That was when she reminded me that her campmates had no problem standing back and laughing when they saw her fall.
She had a point.My statement had suggested that all people were good, when I knew from first-hand experience that they weren’t.So I’d corrected myself by saying that it’d take a special kind of jerk to leave a good woman to fall to the ground without trying to help her.
Halle had nodded in agreement before launching into a full-on account of how much she’d enjoyed the horse riding (up until she’d fallen off) and what a buzz she’d gotten from seeing the views of the city.
She probably spoke to me more in that one ride back here than she had in the whole time we’d been at the hotel.
But I wasn’t complaining.And as tempted as I was to say that maybe we’d turned a corner (I mean, we even took a photo together), I wasn’t gonna jinx it, because for all I knew, tomorrow she’d be back to hating me again.
Which meant that instead of staring into her pretty brown eyes and wondering if her lips were as soft as they looked (something I’d done way too many times already today), I was gonna go back to my room and… well, I didn’t know what I was gonna do yet, but it wouldn’t involve thinking about Halle.
‘So I should get back…’ I said.
‘Yeah, me too.’ Halle said.‘I’m bursting for the loo.Sorry.TMI.You didn’t need to know that I need to wee.’
‘Speaking of that, what’s the fascination you Brits have with taking a leak?’
‘Eh?’ She frowned and I started to wonder why instead of going to my room like I’d planned, I was still choosing to have a conversation with her.And one about urinating.Jeez.I really needed to work on my conversational skills.
Well, I guess I’d taken a turn down this alley, so I had to see it through.
‘You talk about pissing a lot.I mean, we talk about being pissed off here too, but one of my British friends, or should I say, mymate,’ I said in a terrible English accent, ‘taught me a lot more.’
‘Go on then,’ she grinned and suddenly I didn’t regret my choice of subject after all.‘Let’s see how many references you can remember.’
‘Sure thing!’ I mirrored her amusement before puffing out my chest like I was ready for battle.‘Okay, so there’s takingapiss, not to be confused with the teasing phrase: takingthepiss.’
‘Well done,’ she clapped.
‘Then you havea lotof drinking-related ones, right?Likebeing on the piss,having a piss-upandbeingorgetting pissed, which is when you’re drunk.’
‘Correct.’ Halle’s smile widened.
‘Did I get them all?’
‘Not quite.There’s the weather one – so when it’s raining you can sayit’s pissing it down.’
‘That’s kinda gross.’ I winced.
‘I don’t make the rules,’ she chuckled.‘And then there’spissing around, which is when you’re wasting time, orpissing away something, so you’d use that to say you’re wasting an opportunity or something.Hmmm, what else?’ She paused as she racked her brains.‘Oh, yeah!There’s alsopiss-take, which is like when something’s ridiculous, like, “Fifty dollars for a bit of mince?That’s a piss-take!”’
‘Not if it’s prime beef mince though, right?’ I teased, remembering our conversation about my ‘beefy’ arms.
‘Right.In that case, the beef would be worth every cent…’
Her eyes dropped to my arms and when I caught her biting her lip, I had to admit that I enjoyed knowing that she liked my arms.If ogling them is what it took to get her to smile, I’d take it.
‘I should…’ She broke the silence.
‘Go and take a piss?’ I lifted an eyebrow.
‘You taking the piss?’ she joked and the sound of her laugh was almost as thrilling as watching the way her face lit up when she smiled.‘No, seriously,’ she started jiggling around on the spot, ‘I really need to go.Bye!’ Halle ran off.‘And thanks again,Hero!’
And with that, she was gone.
Hero, huh?
I had to admit, as nicknames went, that wasn’t a bad one.
