Reaching Out

“Natalia, why are you here? Do you know what time it is?” Reiner uttered the moment he saw me standing in front of his room’s door.

Once again, he managed to open the door right before I started knocking. It was some time very late at night and the reason I was here was…

“I can’t sleep. I’m tired but too stressed out and no, I don’t know, and I don’t care what time it is. You weren’t asleep, right?” I replied as I pouted at him.

“So, what do you want?” Reiner replied. He was clearly using his big body to block me from entering the room.

“Let me sleep here…please?” I said in a sweet voice as I smile pleadingly at him. This smile works very well on Zak…by the way….

“No. Go back to your room. It’s late. Oh, and if you keep turning up here, I’m going to change rooms,”

Reiner replied and began closing the door in my face.

“No! don’t close the door…” I screamed as I pulled on the door. How can he do this to me?

“Natalia…go back to sleep,”

“If I could do that, I wouldn’t be here. Use your head. What about…you come to my room, then?”

“No. Now go back to your room,” Reiner said curtly before closing the door firmly in my face.

What…just happened?! Did he just…shut the door in my face?! What?! Is the sky falling?!

“R! open the door…Reiner, open the door…” I called out to him as I banged softly on the door. It’s late at night so it’ll be bad if I wake everyone up.

I’m sure he can hear me, but I am not getting a response. I guess he’s going to just ignore me until I go back to my room. Maybe I should just head back before he gets sick of me…or…

“I’m just going to sit here until you open the door,” I stated firmly as I sat down in front of his door leaning my back against the wall of the hallway.

Since I can’t fall asleep in my bed, I might as well try my luck trying to fall asleep in the hallway instead.

I hated being alone nowadays…whenever I’m alone my mind wanders and the paths that it wanders along aren’t filled with pink rose petals either. The day’s I’ve spent with Reiner by my side helped to dissolve the troubles in my mind. It didn’t just help me forget and keep my fears at bay, it really made me feel a little stronger to have him by my side.

Thinking back on it now, I suppose I never really thought about how Reiner felt to be spending time with me. Perhaps he didn’t think anything at all apart from the fact that it was uncomfortable and awkward to react to my selfish advances. I don’t blame him because it was clear that the one to blame was me.

Reiner is rightfully concern of people viewing our relationship and interactions as inappropriate. But then again, since when was any of my relationships and interactions appropriate? I wasn’t sure what was worst, having a relationship with my stepfather, step uncle, step cousin…or my personal butler?

Why am I even in this mess?

The key difference is that Reiner is not a Rosenhall, thankfully. However, that also meant that I should not involve him any further in this complicated web that I am in. I’ve asked myself multiple times the same question regarding the other guys that I’m involved with. What future do we have together? The answer was always the same…we didn’t have a future together. The same goes with Reiner. Reiner should have a bright future, if only he isn’t stuck with me. Trying to seduce him without a future in mind was very irresponsible of me. I need to come to my senses and stop this workplace sexual harassment as soon as possible. Thinking about it this way made it funny and less stressing for me.

It’s so quiet now that I could even hear the sound of my own breathing and once again my mind was starting to think of all my troubles. I took my phone out from the pocket of my robe and unlocked it with my fingerprint. I scrolled through random online shopping sites, social media and many other apps to kill the time. Soon, my mind was fully occupied with my troubles and insecurities that I wasn’t even aware at what was on the screen, and I also started to forget that I was sitting here waiting for Reiner to open the door.

‘How was your day? I’m on a business trip abroad. Let’s meet up right away when I’m back. I really miss you…’

A text notification popped up on my screen followed by a selfie photo of a very handsome face with a wicked naughty smile. He’s texting this late at night so he must be in another time zone. I almost laughed with joy and cried in relief as I saw his photo. I was such a fool to think that I was truly alone.

How could that be when Zak is always right here?

He’d be so surprised to get an immediate reply. He probably thought I went to bed already. I took a selfie of myself smiling brightly, the lighting in the hallway made me look awful but I’m sure Zak would be happy to see a photo of me, no matter how bad it looked. I sent the photo to him along with the words…

‘Thank you. I love you.’

Immediately, I got a reply back…

‘Why aren’t you asleep? Thank you for? I love you too.’

I smiled a little as tears began to sting my eyes. I’m going to cry…again. It’s been a while, I guess Reiner really won’t be opening the door. He’s probably sick and tired of dealing with my selfish whims and stubbornness. His life will probably be much easier if he was serving someone else. He really drew the short end of the stick when he got stuck with working for me…maybe I should talk to Lucien about replacing him or getting rid of the idea of me having a bodyguard all together. Letting him go is probably the right decision. He should stay away from me before my messed-up life messes his up too. I hugged my knees to my chest and slowly drifted to sleep.

…

It’s been a while and I can sense that Natalia was still in front of my door. How long is she going to sit there? She should have given up and went straight back to her room. She’s oddly quiet now too, is she already asleep? In the hallway?

How many times do I have to tell her to stop dropping by at night? It’ll be bad for her if we were seen.

She’s so careless and always just does whatever she wants. I’ll need to put some distance between us, the past week of being together and so close to her is making me feel confused and it’s frustrating…

She’s probably asleep already. I should take her back to her room…

Reiner opened his door softly to find Natalia curled up in a ball and asleep leaning against the wall. She must have fallen asleep while playing with her phone since her phone was still in her hand, Reiner thought to himself as he observed her. He crouched down beside her to take a closer look at her sleeping face. There were faint signs of tear streaks on her face and Reiner did not miss these. He reached out gently to wipe her tears away with his fingertips before lifting her gently into his arms.

--To be continued...