The Gap Year

Chapter 13

'You want an ouzo?' I reached in to the prickles of the thyme bush, retrieving the bottle.

'I thought you only drank red wine?'

Denying him an answer I sat back on the step, already taking another swig.

'If you had my job then you would need to resort to hard liquor too.'

'I work with Adonis remember, so I know all about needing to numb the pain, or in my case blocking out the sound of his booming voice.' He moved to sit next to me, taking the bottle from me. 'I swear that accent is fake and really he is cockney in hiding...What?' My mouth was now hanging wide, having relaxed in to the shape of an O; something which he had clearly noticed.

'Nothing,' I shook myself from the trance, 'are you going to drink that?' I reminded him.

As he brought the head of the bottle to his mouth my own again dropped open. I studied his forearms, soft caramel in colour, with fine elongated muscles moving serpent like under his skin as he handled the bottle. Moving my eyes down to his legs, his shins and carves crafted with the same level of quality and excellence, I reached out to run my fingers through the soft sun blonded hairs which covered his shin.

'What are you doing?' I looked up still mesmerised, to find him not angry but smiling, if not a little confused.

Without thinking I leaned forward and pressed my lips to his. Gently, tauntingly he slowly opened his mouth, allowing me the release of moving my tongue against his.

Never mind organised fun, spontaneously kissing this man is the ultimate medication. Wrapping my fingers in to the curls of his long hair I tugged at them, pulling him closer, still fervently rubbing my tongue against his, lapping up its flavour, an explosion of peaches and pineapples, only mildly masked by the aniseed of the ouzo. It was delicious yet also familiar like he'd eaten some sweets of my childhood or...Sex on the Beach!

'Good God, what am I doing?' I pulled away, breaking the hypnosis of the ouzo and the moonlight. Maybe he'd snake charmed me or something? I'm such an easy target.

'What's wrong?' Quite rightly he looked offended.

'What's wrong? I'm supposed to be immersing myself in a bubble of serenity, not snogging some grotbag waiter from Runcorn.'

'It's Holmes Chapel actually, and have you ever been to Cheshire?'

'I doubt it!' I scoffed at the idea.

'Well it's very nice. Plus I think you need a reality check sweetheart, since we're in Corfu, which is hardly exclusive.'

'I'll have you know that Kate Moss holiday's on her yatch off this very coast.' I defended. It might not be Mykonos but this part of the island is hardly Blackpool; it's not like we're in Kavos.

'Yeah well Kate Moss is from Croydon,' he was still answering back, 'so suck it up and stop being a posh princess. And just for clarification,' he was standing, obviously ready to leave, 'I'm actually a qualified senior mixologist and not just some "grotbag waiter"!'