Best Friends, Remember?

Surprise, surprise!

A bright ray of sunshine has appeared in the room and interrupted Jared’s sleep. He slowly tried to open his eyes, but his eyelids didn’t seem willing to cooperate. Finally, he won the battle. Jared has opened his eyes and saw a frightening amount of dust all over the room. He was eventually able to see the room in all its glory. It was nicely furnished with some grey and white, wooden chairs attached to a small table, an old-looking wardrobe and a little coffee table right next to the door, where he found a dusty, empty vase, with no flowers or water in it. Jared rubbed his face with his hands and finally decided to move forward. He sat on the bed and checked if he still had his denim cap and his bag with him. They were safe, lying against the wall. Jared looked around the room once again and smelt something delicious coming behind the locked door. This smell took him downstairs, where he found Genevieve – standing in the kitchen and cooking.

“I’m preparing some breakfast for us” she informed Jared, as he appeared on the stairs.

Jared smiled shocked and joined her. He sat down at the counter, near enough to see what was Genevieve doing. The cooker was saved by

a small jug and a kettle. It started to whistle, so she drew some tea for themselves and with an amused mine she gave Jared his plate.

“Check this out”

She removed a cover from the jug and suddenly a white and warm stream floated above an orange liquid which was inside the jug. They both leant their heads and smelled it.

“Cool” commented Jared, laughing.

“I couldn’t resist it” Genevieve explained grinning; “I’ve picked up this pumpkin from Stan’s garden. That was the smallest one. I couldn’t handle carrying other ones. They were way too heavy” she added.

They both sat next to each other and started eating their breakfast. It all smelt and tasted deliciously, judging by their faces and pleasant purr.

“That’s awesome. I’ve never eaten anything so tasty in my life” Jared complemented, so Genevieve thanked him and blushed a bit; “What is it?” he asked”

“Pumpkin cream. With some spices from the kitchen. I think it was oregano and powdered ginger… If my senses don’t lie” she responded.

“It’s delicious” admitted Jared. Genevieve thanked him; besides… I can’t cook” he added.

She looked at him and said:

“You know, it’s very simple. I can teach you if you want…”

Jared smirked and continued eating the meal.

When they finished, Genevieve stood up to do the dishes.

“No!” suddenly Jared also stood up very quickly. Genevieve froze in one place and didn’t say anything until Jared made the first step.

“Let me do that. You’ve done enough”

“Oh… that’s nice, thank you. I believe I saw the washing-up liquid over there” she said and leant to reach the plastic bottle placed under the sink; “Here you go” she added passing it to Jared.

He thanked and started washing.

“You know, since we’re stuck in here, we could do something productive…” started Genevieve.

“Like what?” asked Jared after turning to Genevieve.

“I was thinking of cleaning up this place. I mean, just look around… What a mess!” she said outraged. She walked closer to Jared and leant under the sink again.

“I’m pretty sure, there’s also a sweep in here…”

She was trying to find it and successfully did.

“Got it. Would be nice if I only found some broom too…”

Jared has finished doing the dishes and dried his hands with a cloth which was hanging on the wall.

“How about… here…” he opened a high, but not wide wardrobe and surprisingly found a broom inside it.

“Smartass” she complimented him.

He bit his bottom lip and smiled.

They have been cleaning up, dusting and sweeping every furniture in the house, while listening to some music on Stan’s adapter. They found a great chart on a vinyl plate, already put in the machine. It was “Mr. Blue Sky” by ELO, accompanying Jared and Genevieve all the time. They didn’t want to change the song, as far as they loved it very much and decided to stream it over and over again. Anytime it ended, they replayed it with smiles on their faces and co-agreement.

