Abruptly he stopped and leant up against one of the mighty trees right outside someone's lovely four bedroomed detached house. Noticing the curtains twitching, the person inside watching his every move, he couldn't have cared less. What mattered was that he was just round the corner from her house, and he knew that he needed to find the extra courage to take him there.
'Come on,' he thought. 'You can do it.' What was that phrase he'd heard so often, the one that annoyed him so much? Oh, that's right. Man up! He didn't so much need to man up, as dragon up!
Breathing threatening to overtake him in short, sharp bursts, he focused on everything he had to say, having spent days preparing it, thinking about the words and how they might sound. But here and now, the words seemed to spill from his head, letters drifting casually off into the wind, floating away, well beyond his reach. Feeling light headed and as though he were about to throw up at the same time, out of the corner of his eye once again he noticed movement behind the curtains. Knowing that if he waited any longer he risked someone coming out to see what was going on, or worse still... calling an ambulance if they thought him unwell, or both. All of which he could do without. Taking a deep breath, his head vacant of all the words he'd prepared, he straightened up, strode purposefully round the corner and headed directly for her front gate, both disappointed and excited in equal measure to see her pink car parked outside. Resolutely he paced up the path to her front door, determined to carry out what he'd spent days planning and thinking about. His body knocked on the door, while ironically, his brain RAN AWAY!
A few shuffling footsteps later, the lock on the door started to turn, giving rise to a general feeling of weakness and nausea. As the door started to move, he wished he'd followed his brain. A beautiful face with gorgeous blonde hair slinked around the gap in the door, its expression of neutrality changing instantly to a frown on noticing who was there.
"Oh... it's you!" uttered Janice.
"Uhhh... h... h... hi," was all he could get out.
"What do you want?" she asked circumspectly.
With his brain laughing at him from far off in the distance, not offering up any help at all in the way of an intelligent response, and the rest of him unable to ascertain the reason for her unhappiness, he barely managed to mumble,
"Can I come in please?"
It was all that he could think of to say.
To say there was an awkward pause was an understatement.
"I don't think that's a good idea," answered the downcast bar worker.
Feeling as though his head would explode, he hadn't gone through all of this only to be turned away... NOT NOW!
"PLEASE!" he begged, "just for a moment."
Against her better judgement, she held open the door and let him pass. Scuttling through, he started to head towards the lounge as she closed the door. It took him a second or so before he realised she hadn't followed and was in fact standing angrily, back against the front door.
"Say whatever it is you've come to say and then... go."
At that moment, he would have done ANYTHING to rid her face of that look. Anger, resentment, derision and betrayal were all there in equal measure.
'Perhaps she hasn't heard,' he thought hopefully. 'In which case, as soon as I tell her... BOOM! Back to normal.' And that was what he wanted most, as he'd come to realise long ago that he loved her, more than anyone or anything.
"Tank and I were cleared of having anything to do with the destruction of the clubhouse," he stated emphatically.
But before he got any further, his hopes were all dashed at once.
"I know."
This time it was his body that wanted to run away, as every molecule within it screamed,
"Uh oh!"
"Then I'm not sure I understand?" was all that he could babble.
Fire, anger and rage tore across her face. Before today, he'd never seen a human so angry. Storming up to him, her face having lost its delicate complexion, replaced by a not very becoming shade of scarlet, she poked her index finger firmly into his chest, looked him right in the eye and bawled,
"YOU LIED TO ME!"
Nearly falling backwards, that's how startled he was, he tried to stay upright but it was difficult with his mind spinning this way and that, thinking back on so many things, trying to see where he'd slipped up and just how he could put things right. More information, that's what he needed, at least that's what his very confused mind was telling him.
"About what?" he whispered gently.
She went ballistic. For a moment, his body felt as though he were back on the Astroturf on that cold, fateful night, once again facing the dark dragon Manson.
"Oh, I don't know... how about EVERYTHING?!"
His head spun more than before.
'What does she know? How does she know it?' he just about managed to think, using all his effort.
"What happened at the clubhouse?" she growled.
"Uhhh... you know what happened. The... the... there was a bomb, Tank and I tried to defuse it, but we couldn't and... BOOM!" he replied, waving his hands in the air for effect.
"And that's it?"
The question wasn't yelled, it was asked softly, meaningfully and with intent, the words ringing right through him, shaking him to his very foundation. It felt as though he'd reached a tipping point, balancing precariously, his very soul on the line. Another lie to the one he loved would be enough to send him over the edge into the abyss, into oblivion, losing everything that he believed in, stood for and ultimately... her! Sensibly he kept quiet.
"Cat got your tongue?" she asked sarcastically.
This wasn't how he'd planned things at all.
"You might have been cleared by the police," she commented passionately, "but there was certainly more going on in that clubhouse than you let on. You must think I'm a very stupid little girl."
Shaking his head ever so slightly, he didn't dare to interrupt her well deserved, and ultimately correct, rant.
"I struggled at the time to understand how nobody heard your friend break down the office door, but looking back on it, it seems all but impossible. As well, both of you knew all about the bomb, what it was, and more importantly... what was going on, something you didn't share with me then, and seem more than a little unwilling to share with me now, despite coming over here for what seems like some kind of forgiveness. And then of course," she continued, "the mysterious bright yellow light which flashed around the clubhouse, and this is but a guess... contained the explosion!"