A Fiery Dalliance

XXIII

"Look at identical twins. When you get closer, you start to see the small differences. It all depends on how much you magnify it." Brian Swanson

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XXIII.

Joe stormed away from Perrie, knowing that he would regret the entirely ungentlemanly act of leaving a lady unaccompanied. But at that moment, his pride had clouded his better judgement, and it had made him spit out poisonous untruths.

He felt awash with humiliation, hurt, and shame, and all such feelings overwhelmed his senses and took control of his words.

Joe's humiliation was triggered by the stunned expression on Perrie's face after he had kissed her. He had not known what he had been expecting from her, but it certainly was not her to fumble out in her next breath that she did, in fact, hate him. He could not believe that he had behaved so foolishly, so cavalierly, with such a girl as she.

The hurt that had suddenly flooded his entire being in the aftermath of their exchange was the most foreign emotion that he had ever experienced. Joe felt as though ... he felt as though he was losing Perrie. He felt as though he was losing her.

When he was in his right mind, he would have been well aware that Perrie had never been, nor could she ever be, a possession of his, but in that moment, as she had stood before him and confirmed that she hated him, Joe felt her slipping through his fingers, and trying to seize hold of her was like trying to hold onto smoke.

What he was trying to hold on to was still another question to ponder. Was he trying to keep hold of his childhood sparring partner? Or was the very fact that he had kissed her an indication of the desires that bubbled beneath the surface of his sanity?

The shame that was quickly consuming him as he stalked away into the night centred directly around how he had just behaved towards her. Joe had already been in a state after his interaction with his father, but what he had said to Perrie was cruel, and he had deliberately tried to hurt her because he could not hurt his father.

A person could not be hurt if they never cared.

But Perrie could be hurt, because she did care. And so, Joe, in his reckless state, had taken advantage of that, and he already hated himself for it. Joe hated that he could be as cruel as his father was, and that made him fear that he was more like John Parish than he realised.

Joe desperately wanted to turn around. He desperately wanted to go back and apologise to Perrie, to beg her forgiveness, and to try and explain the naval war that was the inside of his mind.

But the shame stopped him. The very fear he had that he was entirely too much like his father stopped him from going back and throwing himself at Perrie's feet. How could he ever live with himself if he treated her the way that his father treated him?

What had unfolded that evening was frightening enough. Somewhere in the garden, Joe stopped, freezing in place, his right boot snapping a large twig underfoot.

Sparring partner. Nemesis. Enemy. Horrid little imp. Perrie.

Joe had spent the last decade deliberately making Perrie miserable. He had found joy in it. Watching her squirm had been amusing to him. But the very fact that she reciprocated every one of his pranks erased any guilt that he might have ever felt.

Joe had always thought that he had formed a distaste for Perrie Beresford on her first day of school because of what she represented. And that still could well have been true.

But his reaction, and his subsequent actions, could only be attributed to his own lineage.

John Parish was a cruel, cold, and unfeeling man.