What the hell did I do, never been the type to, let someone see right through...
Quin turned the small creme colored envelope that held a card stock letter over in his fingers as the two pristine black Land Rovers rolled through hills of Scotland toward a house in Dunkeld. Though he’d not been to it in ages, the man knew the place well in his own typical way. The edges of the envelope that held that little card were soft now from moving from perfectly tailored coat pocket to coat pocket. He’d lost track of how many times he’d seen her since or how many times he’d thought about what he’d written on it. The words, perhaps at the time, felt more like a want than a need. However, time had only made them all the more true... which he found incredibly frustrating under the circumstances.
He could still remember the way Sun had looked over the counter at the card, trying to read what he was still writing after she’d finished packing up three different chocolate sets to mail out in the late July heat. Quin knew he wasn’t ready to share it by the tension that had risen in his shoulders and the look he’d given the innocent shop owner, but he wrote it down anyways. It was as if he knew this soul had put just enough pressure and warmth on his hard exterior that, if given the time and space, would inevitably crack him. In that moment, and once again, he found himself frustrated.
Time and distraction had historically always sufficient in keeping his mind off of unwanted reflection of his life choices. This was no longer the case and, for some subconscious reason, the card had never made into the secret compartment on his bedside table where he kept the few personal items in his house that no one had access to or seen. Letters from his Libs, photographs of his little brother laughing at a birthday party and his mother with his first dog in her lap. The sentimentality of the abundance of items in that drawer were as secret as most things in his life, but the little chocolate letter never made it in and now it traveled with him to a place where he knew he’d turn it over, be it to fire or the hand of its rightful owner.
Knowing that Eittie was in the little cottage on the River Tays was something he’d been sure of before making the long trek out of his comfort zone. Quin also knew that she was smart enough to understand that all their little run-ins were surely not just happenstance. As the cars lulled to a stop a mile from the cottage at his command, Teague looked at his perfectly pristine shoes and the long gravel walk head before concealing his custom Les Baer tactical handgun and getting out of the car, marching toward her cottage. At his cautious pace, listening to the sound of the echo beneath his feet as he thought about the moments that head led up to the decision to finally turn the small card over. Quin could confidently say he was ready to turn it over and answer anything she’d have to ask, no limit on questions and a less dance-around-it nature than he’d graced her with through every day they’d spent together.
His knuckles rapped on the door with the firm smack of purpose, the card already in his other hand. With a wide stance, his left hand holding his right wrist, Quin appeared to be there moreso for trouble than truth. Still, when the door opened and the glow of setting sun hit the fiery hair of the Scot, he briefly lost his rehearsed words, managing neither a hello nor the rehearsal. Instead, he greeted her with his heavy gaze and a quick study, some of his usual stubbornness surfacing so that he couldn’t muster the emotion of his thoughts; You look resplendent, Dearg. Holding out the small card to her, Quin broke his gaze, “This was supposed to come with some chocolates from Rome last summer.”
Regardless of the courage or selfishness in turning that piece of paper over, the eminent start or end of something held him in place on her doorstep with the weight of all the doors he’d closed on her. Quin waited for her to read the little thing before he spoke.
I don’t want other people to decide who I am, finding it both more interesting and less disappointing to discover the world on my own. I was petrified by the deafening loneliness it had created and yet, until I met you, it was an ache that I was wholly unaware of. I’ve been living in an inescapable reality that no one has ever intrigued me as much as you, let alone beyond the parameters of something sexual. The banality of every person I’ve encounter since meeting you has made me all the more grateful that you’ve put up with me. Until your next interrogation, I’ll be thinking of that damned smile and curious mind.
When her eyes stopped rolling over the words of the short letter, Quin set out to say what he felt he should have told her months ago but perhaps hadn’t been ready to say or realized when he wrote the card. Moreover, he was aware of all she’d been through since and that she could very well not be interested nor the same person the letter was meant for. “In my own selfishness, I refused to listen to your needs when, like a child, you denied me my exact wants. It was a mistake that took me far to long to stand in front of you and apologize for, but Eittie, if we could talk through it...” He sighed and for the first time in two decades an expression of something resembling timidness found his face., “I need you in my life, beyond the capacity with which you’ve already blessed me.”
