They continued to garden in silence until Lyrah stopped; her attention was on something in the distance in the field. The sound of galloping echoed across the serene gardens of Xander’s mansion. Xander followed her gaze to see a horse, mounted on it was the heir of the town’s car manufacturing company, Vince. Xander had been introduced to him once before at one of the parties he recently attended, much thanks to his older sister for taking an interest in him and wanting to meet but being too slow as another woman caught Vince’s attention first. Casting a glance back at Lyrah, he noticed she was still staring at Vince. “Do you know of him?” he asked, breaking the silence between the two.
She simply returned back to her work with ease as she replied. “Sort of, he’s pretty admirable.”
For some reason, something inside of Xander ticked and he resumed plucking the weeds as he spoke. “What do you know about him?”
Lyrah eyed Xander with an assessing gaze from beneath the rim of her hat before looking over at Vince once again. “He’s a great horse rider, he’s kind to his workers, he’s down to earth and he isn’t a typical rich man.”
He noticed she was looking at him again, this time Xander started to feel annoyed. How did she know so much about Vince? He threw a few strands of weeds and dirt at Lyrah to get her to stop looking. “Whoops, my hand slipped.”
The soil hit her face and smudged her cheek. She had shut her eyes in time to prevent dirt getting into her eyes. After wiping her face clean with the sleeve of her shirt she faced Xander with a frown. “What’s the matter with you?”
“Have you ever spoken to Vince before?” he couldn’t explain it, but for some reason Xander wanted to know more about Lyrah’s connection to Vince and how she came to know him.
Lyrah continued with her work casually. “Of course, I have, many times. How else would I have known about him?” she seemed calm, like it was a natural for her to know Vince. She also became aware of Xander’s sudden change in behaviour. Was he upset that she knew about Vince? Not wanting to leave this alone, she began asking questions.
“Do you not like Vince?” she asked.
“He’s a good man, there isn’t anything bad about him, as far as I know.” Xander replied, now tugging roughly on the weeds.
Lyrah held back her chuckle and nodded in response. “You didn’t expect me to know other rich men personally, did you?” she dusted her hands and wiped them on her work pants, leaving a smudge of dirt on her clothes.
Xander hesitated and frowned. “You could say that.”
“That’s all the weeds, I’m done for today.” Lyrah said, standing up and stretching her arms above her head.
He stood up abruptly and glanced up at the sky. “But it’s only morning still, don’t you have other tasks to do around here?” he still wanted to talk more with her, it’s not every day he gets to speak with someone who is not the maids or workers around the household. Also, he felt somewhat comfortable in Lyrah’s presence, perhaps it was because she didn’t try to impress him or probe him with unnecessary questions like the other workers. Because they were able to hold a civil conversation, with the exception of speaking about Vince.
She shook her head in response and picked up the secateurs and the bucket with the rose stem trims and weeds. “Nope, old man Joseph said to tidy the rose beds and that’s exactly what I did,” she smiled and turned on her heel before walking down the path. “Until next time, Xander.”
He watched her walk off and saw one of the maids in the distance heading towards Lyrah. The maid retrieved the items from Lyrah and they continued walking together. Xander shook his head as if to wake himself up. Wait, I don’t recall telling her my name. Ah, she must have heard it from Joseph, the gardener in charge.
Xander headed back to the mansion, a smile dancing on his face as he thought about his morning. He was now looking forward to more conversations with Lyrah, an interesting person, he thought to himself. A breath of fresh air from the daily stress I go to. He looked up to the sky as he stopped in his tracks, allowing the gentle breeze of the spring air flow throughout his entire being. His favourite garden has now become his sanctuary.
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