Just a Spoonful of Sugar, Chapter 18
Chapter 18.
Chapter 18: The Silver Lining
They remained in this hold for several minutes, Willy brushing his hands along the young woman’s cheeks as well as in her hair. He smiled when he felt her arms wrapping around him, the warmth of her hold somehow drawing him in and making him feel an extreme abundance of emotion.
His gaze returned to the young woman who lay wrapped securely in his arms. He never would have imagined that she would so willingly trust him enough to rest there, but a slight smile covered his face as he maintained his gentle hold on her. Perhaps if anything, this was the silver lining to this whole sorted mess.
As her sobs subsided, she began to back away from him, her head rising until her eyes met his. “I seemed to have gotten you all wet,” she said shyly when she raised her head and could see that his vest was now covered with the moisture from her tears.
“You needed it,” he said, his honest words simple. “Perhaps it was not just what happened with Belinda, but what had been happening before. You know, I think you just went and cried for both of us.”
“What do you mean?” She sniffed.
“Well, perhaps it is not the greatest masculine tradition to admit this, but there are moments when I wish that I could cry out in fear and rage, but I can’t. What would happen if the media found out that I had cried or gotten scared? They would make me out to be a coward, weakling, or something even worse.”
“You’re not,” she said. “And for the record, I don’t read tabloids.”
“Nor do I,” he smiled as he reached for one of her hands and when she surrendered it, he continued. “Perhaps it is quite a normal reaction. Crying is an emotional outburst like any other.” With his free hand, he reached over and touched her face, his fingers lightly brushing the remainder of her tears away.
“I-I don’t know,” she whispered. “I just know that I’m tired of being afraid all the time. That’s why I wanted to get rid of those balloons, because I was afraid of what I saw. The truth is, they scared me because they reminded me of Neil,” she paused, but raised her head and looked at him. “Maybe I didn’t react to them as I should have.”
“Maybe you did, and perhaps I was the one who got the wrong impressions about what your intentions were and…” This time, his words trailed.
“…abducted me,” she finished, her gaze still on him.
He nodded slowly. “Yes.”
“I don’t blame you for wanting to get back at her, though,” she whispered.
“You don’t?” He asked.
“No, I suppose I was just mad because you didn’t believe me when I told you who I was,” she said.
“That was it?”
She nodded. “Does that surprise you?”
“I should say so. Perhaps I should have listened to my inner voice, because it kept telling me that you were perhaps not the person I thought you were,” he said. “Then yesterday morning when I was bringing you to this room, one of my workers came up to me and said that Charlie had seen Belinda squeezing another small parcel into the post box at the front gate. After she had left, he went and fished it out and brought it to someone inside before going to school.”
“What were you thinking when that happened?” She asked. “Or do I really want to know?”
“Maybe one day I’ll tell you, when I actually have it figured out,” he said with a slight smile on his face. When that disappeared, he looked deeply into her eyes. “Tamara, do you know what happened to me the night we met?”
“No,” she whispered. “What happened?”
“I had received another parcel from Belinda. I didn’t know her name, I just knew BH. Two days ago after I found the balloons, there was another parcel with the name Belinda. I still don’t know her last name.”
“It’s Hutchinson,” she whispered. “Was that parcel in your lap the one from her? I couldn’t help but notice that you looked a little bit unnerved.”
“You noticed that?” He asked.
She nodded. “Well, you sort of looked like I have often felt since leaving Somerdale and moving to this town.” She timidly reached over and touched his face, her fingertips brushing along the smoothness of his cheek. When he raised his head, she lowered her hand.
“I did not realize that what was happening to me was really as scary as it was. Others around me were noticing it, but I had never been afraid of anyone before. Somehow it started to feel out of character for me. Generally, I pride myself on always knowing what to expect or at the very least, what is happening. The strange thing is, there were other people telling me that I was not doing well, but I wasn’t consciously aware of it until that day,” he said.