They spent a lot of time cleaning, but fortunately enjoying themselves. Chairs, wardrobes, tables, shelves, books, cupboards, desks, rugs, the carpet lying in the hall, chandeliers, lamps, chests of drawers, the big, dark green armchair in the living room, the big globe placed next to it, table sheets, cutlery, plates, bowls, cups and mugs, even the bath, the washbasin and the toilet. Everything was dusted, washed or even polished, so it finally looked like a civilised house. It stopped looking like a ghost house. An abandoned one. Even haunted. Wooden integument wasn’t all covered by dust and dirt, it became shiny again thanks to Jared who polished them diligently and properly. Cleaning up the tables, cutlery and all the plates made eating doable again.

“I cannot somehow imagine, how could Stan and Joan in such a messy place!” astonished Genevieve.

“Maybe it wasn’t so scruffy when Joan was home” he supposed.

“But still… that is unbelievable to neglect this place in such a short period of time” she pushed.

“I guess” admitted Jared; “it is weird”

Moving forward, both Genevieve and Jared discovered, that not all the rooms were open. Actually two of them were locked: first – room on the first floor, second – attic. Jared tried to unlock both of them by using different keys, found in a drawer next to the bed. He even asked Genevieve, if she had any hairpin with herself. She had, but it didn’t work, so he gave it back to her and they dropped the topic.

Jared and Genevieve went outside to continue tidying up – they swept all the fallen leaves at one spot, took out the tools and put them into the garage. They collected the rocks out from the pavement and Jared repaired the window glass on the porch. Genevieve dusted a pretty hanging ornament, which rang, when she moved it. It shined in early evening gentle sunshine. She smiled to herself and watched Jared repairing Stan’s wooden shed door. He knew exactly what to pick, where to put stuff and so on. Genevieve bit her bottom lip and started looking intensively at Jared, admiring his handiness. He had no idea. That felt fun for her. But suddenly he took a look at Genevieve and started being suspicious.

“What?” he asked in a joky way.

“Nothing” she responded, leaning against the wall with arms crossed.

“You’re grinning” he laughed.

“No, I’m not” she denied.

“Oh, so what is that wide thing on your face?”

She immediately realised that she WAS indeed grinning all the time.

“Damn it!” she cursed, which made Jared laugh. He took something away from the ground and threw it to Genevieve.

“Catch this!” Jared shouted and threw Genevieve a bottle of orange juice; “Just hoping Stan won’t mind taking this from his fridge. Cause that’s the only thing he had…” he smirked.

“Oh, God… you’re a one…” Genevieve said rolling her eyes. She caught the glass bottle and sat at the porch next to Jared. He noticed Genevieve couldn’t handle opening the cap.

“May I?”

She passed him her bottle, so he opened them pushing both bottle caps against each other. They both opened and the caps jumped out and fell on the floor.

“Wow, now I see you have to teach me a lot of things”

Jared just laughed and drank two sips of the juice.

“I’ll try”

Genevieve and Jared were sitting calmly, drinking their orange juice, when suddenly a stronger wind has blown. More new leaves fell on the ground which made Jared and Genevieve groan. They saw some upcoming dark clouds, that slowly started to cover the setting sun. It became darker, but still bright enough to see things freely.

“That’s interesting…” Jared commented the situation; “we better come inside”

“Okay” agreed Genevieve, but then she suddenly stopped and gave

a frightened look at an unknown spot.

“What?” asked worried Jared.

“Oh, no!” shouted Genevieve and started running straight ahead.

“Wait!” shouted Jared and followed her.

She ran on the road, passed some bushes and ran into some lonely field.

An old-fashioned van was heading the gravel path and there seemed to be no driver. The thing, that scared her was, that in the middle of the road there was sitting a small dog, which apparently had no idea about the danger it was in. The van kept going straight ahead them and didn’t seem to slow down. Genevieve screamed and grabbed the dog. Jared grabbed her just in front of van’s hood and pushed her out of the road. They – Jared holding Genevieve, who was holding the dog – have turned into a slope. The van passed them and stopped only at the end of the road.

Jared was lying on Genevieve, covering her all. The dog slipped out of Genevieve’s hug and sat next to her face. It made Jared and Genevieve look straight into each others eyes. They were sighing and deeply breathing.

