DISCLAIMER. This is a work of adult fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. 

The author does not endorse or condone any behavior enclosed within. The subject matter is not appropriate for minors. Please note this novel contains profanity and explicit sexual situations.

Once lost, Now found

Chapter one

Cas

IT RAINED BUCKETS the whole day. There wasn't much that could make me feel more disgusting than a plane ride coupled with that wet and dry moistness you get from being in and out of the rain. Moist. That word alone made me want to take a shower. I hated it, but then again I have hated a lot lately. I've just arrived back in my hometown, a place I've not been back to in nearly six years. Yet due unfortunate circumstances I'm back. My grandmother passed away a month ago and I inherited her house and bakery. So, here I am, back home. The taxi had dropped me off at the bottom of the road, there was no other way up but the long flight of stairs I once used to enjoy running up and down. Heh, memories old. I grew up with my grandmother when my parents passed away in a car accident, I was at the tender age of only ten when it happened. I was slightly confused for a while, but I got it, they were never coming back. 

So I grew up in my grandmother's care. I didn't have a bad upbringing, per say, she did all that she could for me, my school life was fairly ordinary, I didn't have many friends, not that I cared anyway. But a part of me felt missing, I was missing something. Then when I graduated school I started working in my grandmother's bakery. It was then I realised that making food was my calling, so I left home and went to culinary school. That's when I met him, Scott. A popular guy. Handsome, tall, he had a silver tongue and could talk his way out of everything and I fell in love. We clicked straight away. It didn't take long for us to fall in love with each other and become more than friends. When I finally graduated, we decided we'd go to America, his homeland and open a restaurant together. He had the means, a good family, and money. We didn't need to worry. I was the sou chef there. I was happy, everything had fallen into place. I kept in contact with my grandmother, everyday I would talk to her and tell her how happy I was, how well I was doing. Even though I wasn't, little lies I'd tell myself wouldn't hurt. I couldn't break my dear grandmother's heart. Because that's exactly what I felt like would happen and she was just too far away from if anything happened, But Scott….he decided after six years I was just not good enough for him anymore, I guess. Not that I was surprised. But it broke my heart, badly. Worse than before. 

So here I am. Starting over again, in a place I never thought I'd come back to, so many memories. So many broken promises. The microcosm of the whole town's alterations made me feel sad and extremely nostalgic. My youth hadn’t been lost, it had been bricked over by the years spent away from here, with Scott. But painfully it's one of those things that happened. You find love, you lose love, you get angry and swear you will never want it again. I don't think I do you know, I didn't realise that falling in love could be this painful, maybe that was an imprint from my parents.

I truly believe my parents made a huge mistake by getting married. Neither showed any form of affection, from what I can remember, towards one another, in any way whatsoever. I don’t remember a single hug or kiss being exchanged. They tended to ignore each other. At one time they must have shared a certain amount of intimacy or yours truly wouldn’t have hatched into the world. Maybe that's where I found it painful, because those displays of affection were never ingrained into me from the ones who should have, I don't know. As I have said, the resulting child became a bit of a loner. I was friendly and polite because my mother had hammered into me the ritual and courtesies of manners, (one of the few things for which I have to thank her) but I really only felt ‘complete’ in my own company. But their parting from this world was still hurtful nonetheless.

The old house was still the same as I remembered from years before. The same nostalgic smell, comforting but also very sad. Empty with too much accumulated dust. "I need to clean." I whispered to myself looking around at the old furniture and my new stuff that was already brought here by the movers. The many boxes full of memories from america. "Maybe I will just chuck most of it." So I grabbed a box that said. 'holiday moments' in it were pictures and things from our first vacation. Bitter sweet. So I grabbed it and shoved it away in the cupboard by the sliding doors that lead onto a back garden that needed tending. I was never very green fingered. Although my grandmother tried to teach me, I was….well, not interested, but thinking back to my young childhood, I regret not being interested. I took a lot for granted back then, but when you're so young and carefree, you just don't know the damn difference. One must do what one can, I guess. I opened the doors to let the warm summer air clear the stuffy ness from the house and I sat on the back porch. "It's so warm." Finally the rain had decided to stop and the last bit of sun leaked through and warmed me. But then I really realised sitting here, how alone I actually was and I wondered. What am I going to do now? Open the bakery that had been close for so long or just sell it and find an easy regular job? I just don't know, not anymore.