Tyson liked the s’mores and we then spent that night cuddled up while he talked about books he liked.
He showed me all sorts of paintings in his garage painted by his uncle and that made me really sad for him. If the paintings were put on exhibit you could line them up, all thirty or forty of them and call them, “Bi-polar. Illustrations of the highs and the lows.”
I also saw a stack of other paintings, but Ty stopped me from looking at those. He said they were more graphic ones of his mother, that they were too upsetting to look at as well as some of the ones he’d painted when he was young, and that he didn’t want me to see them.
I didn’t push. Something in his eyes told me not to.
In the past few days, I’ve spent 24/7 with him and it’s been bliss. We spent time cleaning up together. I bought a mop when we got s’mores stuff and he acted like mopping was fun. It was adorable. We also cleaned up the other bedroom. Everything smelled like Pine-Sol when we were done, and he kept breathing it in as if it was the best smell ever.
Thursday, we did some more organizing and hung out outside weeding the garden beds and cutting the grass. He had one of those ancient manual push mowers and the place was already looking a lot better. It was also pretty warm that day and he cut the grass with no shirt on. That was fun to watch.
I showed him some nice pictures online of pretty landscaping ideas and suggested he get some flowers sometime, and then he immediately took me in his truck to the nearest garden center ten miles away and bought all sorts of flowers as well as some patio furniture for the porch. And a bunch of vegetable seeds.
He was trying to make this place a home for me. He was trying to encourage me to settle in here. Grow herbs. Vegetables.
Root me.
He started a compost pile back away from the house, too, and made a point of taking our organic waste from the kitchen scraps to it after each meal, like it was something important, because he was doing it for me.
God, he was sweet.
And affectionate. Normally, I got annoyed when a guy was too demonstrative with me, found it clingy and unattractive. But not so with Tyson. I couldn’t get enough of how cuddly he was. He was always touching me, making eye contact with me, looking at me like he found me fascinating.
But that he was talking about painting the house, going to the furniture store; it was freaking me out.
Because I could stay here with him.
I could.
It was tempting.
So very tempting.
Things were hot and heavy, but we both knew I wasn’t ready to declare that I’d stay and it created tension at times that resulted in marathon sex sessions where it was like he was convinced I was just a few orgasms away from agreeing to spend my life with him. Though, like I said, he never asked. He told me I was staying with his actions, with his plans that included me picking the furnishings and tending a garden.
I sent twice daily check-in texts to Mom and Amelia to prove to them I was alive. I rejected phone calls and hadn’t listened to any more voicemails. All that and being vague in my texts despite Mom pushing to get more information about where I was and her digging for more information on Tyson.
She was being peculiar about it, really. Aunt Nelle always said mom was a little psychic, had great intuition. Did she sense something was off kilter here?
I got a text from Amelia an hour ago asking me whether I was meeting her at the dress shop or at her apartment.
I tucked my phone away before Ty saw the message. I still had to tell Tyson that tomorrow, I have to go home.
I need to go home, check on the apartment, which has been empty since my roommate Tamara is in Jamaica with her boyfriend, and I need to go for my final fitting for Amelia’s wedding. All the bridesmaids and both my mom and Rick’s mom are going for dinner afterwards.
I’ve got the feeling, after his behavior so far, that he’d take issue with this. Not only would he take issue with this, he’d try to stop me.
I was thinking I’d buy him a cell phone today. I’d do that while dress shopping and then sit him down very calmly after the party and tell him that I had to leave but that this didn’t mean it was the end for us.
I wasn’t saying goodbye, just going home and we could talk and make plans to get together again soon. I didn’t have to worry about work for a while, but I needed to go home for the fitting and to check on the apartment and get my flippin’ head together (not that I’d say that) and then I could come back again. For a visit. See where things went from there.