23 Gentle Memories and Warm Hugs

"Zzzz zz, Zzzz zz." Liam's phone buzzed consecutively next to his head where he lay fast asleep on the bed.

He'd been asleep as a log of ancient, rigid wood with his skin lined up with what looked like alien marks around the entirety of his face. 

Trying so hard to contain the urge to open his eyes, his phone buzzed irritatingly again.

"Oh. Who makes these buzzing demons?" Liam uttered in a low octave of frustration as his eyelids opened with his eye balls tracing their way around the room like he was a stranger in this place.

Liam, still obsessed with returning to the warm loins of his slumber, stayed still, expecting to be kissed passionately by a sleep seductress.

Half-way to exchanging a cold kiss with his fantasy, his phone buzzed again, and triggering fury in Liam's belly, he groaned as he stiffened his teeth against themselves over his clenched jaws.

He knew he had to check out whatever was disturbing him, so he opened his eyes half-way in a bid to not lose sight of what was still clouding his fuzzy mind.

"Oh, fuck!" Liam exclaimed with an unclear voice as he immediately sat up with his back leaning against the bed's frame.

"There had been a shooting at the Forbes' Conference in Berlin and one person had been shot."

This was reported by CNN and BBC and these notifications were the buzz that'd woken him up.

Liam didn't know what to think as his heart sprinted halfway across the world in Bolting speeds while his mind was clumsy as it glanced at the worst possibilities.

"... Is she okay?" Liam thought to himself with a sentimental voice in his head while he looked at the walls of the room as though he had left his body.

His phone buzzed again, and that caused him to shiver. The unknown was here, and it met him tense as though he'd not taken a dump in decades.

"Hey, Liam… mmmmm..there was a shooting here at where heeere is, and I'm in shock right now, so I'm sending this message... The police are around the corner… fuck!" Charlotte's voicemail message played through Liam's speaker and he could recognise her frail, scared voice and shaky breath amidst the discordant voices of those in the crowd who were running helter-skelter in search of safety. 

Liam was scared. His face was a bold canvas of his many worries as his breathing felt uneasy with anxiety rushing inside his mind. 

He didn't know what to think. He didn't know why he felt like this. He was sincerely concerned about someone who couldn't care less if he lived or not.

This care and compassion he felt towards her wasn't because of the contract that they had which could be at stake, but because he really did care for her.

His mind was melting into the solemnity of his feelings, and he knew that he had to snap out of it. 

"Wait. She left me a message?" Liam had been too concerned with how he felt that he'd not paid attention to the fact that she sent him a message at such moment of her life.

He didn't know what to feel. He couldn't afford to feel special to her, but he found a tingling sensation in that thought.

Maybe it was just anxiety and the quarter-to-grave tension that inspired her call to her worst nightmare.

Liam couldn't find one answer that soothed his mind enough so he stopped giving an audience to the maybes and what ifs that his mind conjured.

One thing was obvious. He cared for her. Either less than he thought or more than he felt.

*********.          ***********

Liam was at the airport with his averagely pricy Mazda car to pick Charlotte who'd immediately flown private after telling her account of the incident to the detectives who appeared on the scene afterwards.

"Thank you for coming to pick me up." Charlotte said with sincerity devoid of pride as she handed her wheeled travel bag to Liam who was keenly looking at her with obvious empathy.

"Oh, it's okay. Anything you need right now, I'm here." Liam said with a voice that was solemn enough to provoke an unexpected hug from Charlotte.

"What the hell was that?" Liam thought to himself with both eyes wide open as if he'd witnessed the resurrection miracle.

Near- death experiences really fuck up the mind, uhn? Who could have thought Charlotte had a warm hug that wasn't for the cameras or some PR stunt somewhere in her?

Liam dropped his fears on the ground as he embraced her warmly, patting her shoulder as he attempted to comfort her in silence. 

"Are you up to fuck me when we get home?" Charlotte asked with a soft voice that Liam thought to be strange.

"What??" Liam thought to himself with utter surprise and worry about whatever insane intention was behind her request.

"Uhmmm.. I don't think that's what you need right now." Liam replied in an even softer tone.

"Ohh! And what would you say I need right now?" Charlotte asked without her usual devilish glare as she showed interest in his reply.