Denial

Even though Nessa only had a 15-minute headstart, she was already gone when Johnny reached her house. He walked around; trying doors and windows, but none of them would open or even budge. And even though he was calling out her name, no one answered.

Johnny sat down on the little steps in front of Nessa’s house, letting his head fall down in his hands. He didn’t know how to solve this, hell, he didn’t even know how this happened. She was at his house, she was there! Why didn’t she come in, why did she speed off like that? He couldn’t understand, by the love of him, why she had been there and why she left.

“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” Johnny let out loudly, rousing the attention of a woman passing by, walking her dog. She looked at him annoyed. Johnny ducked his head, trying to disappear from the face of the earth. He really didn’t understand, but he couldn’t help but worry about Nessa more. There must have been something that upset her, but for the love of God, he had no clue what. But he knew as much that if she was already gone from her house, she must have hurried somewhere, she must have been in a rush. Being in a rush and driving is never a good idea, and he didn’t see Charlotte anywhere.

Johnny did the only thing he could think of, knowing that Nessa wouldn’t want to speak with him now anyway, for some kind of reason. He grabbed his phone and called the Sanders house. The phone quickly answered by Izzie.

“Hey little man, you want to come over for dinner?”
“No time. Iz, you need to help me.” Johnny heard how desperate he sounded, but he had no time hiding his feelings. He needed something done.
“What’s going on? You sound weird” The worry took over in Izzie’s voice, and he could hear people in the background, probably the others that were listening in by now.

“Nessa came to my house-“
“Oh Johnny that is great!”
“No, please, let me talk. I came outside and she was still in her car. She stared at me and then drove off, angry, or sad, or… I don’t know… She seemed upset. I don’t know what’s going on-“ He was taking a breath to continue when Izzie already broke in
“What? Why would she do that? What did you say, what did you do?”
“Nothing! I don’t know what I did, I mean, I get why she told me to leave this morning, but she was at my house, that must mean something, right? Why would she be there if she didn’t want to talk? Why would she?”
“I don’t know” Izzie silently replied “What do you need from me?”
“I need you to try and get a hold of her, I have a feeling she wouldn’t want to talk to me, but I need to know that she is okay. If she ran off upset she might not be paying attention or…” He couldn’t even wrap his head around everything that could happen. He didn’t even want to think about it, too worried that his thoughts would become truth.
“Okay…. But Johnny, you better be honest with me, if I find out you hurt her in some way, I will kick your ass! Speaking of that ass, get it over here. We better make a plan. Be careful”

Izzie looked at the phone in her hand on which she just ended the call.
“What the fuck happened?” Mia and Tammy both let out at the same time. Everyone was still there. After Johnny had left they had talked for a while and then just decided to hang out for the day. Everything had gone to the back of their minds. With the men because they just were like that, it was done for them. With the women, because the men had told them to. But now everything was back into full attention.

Izzie quickly brought everyone up to speed and met de skeptical eyes of each of the individual men, including her husband.
“We just said-“
“I know what you just said, and I heard you. But this is not meddling in their relationship. This is making sure Nessa is okay.” Matt looked at her and slightly shook his head, before he saw the look in his wife’s eyes.
“You know how she can get, Matt. It’s not okay for her to be driving when she is upset, what if she gets one of her panic attacks again?” Izzie’s voice got softer with every word she spoke. Matt couldn’t stand to see her like that and pulled her into his arms, kissing the top of her head. He sometimes wondered if his wife’s big heart would get her into trouble sometime soon. So as always, he caved “Okay, try to get a hold of her, we need to know where she is and what the hell happened”

Against her better judgement, Izzie tried to call Nessa, but she knew Nessa wouldn’t answer. Nessa hated calling and even if she would make an exception, she would definitely not answer while she drove her car. She texted her, send her an Instagram message and finally even tried Snapchat, but no luck.

She let out a frustrated sigh.
“Seriously, if something happens to her I will kill the gnome!”
“Izzie!” Mia chastised her “It’s not Johnny’s fault”
Ofcourse Izzie knew that, and she loved Johnny to death, but she couldn’t help but wonder why Nessa had fled the scene. Something must have happened. She knew her friend. She knew that it would have taken a lot of self-convincing for Nessa to end up at Johnny’s house after what happened that morning, so she wouldn’t just change her mind. Something must have set her off.

“Have you found her?” Johnny rushed into the house, his shirt on backwards, his shoes not even tied. Mia shook her head before she walked over to him to hug him closely “But we will, I promise”.
“I don’t know what to do. If she doesn’t want to talk to me, or see me, I’m fine… well maybe not…” he murmured the last part more to himself, before he caught his voice again and continued “But if something would happen to her… I-“ Johnny’s monologue was disturbed by his ringing phone.

He looked at his screen full expectation, but then his face fell “I have to take this”. He pushed the answer button, before he walked away from the group a little.

