Mr. Blue Eyes: Wild Night Dreaming 1 (3 page)

“I’m glad you’re here, girlfriend,” she said,
smiling. “Where’s Jake?”

“Probably still resting. I didn’t knock at
his door. I want us to have a chance to chat, just the two of us.”
Thera said conspiringly. “By the way, thanks for the separate
bedrooms. You know we haven’t been intimate yet so it would be a
little uncomfortable to suddenly share the same bed.”

She was surprised at this. “You’ve been
travelling together for two weeks… and still nothing?”

“Well… we’ve kissed and… did other things, of
course… a few times… but nothing very intense.” Thera’s face was
very flushed, so flushed she wanted to get a fan for her. “It was
both our idea, actually. I don’t really want to rush things and he
said he respected that. He said he also wants to take it slow and
steady with a nice girl like me. He said he is tired of flings, you
know.”

Carla looked at her as if a second head has
suddenly popped up from her neck. “Jake has said that? The one who
sleeps upstairs? The tall guy with the blue eyes?”

Her reaction amused Thera. “Yes silly. That
one. He’s already thirty-five and it’s about time that he finds
something more substantial in his relationships. He wants to start
getting serious. Why do you find it so weird? Besides, now that we
are here there’s nothing that’s stopping us from abolishing the
second bedroom at any given time.”

“No, of course… and it’s none of my
business.” Carla was trying hard to abolish a bunch of
not-so-serious images in her head wherein Mr. Blue eyes was the
main player.

“So, what do you think of him?” Thera asked
in a curious tone.

She has already decided not to reveal
anything to Thera until she had cornered Mr. Blue Eyes and talked
to him about what game he was playing here. On the other hand, she
had thought about the situation and she eventually believed he did
not mean for this to happen.

They both had not disclosed their real names,
she guessed, after being introduced to him in the airport. This
meant that even if her friend had mentioned her name to him, he
would not know it was actually her – unless Thera had shown a
picture to him of her. She was going to confirm if this was true
before she would decide on what to think.

Although… even if she had done that, she
honestly was not quite sure how she would handle such a discussion
with him.

“He seems very nice,” she answered on the
side of caution.

And Thera looked at her as if she was the one
who had two heads on her shoulders. “Excuse me, are you blind? He
is a hunk, charming, rich, tender, kind, and hot – and you call him
very nice?”

She was laughing before she finished.
“Alright… alright. He could be all of those things… to you. But I
am being careful. You are his girlfriend. And you know I don’t
really pay that much attention to guys. I mean, when I look at
them, I am not immediately seeing them in that context. That’s
inviting trouble.”

“You mean, you haven’t seriously fallen in
love since I left?”

She rolled her eyes. “You know I did. A
couple of times.”

“That’s not falling in love. Both
relationships only lasted a week!”

“It is falling in love,” she insisted, “as
opposed to… that real, honest-to-goodness love.” She shrugged her
shoulders. “And yes, it fizzled after a week,” she said
regretfully.

“Hmmm… I would imagine that it fizzled for
you. Men always want to be near you. You, on the other hand, have
always rather wanted being alone and lonesome. Did they fight to
get you back?” When she didn’t answer, she threw her a smug smile.
“I knew it.”

“
B
ut I don’t want to
do that again,” she said after a while, and guiltily. “I hadn’t
wanted to hurt anyone. It took a while before they can speak to me
civilly when I encountered them in town. And of course, after
breaking the hearts of two men, I suddenly got the reputation of a
play girl. So I started to take care.”

Thera was looking at her with sympathy. “Both
of these relationships happened after your parents’ death,
right?”

“Umm, yeah.” She looked at her with teasing
in her eyes. “You are over-analyzing me. Maybe I used them to
forget. But I’m glad that phase is finished.” She looked out at the
sea. “It is still painful, and I miss them terribly. But I don’t
wake up crying in bed now. And I know, wherever they are right now?
They are very happy.”

Thera reached out for her hand. “Hey, of
course they are,” she said.

“I just wish I was able to tell them how
grateful I am for everything that they had given me,” she said, a
single tear rolling down her left cheek. “That way, it wouldn’t
have been so hard.”

