I am. I would never have thought to arrange carpooling. I’ve become accustomed to doing everything on my own.
“Emerson,” Brooke says, waving her whole arm excitedly. “You made it.”
“I did.” I smile. “I’m looking forward to it.”
“Okay,” Josh says, waving his arm over his head in a beckoning gesture. “I’m in the white Landcruiser, so just follow me. It’s only ten or fifteen minutes away, but the entrance is not easily spotted.”
Returning to our respective cars, I fall in behind Josh, and we follow him along a winding road weaving through a forest. We pass the occasional driveway but not many, and it’s a far cry from the hustle and bustle of the city. After no more than fifteen minutes, Josh turns into a gravel driveway, and we follow. There is no gate, but we bump over a cattle grid to gain entry. He was right. There are no clear identifiers marking the property other than a small, black mailbox and, with no house visible from the road, it would be easy to miss the driveway altogether. It is so very private, and it feels like it’s a privilege to be here. We weave through tall trees before ascending a small incline.
Josh’s Landcruiser disappears over the crest ahead of me, and I hit the accelerator a little harder to keep up. When I reach the top, the view that greets me is awe-inspiring.