The Construction Worker Part Seven

A New Dawn

I was in a daze.

My skin still smelled like Rhett. I’d showered, but his scent clung to me; sweat, sex, and the faint bite of sawdust.

I’d barely set my keys down when two messages landed at once.

One from Rhett. I’ve had a great weekend. Thank you for trusting me and coming over. R

I smiled, wanting to reply but not quite sure what to say.

The other from Anna. Just wanted to say I might extend my trip a few days. Been good to get space. Talk next week? Take care.
No “I miss you.” Or “love you.” Not even a heart emoji. Just “take care.”

I felt that deep in my chest. The years we’d started building something beginning to disintegrate.

Things with Anna had spiraled terribly over the months and somehow, we’d reached a point of no return. I just sat on the sofa and re-read her message. I didn’t cry. I just stared at the screen while the house got darker around me. A hollow throb set up in my chest. Not sharp, just steady. The kind of ache that says, “You already knew.”

But if there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s pushing deep, emotional shit to one side and kicking that can down the road for future me to deal with.

As I stripped to go shower, I realized that the feelings I had for Anna had drastically changed over some time. And as the spray of the water came down all over me, it also dawned over me that she felt the same. No more, ‘I love you’ texts and no more, ‘I miss you’.

Those days were well and truly behind us. We’d become friends.

I remembered the way she flinched when I tried to touch her lower back in the kitchen two weeks ago. Just a twitch, but it was like I’d reached for her through a wall of glass.

I began to mourn the reality that I’d refused to acknowledge for far too many months, and also the new feelings I had for Rhett.

That night, as I made myself a solo dinner, tidied up my house and later sunk into my couch, a beer in one hand, the remote in the other, I wondered how I’d gotten into this predicament.

The TV was on, but I couldn’t tell you what was playing. Everything normal felt fake. I watched two actors kiss and felt nothing. My body remembered Rhett, and my mind was still trying to pretend that meant nothing.

I thought about him and finally messaged him back. Hey, thanks Rhett, was fun. Chat soon. M

Yeah, that was quite a sterile response given only that morning I’d put my dick in his ass and then spent the entire day eating junk food in bed, fooling around and kissing while watching Stranger Things from the beginning.

Then I gave him the romantic equivalent of handing someone a business card after a hot fuck. I hated myself for it the second I hit send. That message didn’t just cool things off, it put the entire weekend in a fucking ziplock bag and shoved it in the freezer.

I tossed and turned on the couch, and woke up at 6am, forcing myself to get to the gym before work. Deep down, I knew we were already over. We were just dragging the corpse through the motions.

Monday morning, I sat at my desk thinking about Rhett and Anna, while work piled on and my schedule looked like my college dating life; jam-packed with questionable decisions and not nearly enough aftercare. Both of those weren’t things I needed to prioritize right now. My focus was work, my mental sanity and health.

Later that afternoon, after unsuccessfully trying to focus, but somehow having got through a lot of work, I got a message from Rhett.

How’s the day going?