Currents

Twenty-nine ~ Lifestyle

Twenty-nine ~ Lifestyle

I've never had a one-night stand, so I've never experienced that awkward situation of waking up next to someone and not knowing whether to stay or leave. Brent slept beside me, still clothed—like me. I wondered if we'd both fallen asleep during the film or if he'd stayed dressed out of courtesy.

I shuffled further down the bed, pulling the sheet higher up my body. Brent stirred. I froze, not wanting to wake him; this was such an awkward time for us both to acknowledge I'd stayed. Would I need to leave? Or would he just tell me to go back to sleep, hence making it a perfectly acceptable arrangement?

Maybe staying the night didn't carry such a stigma here. Maybe Brent didn't care either way. Maybe he liked the company. Maybe—

"You awake?" His soft, husky voice interrupted my train of thought.

"Yeah. Sorry, I fell asleep."

Stupid thing to do, pointing out the obvious. Everything felt a lot more real now we weren't drunk and using the excuse of alcohol to kiss each other.

He rubbed at his eyes and rolled over to face me. "Don't apologise. Can I get you anything? Water? Something to eat?"

It was a toss-up between not wanting to inconvenience him and having something to do to fill the awkward time and satisfy my grumbling stomach.

"Perhaps some toast," I said. "Whatever you've got in."

Brent padded over towards the kitchen, the occasional floorboard creaking under his feet, and disappeared around the corner where I heard the odd clatter of pans or banging of cupboard doors. Alone, I stretched my limbs and dared to check my appearance in my phone's camera.

My eye make-up had smudged, black lines streaking across my face. I rubbed away at it, attempting to tidy up the mess at least a little. Within the depths of my bag, I sourced a bobble and scraped my tangled hair back into a high ponytail, already feeling more alive and refreshed.

When Brent returned with my toast, he did a double take at my sudden change.

"You look so different with your hair back." Rather than expanding on that, he jerked his head towards the door. "The sun should be rising soon. D'you want to eat outside?"

With every day that passed, I noted something else I'd miss when I left. Money bought holidays to exotic destinations where I could watch the sun rise as much as I liked, but it wasn't the same as having it on your doorstep—which is where Brent and I sat as we ate our toast and gazed across the calm surface of the ocean, towards the vanishing horizon in the distance where the tiniest glow of orange peeked out.

"Can I ask you something?" I said, in a quiet voice. "You don't have to talk about it if you'd rather not."

"Sure," he replied, with a hint of trepidation that mirrored my own hesitance.

"Where are your parents?"

For a lengthy period, he stayed silent. Perhaps I'd crossed the line. He'd been cagey for the majority of summer, and most of his admissions had been voluntary. Was it really my place to ask, anyway?

"They're not here anymore," he eventually said. "My mom became ill when I was fifteen, and Dad couldn't handle it. I'm not sure if it was fear or cowardice—or maybe they hadn't been getting along—but he left the day after my sixteenth birthday."

"I'm sorry," I said, even though I knew people hated hearing that as a means of showing sympathy. I was sorry, but I doubted Brent would appreciate my pity.