Tamara took a deep breath as she looked over at him. “After we met on the bench that night, I had no idea about who you were. I just figured that you were a nice man who was just another nameless face in the crowd. Then after I left, I went home and saw all those terrible things on the table. There was a melted mass of chocolate on one end, those dreadful balloons and shredded candy bar wrappers from Slugworth bars. When I made that discovery, I got so scared. Then a few minutes later, Belinda came out into the room and told me what she intended to do.” The young woman shook her head as her next words emerged. “I told her that she was crazy and that no one would want to be trailed like that.”
“You were right,” he said. “And this was entirely based on your own experiences.”
“Yes,” Tamara whispered. “S-she picked up this knife and held it in front of me. It was as though she was warning me of something. I initially thought that she was going to attack me with it. I couldn’t think straight, I just got scared. In my own home, I was so terrified…” her voice trailed off and she pulled her hand from his hold so that she could cover her face with it.
“You don’t have to go back there, Tamara,” Willy said firmly. “I would strongly recommend that you not go back there, at least not alone if Belinda is pulling this strange sort of horror trip on you.”
Tamara nodded. “I had lived under the same roof with her all this time and I had no idea that she was going to turn around and do this to someone. Oh God it scares me and it reminds me so much of what I ran away from.”
“I should have listened to you when you tried to tell me,” Willy repeated these words, the regret laced in them.
“It’s not your fault,” she whispered.
“Yes, it is,” he said weakly. “It is my fault, Tamara.”
She looked up at him, her voice still cracking. “It felt as though I was being backed into a corner because Belinda’s obsessed and would do anything to catch your attention.”
“Is that what she said?” Willy asked.
Tamara nodded. “Pretty much.”
Willy stared at the young woman for several minutes, his eyes closing slightly as guilt continued to wash over him. “What should I do?”
Tamara shook her head. “I-I don’t know. I mean; she’s pretty nuts about this. S-she called it a ‘project’, and insisted that y-you’d be flattered, but I knew that you wouldn’t be. I just knew it.”
“No, I didn’t ask about what I should about her, I asked what I should do for you,” he began. “My God, Tamara, I did something quite dreadful to you and I have to rectify it somehow.”
She lowered her head as her eyes closed. He was right, he had hurt her; and quite terribly at that. The tears seemed to give that away, yet, as they washed down over her face, the chocolatier came to the realization of how fragile she really was.
He watched her for several moments, his eyes closing slightly as he stared down at her. Contrary to her delicate emotions and fragile demeanor, she really looked as though she was ready and willing to face this with all the courage and bravery that was manifested in her.
Even after their heartfelt words, he was surprised that she did not speak harshly towards him. He was not quite certain as to whether or not this was a good or bad thing. Perhaps he would have preferred her to yell at him instead of face him with so much boldness.
He too had been afraid, but while his fear had terrified her, her fear had mortified him.
As the silence washed over them, Willy eventually spoke, his words the most heartfelt ones he could muster. “I truly am sorry for having hurt you. I did what I did because I really didn’t know what to do.”
“Y-you were scared,” she whispered bravely.
He nodded.
“Would it help if I told you that all was forgiven?” She asked weakly.
“No, because I don’t know if it’s true or I’m even worthy of that,” he said honestly. “Perhaps, it might actually help more if you were to yell at me, and tell me what a foolish, insensitive, heartless, and cruel idiot I have been. Tell me that you hate me for what I did to you, that my actions were terrible and wrong.” He paused. “Or are you afraid of how I might react to that? Is that why you haven’t said as much yet?”
“No, but you’re already doing a good enough job of it yourself, you don’t need my words to boot,” Tamara whispered. “I don’t think you’re terrible, though. I think you just got scared.” As she spoke, the last word emerged as more or less as a loud cry.
Willy nodded, but instead, he started to stand up, his eyes closing. “Your nightmares were obviously catalyzed by my actions, though,” he said truthfully.
“I was having them long before I came here,” she confessed. “And you gave me the chance to talk about it.”
Willy took a deep breath. “Perhaps, but I still harbor a great deal of anger towards myself for the things that I put you through. I know that what I did was something simply dreadful, something that reminded you of a time in your life that you would have assumed forgetting.”