“What were you thinking?!” he asked quite calmly, but also shocked.

She didn’t respond.

“Don’t you ever do that again, okay?”

She shook her head, while intensively looking into Jared’s deep, brown eyes. He was doing exactly the same. He leant little lower to reach Genevieve’s lips. When he was about to touch them with his, the dog barked loudly, so they turned their heads to it. They slowly started laughing and the dog began to wag its tail happily.

Jared stood up and helped Genevieve to stand. The atmosphere has changed and something sparkled between them. They knew it. They could feel it in their bones.

Suddenly Jared’s face fell. He noticed, that the van driver had got out of the car and was heading them. Jared went upset. He started walking faster towards the man. Genevieve saw that and desperately tried to stop him before doing something stupid. The man seemed sorry.

“Hey, you!” called him Jared.

“No, Jared, drop it…” begged Genevieve.

“No way, he almost killed you and the dog!” Jared’s voice didn’t seem to go calmer. He walked heavily to the man and tightened his jaw dangerously.

“What the f**k was that?!” yelled Jared and got closer to the man, bit aggressively.

“Whoa, whoa, easy, easy, man” reacted the man, when Jared grabbed his jacket’s collar and had him up against the car.

“I swear, I didn’t mean to hurt you, guys! I didn’t see you, I just dropped my keys and I leant to pick them up, I swear, please, let me go!” panicked the man. There was a long silent pause. Jared calmed himself down a bit. His breath went slow and deep again. He swallowed saliva and let the man go. The man took a deep relief breath and apologised again. Jared looked insecurely into his eyes and said quietly:

“I’m sorry…”

The man’s face told that he forgave, even though didn’t say a word – he was too shocked and still blamed himself for the incident.

Genevieve touched Jared’s arm tenderly, but he rapidly walked away and escaped from the friendly gesture.

“Jared…”

He was heading the Mist Hill, through the wheat field and dried grass. Genevieve could see his back and some rays of setting sun marking on his denim jacket. She felt sympathy and repentance from him. The dog ran to Jared and started to merge to his leg. Jared smiled weakly and stroked dog’s head. He knelt to the dog and roughed its golden fur. He suddenly turned his head to Genevieve with the same polite smile he gave to the dog. Genevieve noticed that and said goodbye to the man (she found out his name was Gus). Passing by, he waved to Jared and Genevieve, so they waved back.

“Oh, boy…” sighed Genevieve.

“Sorry you had to see this, I just…” started Jared, but Genevieve interrupted him.

“Sh…” and hugged him warmly. He clung to her arm, neck and could feel the smell of her hair. They smelt very nice, like some flowers. Lilies, thought Jared.

“You probably think I’m a monster, but…”

“No, God, no!” panicked Genevieve; “I never thought about you that way. I just don’t. And I never will” she assured him.

He giggled after hearing Genevieve confessing like that.

“Okay, okay. I get it. Good to know” he giggled once again.

Suddenly, the dog that has been rescued by them, jumped high, so it could join the big hug.

“Hey, buddy!” greeted Jared and knelt down with Genevieve. They both started to stroke the dog.

“You know, he probably needs a name” suggested Jared.

“He? What if it’s a she?”

Jared took a short look down and straightened again.

“Nope… trust me…” and they both laughed.

“How about…?”

Jared was holding dog’s ears tenderly and looking deeply into its eyes, pursing his lips.

“… Jack?…” offered him.

“Yeah… I like it. I really love it! Why Jack?”

“I used to have a dog called Jack” responded Jared.

“Used to?” astonished Genevieve.

“Yeah. He’s been murdered. Gosh, such a good doggo…”

“Oh, my. Murdered? By whom?”

Jared shook his head.

“I don’t know…”

“Oh… So in honour of Jack, let it stay” she said looking at sad Jared politely, pursing her lips. It seemed that she cheered him up.

 “Thanks. That means a lot. So – here we are, Jack…”