Thera slid herself towards her, and her
bestfriend of all gave her a big hug. “Don’t worry, I’m sure they
already know. And one day, you will not need a man to forget the
pain. And one day, you will
really
fall in love. I mean real
love here.”

“Pffff…” Carla laughed playfully as she
pushed from her and wiped at her cheek with one hand. “Love is for
nice girls like yourself and
serious
boys like your Jake.”
She almost choked on the word. “I’m on the other side of the river.
And no matter how attractive your boyfriend is, he is not my
cookie. Sorry.”

She caught movement on the glass, a
reflection telling her that someone was standing at their backs.
She turned her head, looking up to the kitchen.

And of course, Jake was standing on top of
the steps and was staring at her with a mocking grin on his face,
which he hid when Thera turned also.

But it had done its job. Her heart was
pounding like a harassed drum. He looked fresh and hot in another
t-shirt and blue shorts, and all she suddenly wanted to do was… oh,
how was she going to hide her secret from Thera if she was always
thinking of him like this?

How long is he up there and what has he
heard
, she wondered as they watched him descend. He might not
speak Greek, but she suspected that he understood much of what he
heard. He might play dumb, but she knew he really was not.

She averted her gaze when Thera raised her
chin because she knew he was going to kiss her. And he did, and she
was grateful because he did it longer than necessary. She wondered
if he had been listening from the very start and heard her inquire
about their sex life. But of course he didn’t, she thought. She
might have noticed him sooner if he had.

To her dismay, Thera suddenly stood up. “Sit
here,” she said, leading Jake down to where she was sitting a
moment ago, on the other half of the couch where Carla sat – and
just a reach away. “You chat for a while and I’ll get both of you
coffee. I will not be long.”

“How about juice, honey?” Jake asked easily
and in a loving tone that would make any woman fetch him anything
he asked. “It’s very… hot.”

She almost kicked him at the suggestive tone.
Instead, she looked at Thera. “I can do the fetch—I mean, the
juice,” she said.

“Oh no, no. Sit. I’ve been in the kitchen and
I know everything still sits where they were ten years ago. No
problem.” And off she went, humming.

There was a moment of silence before she
spoke. “It’s seems you’re making her very happy.”

“Thera is always happy. She lets nothing
deter her from her positivity, and it’s really refreshing.”

“I find it quite a surprise. You haven’t
found a conquest like her?”

“I, generally, used to avoid women like her.
I’m afraid that I find it hard to break the heart of a cheerful
person. I don’t want someone like Thera to find a reason not to
speak to me when I meet them in town. That’s disheartening.”

She blushed. “Eavesdropper!” she accused.

“I did not mean to,” he said with a laugh on
his voice. “Though I can imagine that any man will be upset with
just a week or two in your company. I would have wanted more.”

This time, she was blushing so furiously that
she knew not even her olive skin could hide it. “Will you stop?
Thera might hear you!”

He laughed, low in his throat, that sensual
sound. And then they were quiet for a moment.

“I honestly never thought it’s you,” he
said.

“I had guessed that.”

“You did? Oh well, I’ll confess though that
if I had realized this before now, I would have been more excited
to come here.”

She blinked at this and turned to him.
“Why?”

He was looking out at the sea before he
turned to her. “I went back to Mykonos to find you again. But the
caretaker of the house said you do not really live there. That you
only rented that house where we’ve… spent our nights and days
together. And that you’d left and hadn’t come back ever since I
left. I should have known, you know, given the situation of my…
visit.”

Her breath caught at her throat. And again,
she was caught, drowning on those blue eyes, before the door-bell
distracted her enough to swim back to the surface.

“Excuse me,” she said, and ran to the
video-intercom stationed by the main door so she could see from the
cameras at the iron-gate whoever it was that was leaning on the
doorbell.

And she groaned when she recognized who it
was.

“Oh boy… let the music begin,” she whispered
to herself as she frantically tried to think of a way to avoid the
incoming disaster.

Gia
came running.