Tamara nodded; she could not deny his words. “OK, you’re right, it was scary,” she admitted softly, but watched as he slowly seated himself back on the chair. “Are you happy now?”
“You’re an amazing person, Tamara, and if you wish, you may stay here for as long as you like,” he said softly. “I want to try and do what I can to be a proper host, but I don’t want you to feel obligated or worse yet, like a prisoner.”
“Why?” She asked softly.
“Maybe I just don’t want you go back to a place where you feel afraid,” he said.
“You mean; you’re going to let me stay here because you know that I’m not ready to go back to my apartment?” She asked wearily.
“I don’t know of too many people who would feel brave enough to go back to that sort of situation,” he said honestly.
“I know that I’m too afraid to even try to face her and tell her to back off.” She shuddered despite her attempts at concealing it. “What is happening to me? Anymore, I feel like a coward.”
“You’re no coward, you’re just having flashbacks to your other experiences and now you’re just coping with the resulting anxiety. After all, ‘there is no such thing as pure pleasure, some anxiety always goes with it’ (Ovid).” He smiled slightly, but continued speaking. “Just try not to worry, I’m here and I’ll see to your needs. I suppose we could both need some time to work through all of these things.”
She nodded but allowed her body to collapse back against the pillows as he wordlessly brushed a lock of her hair out from in front of her face.
After several moments of silence passed, she looked at him, her eyes now staring into a pair of sympathetic blue ones. “Do you really want to make it up to me?” She eventually asked, her words soft.
“Of course, I want to be your friend,” he responded sincerely.
“Then would you bring me a Marshmallow Round?” she asked.
“Do you really think that in your present condition that you should be eating candy?” He asked.
“This inquiry emerging from a man who is the greatest candy maker in the world?” she responded to his question with one of her own.
“Yes, well that may be, but you were still quite sick,” he said with quirky undertones in his voice. “I never forget a smell, after all.”
Tamara opened her eyes upon hearing these words, but instead of immediately responding, she pouted at him. “That wasn’t very nice, and besides it also wasn’t intended. I would have preferred to not have gotten sick at all, thank you.”
“I know, but please permit me to say that it was quite a powerful experience for both of us,” he smirked. “It was actually worth it for me to do something that might have helped, considering that I had made such a mess of things.”
“Was that really the way it was for you?” She asked. “Because for me it was probably the most degrading, disgusting, and humiliating experience that I have ever had in my life.”
“I suppose no one wants to remember such things,” he said. “But, it did give me a chance to do something to help you.” He reached over an brushed the side of his hand against her cheek, the touch light, but filled with his own brand of reassurance.
“I still think that instead of remembering something that humiliating might be remedied by some of your wonderful candy,” she said stubbornly. As these words emerged, she folded her arms over her chest and regarded him through hesitant, but still playful green eyes. “Besides, you did say that you would do whatever you could to make it up to me, and that’s a very small favor to ask.”
Willy took a deep breath. “Very amusing, but just so you will know that I am a man of my word, I’ll see what I can do. For now, perhaps this will help you to feel a little bit better.”
“What is it?” She asked as he began to take the lid off the small bottle.
“It’s medicine, extract from the red cocoa bean.”
“But cocoa beans aren’t red,” she objected.
“I saw some that were,” he said with a smile. “Now, give me your hand.” When she continued to regard him somewhat skeptically, he continued. “I know that I gave you your medicine last night, but this should also help to counter the side-effects of the contaminated food.”
Tamara extended her hand to him and watched him pour a drop onto her flat palm.
“Now, lick it off,” he said, but when she did not move, he continued. “Trust me, it will help.”
Tamara did as he said, but as soon as she tasted it, she cringed, the taste unusually bitter. “Yuck, this stuff tastes terrible.”
“It’s medicine, it’s supposed to,” he smirked. “Now, why don’t you try and get some more rest?” Before she could respond to his words, he took a deep breath. “If you have another nightmare I’ll be nearby and will try to help you to wake up. Contrary to my behavior before, I do hope you recognize that you can trust me.”
