Chapter Thirteen

 

Over the next several moments, Sara listened to Mel quietly release her tears.  Now she was utterly quiet.  You’d think she were dead if it weren’t for her warmth and the barely noticeable rise and fall of her chest.

“Sweet dreams,” she whispered into her companion’s ear and kissed her forehead, then slid out of the bed and covered her up.  Taking one last glance back to make sure Mel was undisturbed Sara went out to the living room.  Her target was easy to find, he was lounging on the couch half asleep.  Sara snuck up and jumped on him.

“Holy s**t!”  Jared said, half laughing.

“Shh, Mel’s asleep.”  Sara smiled and it reached her eyes, which held a mischievous twinkle in them.

Jared made a little “o” shape with his lips but made no sound.

Propping her chin up on her arms, on his chest, she looked down at him.  “Tired?”

“Just a little.”

“Did you sleep well at all last night?”

“Yeah, actually I did.  I had you for company.”

“Smart a*s.  What about Mel, did she sleep at all?  I mean I know she was pretty much out of it when I came out here, but it seems like she’s exhausted.”

“Thinking and worrying will do that to you.”

Sara was confused, sort of.  “What do you mean thinking and worrying?”

He gave one of those graceful shrugs that can mean everything or nothing at all and you couldn’t tell which it was at that time.  “I just know it takes a toll on you.”

“When were you worrying that much?”

“I worry a lot, you just don’t know it.”

“Please don’t tell me it was about me too?  It’s bad enough what I’m doing to Mel.  You don’t need to go through it too.”  She frowned at him.

“Hey, don’t frown.  It’s fine.  I haven’t been worrying lately at all.”

“Are you sure?”  She made it sound accusative.

“Yes.  I’m sure.”

“Okay.”  With that she started to get up off of him, but he grabbed her.

“You don’t have to move.”

“You look uncomfortable.”

“I’m not.”

“Um…  I’m uncomfortable?”

“You don’t look it.”  He gave one of those grins that seem to say, “I win.”

“I know.”  She gave a smile and laid back down, but this time it was more next to him than directly on him. 

Jared smiled back, clasping his hand around hers and let out a sigh, somewhat like a sigh of relief.  He lay there with a relaxed posture, there was no tension whatsoever in that muscled, sculpted body.  He was in a state of contentedness that must have baffled Sara because it showed on her face.

“What?”

“Nothing.  I just don’t understand you at all.”

He laughed abruptly, unexpectedly, “well thank you, but you’re not exactly the easiest person to understand either.”

“I know.  I just don’t understand what you see in me other than an emotional wreck with magnetism for issues.”  She shook her head, “then again, maybe I’m not supposed to.”

Jared just looked at her.  His mouth half-parted, as if he had something to say, but it wasn’t clearly defined yet.

“What?”

“Did you just give up that little argument?”

“What argument, we didn’t have one.  If you’re talking about the discussion we had about my stubbornness, then yeah…  I did.”  That moment, Sara knew Mel was right.  She loved Jared, she wasn’t in love with him, but she loved him.  She wouldn’t just give up like that for just anyone or anything.  It had to be hard earned.  No one said a thing for a space of heartbeats.

Normally, silence didn’t bother Sara.  This wasn’t normally.  This silence wasn’t friendly.  It had a sense of an oddity that she couldn’t even place.  A mixture of not knowing what to say, yet, knowing and wanting to say it so bad it made your chest ache with unsaid words.  Yeah, that was it.  She wanted the silence to break because she didn’t know what to say.  It seemed like Jared wasn’t going to say anything either, so they just looked at one another.

Mel broke the silence.  “Umm… am I missing something?”

“Huh?”  Sara had jumped just a little.

“Well… you two are staring at each other like you’re catatonic and you just jumped at my voice.”

“No.  I mean nothing.  We’re fine.”  She smiled and it barely reached her eyes.

Mel looked at Sara, then at Jared, then back to Sara, put her hands on her hips, shook her head and walked away.

“Okay then…”  This from Jared.

Sara shrugged.  It’d be better to stay quiet and let Mel do whatever she had to do first, if she was upset, that is.