My only problem was the hotel was booked full for that night, and there were no other rooms for me to book for her, and we left tomorrow.
If she wasn’t comfortable staying, I’d drive home that night, no problem. All I wanted was for us to go at whatever pace she was comfortable with, and something told me staying in the sameroom on our official first date might not be her ideal plan. Scotland was different. We might have spent every day together, but we always had our own hotel rooms. Even in the cottage, we might have shared the house, but we were always separated at night. But all my worrying seemed to be for nothing after I explained to Lennon the issue.
“You understand that there’s just one room, right? For both of us to share.” Good, Theo, be as clear as possible, limit any possibility of confusion.
“Umm, yeah. That’s fine, it’s just one night. Unless you have an issue with it,” she replied. Me have an issue with not only being able to have her on my arm for the party but that I get an entire night to be close to her? I didn’t think I could find it in me to refuse the situation, even if it was the right thing to do.
I cleared my throat. “As long as you’re okay with it,” I said.
“Theo, it’s fine, I promise.” With that, a grin spread across my face that I had no desire to change. Since the party was for my work exclusively, I came down the day before to oversee the setup and Lennon would arrive the next day on her own. Not how I hopedit would be, but I was still grateful she was choosing to come at all.
We were about two hours away from the exhibition starting, and Lennon texted that she was walking into the hotel. I raced to the elevator and tapped my feet impatiently while I waited for the cart to hit the ground floor. The doors opened with a ding, and I stepped out, scanning the room for any sign of her. She was passing through the revolving doors when I saw her. She had her dress slung over her arm and was tugging up a bag strap up over her shoulder. Before she saw me coming, I was by her side, taking the bag from her before it got caught in the merry-go-round doors, and it pulled her in for another spin. She looked up as she stumbled to confirm I was not a thief and offered a bright greeting and slung her dress into my other open hand with a thanks.
She looked me up and down as her brows creased together. “You’re already… ready. I’m not late, right?” Her eyes gave me another once over that had me pulling at the bottom of my suit jacket and looking down at my loafer clad feet. I wore my normal attire to these types of parties, black on black on black, so I blended into the background of wherever I was with the hope of slipping out early.
“I have a few more things to do before it starts, so I got ready early.” We walked toward the elevator and stood in comfortable silence on the ride up. Taking the lead as we walked down the hall, we stopped in front of the room. I twisted my body towards her and offered my hip. “My hands are full. Can you grab the room key?” She hummed out a response, and her hand snake into my pocket, while she let her fingers trail firmly along my leg until she reached the plastic card.
I felt like a fucking fifteen-year-old schoolboy whose girlfriend just touched him for the first time. I cleared my throat and awkwardly shifted my body away from her, but I saw a smirk cross her face before she walked into the room. There was a laugh that escaped Lennon as I followed her inside. My head whipped over to her, and I immediately scrambled over my words. “We don’t haveto stay here. We can drive back home tonight if you’re not up to this.”
I was an idiot. What was I thinking? I knew what I was thinking, actually, and I was an idiot for it.
She rolled her eyes at me and walked over to the bed closest to the window and climbed onto it to sit in a crisscross fashion; the sun had begun to set and was splashing rose colored light into the room. It draped her in a soft glow that I couldn’t take my eyes off of. I’d rather skip the party altogether and stay here with her. It didn’t matter if we sat in silence for the rest of the night, it would still end up being one of the best night of my life.
“I’m serious, Len. If this is too much, we can go.” She barked out another laugh. She was fresh faced and barefoot. I could die right now and I would have no issue with this being my last sight.
“It’s fine. Honestly, I was half expecting to walk into a room with one bed is all.” She said it so nonchalantly, but my blood had suddenly caught on fire.
She thought there was going to be one bed in a room that we were sharing and came, anyway. I pocketed this information for now. If I thought about it any longer, I would lose all sense of decorum. “So, I’ll leave you to…” I cleared my throat again as I started to back out of the room, “get ready, and I’ll meet you in the lobby at seven.” The last thing I saw before closing the door was a shit-eating grin plastered across Lennon’s face.
The two hours flew by, apparently the crew that was hired to install the photos was short a few people, so just before seven, I found myself on the top step of a ladder stringing wire from aceiling and into a poster-sized photo. There was sweat gathering around my hairline, being this close to the photo lights, and I was slowly losing my cool trying to get these pictures to hang the way I wanted.
Finally, the last wire was threaded, and I jumped off the ladder for someone to take away. I shook my head as Archie approached me from across the room. His shorter stature was clothed in a vibrant explosion of color and patterns, with a crisp white shirt peeking out from beneath his jacket. “Ah, Theo, just like the old days. You do all the work, and I get to walk around looking like I didn’t just run a marathon,” he said as he stopped in front of me. He looked around the wide space, nodding in appreciation of the work that had been put into the space.
The gallery we rented was situated next to the hotel we were all staying at. It had a large brick-covered front with glass bay windows that caught the morning light and was still as charming in the dark night. Light hardwood floors covered the space through the multiple rooms, and like most galleries, the walls were stark white. The first room through the front doors was lined with photos from our first week, castles of all varieties sat on the wall, waiting for the people to come and see the secrets I attempted to capture.
My favorite was the back room where the installation pieces were. I was able to talk Archie into it, and I didn’t know if it was because he thought it was a good idea or that he had a soft spot for me. It was the last room you could walk through, and as soon as you went to the threshold, there were photos hanging from everyheight throughout the room that had been blown up in assorted sizes.
The deep greens and grays of the landscapes filled your eyes, making the room seem less like a sterile hospital and more like you could walk right into the photograph. Normally, the magazine was strictly the architecture and landscapes of the estates, but I was given the freedom to stage this room.
What better way to fill a space than to fill it with my favorite view?
Pictures of Lennon from different aspects while on our trip hung from the ceiling like my thoughts being plastered across the room for everyone to see. In one, she was only a speck of a person lost in a sea of rolling green grass while Kilchurn Castle looked out over Loch Awe. In another, her profile was the main focus as the mist and the fog surrounded and enveloped her on the steps of Midhope Castle. Each photo was like a glimpse inside of my head. I only hoped she could see the version of her I saw.
A woman who was resilient, captivating, and worth all the love I was desperate to give her.
I left the room and went to wait by the elevator doors; I paced the length and waited for her to come down. At exactly seven, the doors dinged and slid open, and everything went into a standstill as Lennon stepped out and moved towards me.
The clicking of her heels echoed around us as I dragged my gaze from her face down her body. The black dress she was in was some type of shiny material that looked like water as it moved with her, with thin straps that showed off her shoulders and chest.
She gathered her hair at the nape of her neck, with curls threatening to spill out of the pins. I swallowed thickly as my hands itched to let them free, to rake my hands through her hair and pull her into me.
She stopped in front of me, a sheepish smile slowly stretched across her painted lips. I blinked once, then again.
Think, Theo, think.
“You are beautiful, Lennon.” She was radiant, and in her presence, I was left utterly defenseless and speechless.
When I offered her my hand, she slid hers into mine without a second thought and interlocked our fingers. “You ready?” I asked, and she nodded for me to lead her towards the party. There was a warmth spreading throughout my body from where we were joined, and suddenly, the world started spinning again.