Tamara nodded and allowed her body to lean back against the pillow.
Chapter 18: The Silver Lining
They remained in this hold for several minutes, Willy brushing his hands along the young woman’s cheeks as well as in her hair. He smiled when he felt her arms wrapping around him, the warmth of her hold somehow drawing him in and making him feel an extreme abundance of emotion.
His gaze returned to the young woman who lay wrapped securely in his arms. He never would have imagined that she would so willingly trust him enough to rest there, but a slight smile covered his face as he maintained his gentle hold on her. Perhaps if anything, this was the silver lining to this whole sorted mess.
As her sobs subsided, she began to back away from him, her head rising until her eyes met his. “I seemed to have gotten you all wet,” she said shyly when she raised her head and could see that his vest was now covered with the moisture from her tears.
“You needed it,” he said, his honest words simple. “Perhaps it was not just what happened with Belinda, but what had been happening before. You know, I think you just went and cried for both of us.”
“What do you mean?” She sniffed.
“Well, perhaps it is not the greatest masculine tradition to admit this, but there are moments when I wish that I could cry out in fear and rage, but I can’t. What would happen if the media found out that I had cried or gotten scared? They would make me out to be a coward, weakling, or something even worse.”
“You’re not,” she said. “And for the record, I don’t read tabloids.”
“Nor do I,” he smiled as he reached for one of her hands and when she surrendered it, he continued. “Perhaps it is quite a normal reaction. Crying is an emotional outburst like any other.” With his free hand, he reached over and touched her face, his fingers lightly brushing the remainder of her tears away.
“I-I don’t know,” she whispered. “I just know that I’m tired of being afraid all the time. That’s why I wanted to get rid of those balloons, because I was afraid of what I saw. The truth is, they scared me because they reminded me of Neil,” she paused, but raised her head and looked at him. “Maybe I didn’t react to them as I should have.”
“Maybe you did, and perhaps I was the one who got the wrong impressions about what your intentions were and…” This time, his words trailed.
“…abducted me,” she finished, her gaze still on him.
He nodded slowly. “Yes.”
“I don’t blame you for wanting to get back at her, though,” she whispered.
“You don’t?” He asked.
“No, I suppose I was just mad because you didn’t believe me when I told you who I was,” she said.
“That was it?”
She nodded. “Does that surprise you?”
“I should say so. Perhaps I should have listened to my inner voice, because it kept telling me that you were perhaps not the person I thought you were,” he said. “Then yesterday morning when I was bringing you to this room, one of my workers came up to me and said that Charlie had seen Belinda squeezing another small parcel into the post box at the front gate. After she had left, he went and fished it out and brought it to someone inside before going to school.”
“What were you thinking when that happened?” She asked. “Or do I really want to know?”
“Maybe one day I’ll tell you, when I actually have it figured out,” he said with a slight smile on his face. When that disappeared, he looked deeply into her eyes. “Tamara, do you know what happened to me the night we met?”
“No,” she whispered. “What happened?”
“I had received another parcel from Belinda. I didn’t know her name, I just knew BH. Two days ago after I found the balloons, there was another parcel with the name Belinda. I still don’t know her last name.”
“It’s Hutchinson,” she whispered. “Was that parcel in your lap the one from her? I couldn’t help but notice that you looked a little bit unnerved.”
“You noticed that?” He asked.
She nodded. “Well, you sort of looked like I have often felt since leaving Somerdale and moving to this town.” She timidly reached over and touched his face, her fingertips brushing along the smoothness of his cheek. When he raised his head, she lowered her hand.
“I did not realize that what was happening to me was really as scary as it was. Others around me were noticing it, but I had never been afraid of anyone before. Somehow it started to feel out of character for me. Generally, I pride myself on always knowing what to expect or at the very least, what is happening. The strange thing is, there were other people telling me that I was not doing well, but I wasn’t consciously aware of it until that day,” he said.