“Hey... Thank you for calling... Yeah very happy you called me back after this afternoon. Didn’t know if you would after me leaving so soon“ his voice was soft and he got a smile on his face “Sure, Sure, I know I could count on you, you always come through.” Johnny let out a few chuckles, unaware of his friends watching him closely. “The special treatment was exactly what I needed” As he let out a careful laugh, the amazement around the friends grew. “I don’t know if it’s smart to meet up again that soon, I have a few things I need to handle first… No, nothing to worry your pretty head over, this is something I need to handle on my own… Okay. Show it to me the next time we see each other, talk to you soon”

The second he ended the call everyone was over him.
“Was that Nessa?”
“No” Johnny blushed deeply.
The friends shot each other a short look and then it seemed as if the shoe dropped.

“What the hell Christ?!” Tammy let out in a huff.
“Yeah! What the hell?! We are trying to get Nessa back to you and you just pick up another woman?!”
“I wasn’t-“
“That phonecall right there… was it a man or a woman?” Brian pushed, his annoyance growing.
“A woman”
“Do we know her?” Brian pressed again.
“No, you guys don’t know her, but she-” Johnny blushed, feeling that he was attacked for something he didn’t do.
“I can’t even… UGH!!” Izzie let out a huff, trying to find a way to release that angry energy inside of her.

Johnny looked around the group and when everyone finally shut up he took his chance.
“I’m not interested in her! Her name is Bella, she is my new interior designer. My house is a mess and I really didn’t want to finish it without Nessa.” The angry red on his face was replaced by an embarrassed one. The women wanted to stay for what they thought he did, but the look on Johnny’s face was adorable. They let him continue “She is married to my painter friend, and I called her this morning before I came here. She has been at my house to check everything out. Our friendship is purely platonic. She is very sweet, but also very happily married to my friend” He looked around the group, daring them to say something. “I can’t believe you guys thought I would do that to Nessa! Thank you for being my friends!” Johnny was getting pretty angry again, not able to believe his friends would think something like that.
“What about that special treatment and the ‘don’t worry your pretty head’” Zack piped up. He knew exactly how to talk to women you want something from, and Johnny had that tone clearly in his voice. Johnny, however, didn’t see it like that at all and was getting more and more pissed by the second.
“I can’t fucking believe I’m explaining myself to you” he muttered “She worries too much, she takes on the weight of the world and I knew that if I would tell her about the mess I made with Nessa, she would want to try and solve it. She is in the beginstages of pregnanancy, she doesn’t need that kind of worry! And the special treatment… that was nothing more than her coming over on her day off, taking the lead in everything that I want done. Nothing more, nothing less. Fucking assholes!!!”

“Was she at your house when Nessa came over?” Izzie asked, putting two and two together quickly.
“Oh fuck” Mia and Tammy silently let out, following Izzie’s line of thought.
“Yeah…. Why?” Johnny answered “We were done, I just showed her out when I noticed Nessa’s car”.

“That must have been what she saw!!” Tammy let out excited.
“Yes! And she must have drawn the wrong conclusion” Mia added.
The guys just stared at their women, no idea how they would come to that conclusion. Izzie already had her phone in her hand again “Nessa! This is all a misunderstanding, please call me and let me know you are okay, please”

Izzie ended the call and joined her girl friends in explaining the whole thing to the guys. Johnny looked at them in disbelieve “How? Why? How could she?”
“What would you have thought if it had been the other way around? You are both really hurt, you must realize what happened in her head when she saw you and that women. I don’t say you could have done anything about it, but you can understand, I know you can” Izzie put her arm around Johnny and hugged him close. There must be a way to help these two… This couldn’t be the end of it.

Her train of thought was broken when her phone dinged to indicate a new snapchat and she took it out of her pocket because she couldn’t hold her curiosity. This time, the curiosity was rewarded when she saw who it was from.
“Nessa!”
The snapchat contained a picture of half Nessa’s face against the background of a room. The capture only said I’m fine. Izzie made a screenshot so she could look at the picture longer.
“Where is she? Is she okay?” Johnny asked, impatient.
“She says she’s fine, but I don’t know where she is” Izzie briefly showed the picture to the others, but then went back staring at it.

Matt stood behind her, watching the pic together with her. Matt opened his mouth the minute Izzie noticed too “Izzie isn’t that-”
“The Big Bear cabin! Look, that is a little piece of our wedding picture, right there in the corner!”
“But how!?”
“She knows where we keep the key. I told her she could use the cabin whenever she wanted. If she wanted to get away for a bit. She must have taken it.”

Everyone was watching Matt and Izzie, except for Johnny…. Johnny had already left.

Notes

There you are... another update.... And you know what...
It really seems like I'm going to actually finish this story ;-)

One more chapter to go in this story...

<3 you all!