A Fiery Dalliance

XXII

"Anxiety is love's greatest killer. It makes others feel as you might when a drowning man holds on to you. You want to save him, but you know he will strangle you with his panic." Anais Nin

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XXII.

Perrie had assured her mother that she would return in mere moments after seeking some air outside. She did not need accompanying for such a brief interlude.

It was then, as Joe held Perrie in his arms and kissed her as though she was his source of life in that moment, that Perrie thought that God was on her side.

How she managed to think about God at a time like this was a dilemma for another day, but she was quite certain that God had made it so that they were not seen as Perrie was quite unprepared for a scandal that would follow such a compromising position.

Perrie was far too stunned to know what to do. She didn't know what to do anyway, but she certainly had no idea of how to respond to Joe Parish, of all people, kissing her. Her head and her heart were a mess with conflict. Shock at the suddenness of his actions, but sympathy at the scene that she had witnessed between him and his father that had led to her following him outside.

She hated Joe, and Joe hated her. Every thought in her head protested this. It did not make any sense and she couldn't understand it. Perrie's body responded in the way her mind was going. To Joe, it must have felt like holding onto a stiff plank of wood.

Joe broke the kiss and pulled away slowly, his eyes as wide as midnight-coloured saucers as they bore down into Perrie's. Perrie was suddenly acutely aware that her feet were dangling slightly beneath her, and that Joe had lifted her into his arms in order to make their differences in height more forgiving.

Joe gently set Perrie down on the ground, and they both stared at one another. Despite the darkness, Perrie could see the desperate searching upon Joe's face. Perrie's lips parted to speak, and Joe stiffened in anticipation, but no words came out. Perrie's tongue was swollen, and her racing mind was anything but coherent.

What had just happened between them?

"Do you hate me?" Joe whispered, his voice barely audible above a breath of wind.

"Y-yes," Perrie stammered.

Perrie hated Joe in the way that he hated her. It was their sport, their competition, and they both loathed each other in a mutually beneficial way. But she did not think that Joe understood her in that moment as he took several large steps away from her.

"I'm sorry," he uttered. "I don't know what came over me. That was unforgivable." His voice was blunt and emotionless, and Perrie was watching him shut down before her eyes.

It sparked a panic in her. "Joe!" she protested, stumbling towards him over the tufts of lawn underfoot. "I saw your conversation with your father. I wanted to ask after you. I wanted to ensure that you were well –"

"You were eavesdropping?" Joe snapped sharply.

"No, I –"

"Was inserting yourself into business which does not involve you," Joe interjected. He moved away from her again, though he had backed himself into a large hedgerow.

He was wounded. Perrie knew him well enough to know his face, she could also tell when he was hurting.

"When did you know that I wasn't Ed?" he suddenly asked, though gone was the nervous, disbelieving relief that had flooded his voice moments earlier when he had discovered that Perrie had known it was him. His tone was accusatory now. "Did you always know? Were you mocking me? Were you planning on using this to your advantage and punishing me for it?"