Tamara took a deep breath as she looked over at him. “After we met on the bench that night, I had no idea about who you were. I just figured that you were a nice man who was just another nameless face in the crowd. Then after I left, I went home and saw all those terrible things on the table. There was a melted mass of chocolate on one end, those dreadful balloons and shredded candy bar wrappers from Slugworth bars. When I made that discovery, I got so scared. Then a few minutes later, Belinda came out into the room and told me what she intended to do.” The young woman shook her head as her next words emerged. “I told her that she was crazy and that no one would want to be trailed like that.”
“You were right,” he said. “And this was entirely based on your own experiences.”
“Yes,” Tamara whispered. “S-she picked up this knife and held it in front of me. It was as though she was warning me of something. I initially thought that she was going to attack me with it. I couldn’t think straight, I just got scared. In my own home, I was so terrified…” her voice trailed off and she pulled her hand from his hold so that she could cover her face with it.
“You don’t have to go back there, Tamara,” Willy said firmly. “I would strongly recommend that you not go back there, at least not alone if Belinda is pulling this strange sort of horror trip on you.”
Tamara nodded. “I had lived under the same roof with her all this time and I had no idea that she was going to turn around and do this to someone. Oh God it scares me and it reminds me so much of what I ran away from.”
“I should have listened to you when you tried to tell me,” Willy repeated these words, the regret laced in them.
“It’s not your fault,” she whispered.
“Yes, it is,” he said weakly. “It is my fault, Tamara.”
She looked up at him, her voice still cracking. “It felt as though I was being backed into a corner because Belinda’s obsessed and would do anything to catch your attention.”
“Is that what she said?” Willy asked.
Tamara nodded. “Pretty much.”
Willy stared at the young woman for several minutes, his eyes closing slightly as guilt continued to wash over him. “What should I do?”
Tamara shook her head. “I-I don’t know. I mean; she’s pretty nuts about this. S-she called it a ‘project’, and insisted that y-you’d be flattered, but I knew that you wouldn’t be. I just knew it.”
“No, I didn’t ask about what I should about her, I asked what I should do for you,” he began. “My God, Tamara, I did something quite dreadful to you and I have to rectify it somehow.”
She lowered her head as her eyes closed. He was right, he had hurt her; and quite terribly at that. The tears seemed to give that away, yet, as they washed down over her face, the chocolatier came to the realization of how fragile she really was.
He watched her for several moments, his eyes closing slightly as he stared down at her. Contrary to her delicate emotions and fragile demeanor, she really looked as though she was ready and willing to face this with all the courage and bravery that was manifested in her.
Even after their heartfelt words, he was surprised that she did not speak harshly towards him. He was not quite certain as to whether or not this was a good or bad thing. Perhaps he would have preferred her to yell at him instead of face him with so much boldness.
He too had been afraid, but while his fear had terrified her, her fear had mortified him.
As the silence washed over them, Willy eventually spoke, his words the most heartfelt ones he could muster. “I truly am sorry for having hurt you. I did what I did because I really didn’t know what to do.”
“Y-you were scared,” she whispered bravely.
He nodded.
“Would it help if I told you that all was forgiven?” She asked weakly.
“No, because I don’t know if it’s true or I’m even worthy of that,” he said honestly. “Perhaps, it might actually help more if you were to yell at me, and tell me what a foolish, insensitive, heartless, and cruel idiot I have been. Tell me that you hate me for what I did to you, that my actions were terrible and wrong.” He paused. “Or are you afraid of how I might react to that? Is that why you haven’t said as much yet?”
“No, but you’re already doing a good enough job of it yourself, you don’t need my words to boot,” Tamara whispered. “I don’t think you’re terrible, though. I think you just got scared.” As she spoke, the last word emerged as more or less as a loud cry.
Willy nodded, but instead, he started to stand up, his eyes closing. “Your nightmares were obviously catalyzed by my actions, though,” he said truthfully.
“I was having them long before I came here,” she confessed. “And you gave me the chance to talk about it.”
Willy took a deep breath. “Perhaps, but I still harbor a great deal of anger towards myself for the things that I put you through. I know that what I did was something simply dreadful, something that reminded you of a time in your life that you would have assumed forgetting.”
