This Circle Has To Stop Now

Despite the nap Jesse had late in the afternoon he still started to drift off around his normal bedtime that night. “I no sleepy daddy,” he would say whenever Josh mentioned getting him ready for bed but then he would yawn and rub his eyes again.

After a few minutes of this, Josh finally convinced Jesse to get ready for bed by telling him that he could stay up with us. “And when you do feel sleepy we’ll just put you in bed.”

“Otay daddy,” Jesse agreed so Josh took him into the bathroom to give him a bath. When Jesse was clean and dressed in his pjs Josh carried him back out to the living room where I was waiting for them.

“We watch ‘Cars’ daddy?” Jess asked with a little yawn.

Jesse climbed up into my lap with Mister Bear and his blanket and snuggled up to me while Josh was putting ‘Cars’ in for him. Josh turned to come back to the couch, shaking his head when he saw that Jess had his eyes closed; he stilled played the movie though. Twenty minutes later, Josh stopped the movie and carefully lifted Jesse from my arms to put him to bed.

Finally Josh came back to the couch and sat down with me. “How are you doing?” He asked out of the blue.

“Me?” I stared at him, “I’m doing fine, how are you?”

He sighed, “I’m ok.”

“Ok? Is there something wrong?”

“No,” he said but he stood up again. “Come with me?” He asked as he held out his hand to me.

“Where too?” I asked him, slipping my hand in his.

Josh didn’t say a word as he pulled me off the couch and turned, slipping my hand into his other one as he led me over to the hallway and then turned to go towards his room. “Josh?” I stopped but he kept going so he ended up tugging on my arm.

“What?” He frowned as he looked back at me.

“Why are we going to your room?”

He glanced down the hall and then smiled at me, “Why not come and find out?”

“Josh,” I pulled my hand out of his grasp and crossed my arms over my chest. “What do you plan on doing that you can’t do out here?”

“Forget about it Anna,” Josh moved pass me to go over and plop on the couch again. “Just come back here.”

I went back to the couch, “Please don’t be like that, I just asked a question.”

“I know,” he ran his hands over his face. “I’m tired Anna, I just wanted to lie down with you and talk; I thought it would be more comfortable to lie on the bed, that’s all.”

“Well we can lie down out here,” I told him but he said that I’d have lie facing away from him and he wanted me to face him. “Oh,” I sighed.

It wasn’t that I didn’t want to go into Josh’s room with him, I was in there earlier; I guess I just thought that if I did and he made a move, I would let him and then where would I be? If he still didn’t think he could trust me but he could sleep with me, what would that say?

But then on the other hand, he wasn’t the type of guy who lied so if he said that all he wanted to do was lay down with me and talk, then that’s what he would be doing. “Ok,” I told him and stood up once again.

Josh glanced up at me but he didn’t move, “It’s ok Anna, we can talk here.”

“We could but that’s not what you wanted to do,” I turned away from him and headed to his room. “I’ll be back here whenever you want to talk.”

I didn’t bother to flip on the light switch when I entered his room instead I made my way over to his bed and felt around for the lamp. In my search for his lamp, I ended up knocking over the picture frame he had on his night stand, one I didn’t notice before when I was in his room. When I flipped on the lamp, I reached for that frame and was shocked to see a 4x6 photo of Josh, Jesse and me. I wasn’t sure where it was taken, I didn’t recall there ever been any cameras at any places were all were together, yet there must have been, the picture proved that much.

“It was taken at my parent’s house,” I spun around to see Josh leaning against the wall. “The day all my family was there,” he said as he pushed off the wall and made his way over to me. “Liz had her digital camera and she happened to snap this picture of us; she was going to delete it without telling me she had it, she didn’t think I would want a reminder of you.” His arms slipped around my waist, “Cody told me about it and I told her if she deleted it without giving me a copy I would never speak to her again.”

“Josh…”

He placed a finger over my lips, “Shh.” Taking my hand in his, he sat down on the bed and moved back so I could join him. When I was lying on the mattress in front of him, his hand resting at my waist, he started to speak again.

“This morning when I was getting everything ready at the Playroom, I couldn’t help but wish that you were with me, helping me. Then when the party started and you were no where to be seen, I started to wonder if maybe I was being stupid, I wanted you there Anna and I knew that.”

“I know you did Josh, you told me that but wanting me around isn’t enough; you know that and so do I, you need to be able to trust me too.” I looked at him, “Do you trust me?”