Gia was one of her childhood friends and part
of the group that also used to hold Thera. She was a very good
friend to Thera, too.

As soon as she was within hearing distance,
Gia began peppering her with questions. “Where is she? Inside? And
her guy? Is he handsome? Or just cute?”

She tried to grab Gia before she could rush
inside, and she quickly whispered because she could already hear
Thera walking down the steps.

“Whatever you see, not a word – or I will
slaughter you!”

Gia’s eyes widened. But before she could
explain, Thera was there and the two women were screaming and
hugging and kissing and doing all the noisy things women friends do
when they had not seen each other for ten years.

Thera and Gia were both tiny, but their
resemblance stopped there. Gia, who was 24 years old, was quite
chubby and Thera literally disappeared in her embrace. Her long red
hair bounced as she jumped over and over like a cute ball.

When the screaming finally stopped, Thera
grabbed Gia’s hand to lead her inside.

“Come! I want you to meet Jake.”

Oh dear
. Carla followed, wishing for
the ground to open and swallow all three of them. When they arrived
in the balcony, Jake was already standing by the couch and his hand
was ready to give to Gia as he smiled gently down at her.

“Jake, this is Gia, my second best friend!”
said Thera.

And then Jake took a look at Gia’s pale,
shocked face before a resigned look passed his face. He threw a
look at her.

Gia had her mouth wide open and her eyes was
popping out so much that her eyeballs looked ready to roll out. Her
face had turned blue, and then red, and she was trying to speak but
no sound was coming out of her mouth.

Carla snatched her friend by the arm and
pushed her up the steps to the kitchen as Thera looked confusedly
at them.

“Gia, come in my room for a bit. I want to
show you the blouse I told you about.”

But it was too late. Gia recovered her
missing voice and she screamed at Jake.

“DEAR VIRGIN, CARLA! TOM SAWYER!”

Thera laughed. “What?”

Carla used all of her strength to drag her on
the steps, hearing at the same time the troubled voice of Thera as
they left.

“Tom Sawyer? That naughty little fellow who
kept getting into trouble in Mark Twain’s book?”

“Yeah… except this naughty fellow gets us
into trouble…” she mumbled furiously as she dragged ecstatic Gia up
the upper floor to the bedroom upstairs.

Carla pulled at Gia across the upper floor’s
corridor and she only followed because she was still fuzzy with the
encounter. They passed a door – Jake’s temporary guestroom; and
then Thera’s, until they got to the end of the corridor where
Carla’s bedroom was. She pushed Gia inside and then carefully
closed the door behind her.

“Tom Sawyer!” repeated Gia with awe.

“Gia, listen to me—”

“Tom Sawyer!” the other girl repeated much
louder.

“Gia, concentrate, girl, and listen to
me—”

“BUT IT’S TOM SAWYER!” And of course, she was
screaming again.

“GIA, SHUT YOUR MOUTH AND LISTEN!”

Gia blinked at her. “Why are you
screaming?”

Carla combed her fingers through her hair,
like she always did when she was stressed out. She sighed, cursed,
and then spoke as calmly as she could manage.

“Yes, it is Tom Sawyer. And Thera doesn’t
know.”

Gia still looked confused for a moment until
realization dawned on her, and then she was speechless for another
moment.

“Tom Sawyer is Jake Winters, Thera’s
boyfriend.”

“Oh-my-God! You gotta be joking! How is this
even possible? He is Tom Sawyer! How is it even possible that he’s…
every woman with a healthy libido and who has in Internet knows who
he is! He couldn’t be Jake Winters!”

“You know very well that Thera is not like
someone who would look up male escorts on the Internet. She doesn’t
mingle in stuff like that! And we never told her that… well, that
I… that you… oh dear!”

“That’s because she wasn’t here when it
happened. If she was, she would have known.” Gia blinked again,
several times, for the next few seconds. “So he really is Tom
Sawyer? I mean, Jake Winters? Or – aarrgh! – he really is Thera’s
boyfriend?”

Carla nodded painfully. She felt like she had
committed a big crime, now that she was with somebody who knew
about what happened in Mykonos.