Tamara nodded; she could not deny his words. “OK, you’re right, it was scary,” she admitted softly, but watched as he slowly seated himself back on the chair. “Are you happy now?”
“You’re an amazing person, Tamara, and if you wish, you may stay here for as long as you like,” he said softly. “I want to try and do what I can to be a proper host, but I don’t want you to feel obligated or worse yet, like a prisoner.”
“Why?” She asked softly.
“Maybe I just don’t want you go back to a place where you feel afraid,” he said.
“You mean; you’re going to let me stay here because you know that I’m not ready to go back to my apartment?” She asked wearily.
“I don’t know of too many people who would feel brave enough to go back to that sort of situation,” he said honestly.
“I know that I’m too afraid to even try to face her and tell her to back off.” She shuddered despite her attempts at concealing it. “What is happening to me? Anymore, I feel like a coward.”
“You’re no coward, you’re just having flashbacks to your other experiences and now you’re just coping with the resulting anxiety. After all, ‘there is no such thing as pure pleasure, some anxiety always goes with it’ (Ovid).” He smiled slightly, but continued speaking. “Just try not to worry, I’m here and I’ll see to your needs. I suppose we could both need some time to work through all of these things.”
She nodded but allowed her body to collapse back against the pillows as he wordlessly brushed a lock of her hair out from in front of her face.
After several moments of silence passed, she looked at him, her eyes now staring into a pair of sympathetic blue ones. “Do you really want to make it up to me?” She eventually asked, her words soft.
“Of course, I want to be your friend,” he responded sincerely.
“Then would you bring me a Marshmallow Round?” she asked.
“Do you really think that in your present condition that you should be eating candy?” He asked.
“This inquiry emerging from a man who is the greatest candy maker in the world?” she responded to his question with one of her own.
“Yes, well that may be, but you were still quite sick,” he said with quirky undertones in his voice. “I never forget a smell, after all.”
Tamara opened her eyes upon hearing these words, but instead of immediately responding, she pouted at him. “That wasn’t very nice, and besides it also wasn’t intended. I would have preferred to not have gotten sick at all, thank you.”
“I know, but please permit me to say that it was quite a powerful experience for both of us,” he smirked. “It was actually worth it for me to do something that might have helped, considering that I had made such a mess of things.”
“Was that really the way it was for you?” She asked. “Because for me it was probably the most degrading, disgusting, and humiliating experience that I have ever had in my life.”
“I suppose no one wants to remember such things,” he said. “But, it did give me a chance to do something to help you.” He reached over an brushed the side of his hand against her cheek, the touch light, but filled with his own brand of reassurance.
“I still think that instead of remembering something that humiliating might be remedied by some of your wonderful candy,” she said stubbornly. As these words emerged, she folded her arms over her chest and regarded him through hesitant, but still playful green eyes. “Besides, you did say that you would do whatever you could to make it up to me, and that’s a very small favor to ask.”
Willy took a deep breath. “Very amusing, but just so you will know that I am a man of my word, I’ll see what I can do. For now, perhaps this will help you to feel a little bit better.”
“What is it?” She asked as he began to take the lid off the small bottle.
“It’s medicine, extract from the red cocoa bean.”
“But cocoa beans aren’t red,” she objected.
“I saw some that were,” he said with a smile. “Now, give me your hand.” When she continued to regard him somewhat skeptically, he continued. “I know that I gave you your medicine last night, but this should also help to counter the side-effects of the contaminated food.”
Tamara extended her hand to him and watched him pour a drop onto her flat palm.
“Now, lick it off,” he said, but when she did not move, he continued. “Trust me, it will help.”
Tamara did as he said, but as soon as she tasted it, she cringed, the taste unusually bitter. “Yuck, this stuff tastes terrible.”
“It’s medicine, it’s supposed to,” he smirked. “Now, why don’t you try and get some more rest?” Before she could respond to his words, he took a deep breath. “If you have another nightmare I’ll be nearby and will try to help you to wake up. Contrary to my behavior before, I do hope you recognize that you can trust me.”
Tamara nodded and allowed her body to lean back against the pillow.