Lina’s POV

                I was hoping to escape the hole of depression I found myself in from the moment I woke up this morning; on top of the horrible hangover that I was fighting the event with Jon was replaying over and over in my mind. I was stupid to let myself go and kiss him like that, everything was going good between us and I had to up and ruin it all. Would he even be able to look at me the same after last night; would I even be able to look at him the same? I don’t know why I even asked myself that when I already knew the answer, no, no we wouldn’t; everything would be different between us now, awkward, never the same. After hours of doing nothing but feeling bad for myself in my room alone I decided to go out and spend some time with my horse; being with the horses always offered me somewhat of an escape, a sense of peace. I was brushing out Juliet when I noticed Jon in the bars with me just outside the stall, I wanted to try and avoid him for a few days, give myself some time to get over what happened but clearly that wasn’t going to happen; he did his best to make conversation but I couldn’t help but feel a little awkward with him now like I knew I would.

“Lina about last night…” Jon started; I knew where he was going with this and I didn’t want him to try and make me feel better, I just needed to get over this on my own and hopefully one day we could go back to what we were before, friends.

“Look Jon, its fine you don’t have to explain. I don’t know why I thought that you would have feelings towards me and I never should have done what I did. Can we just try to forget about the whole thing and move on?” I asked hoping that he would accept that and we could start working back towards some sort of friendship with each other.

“I don’t want to forget about it Lina, I meant what I said.” He replied taking me by surprise; I thought that him saying that he wanted me was all just a way for him to make me feel better. Could he really want to be with me? No, he has to be trying to patch things up in his own way.

“Jon its ok, I get it. You don’t have to try and make me feel better; I know when I’m not wanted.” I replied trying to focus on brushing Juliet so that my mind didn’t drift off to the old fantasies I used to have about being with Jon.

“Lina would you stop and just listen to me for a minute?” Jon placed his hand on mine stopping my brush strokes and I finally gave up and turned to face him.

“What do you want from me Jon? I don’t understand what you want. One minute you seem into me and the next you’re pulling away, then you give me some excuse about you not being good enough for me? What the hell is that supposed to mean? Why wouldn’t you be good enough for me? If you think that because of your past your any less of a person than anyone else than you’re just plain stupid! You have my mind so messed up right now that its hard to even think straight Jon; I just need some time alone to sort things out.” I snapped and went to walk out of the barn; so maybe it wasn’t exactly the right thing to do, maybe I was a little harsh but I really just needed time to sort everything out. I was already fighting my own battle in my mind about my feelings for him I didn’t need him filling my mind with more things that I didn’t know if they were the truth or just lies to try and make me feel better.

“Damn it Lina!” Jon shouted as I made my way to the stall door; the tone in his voice made me stop in my tracks, even Juliet shuffled a little next to him and normally it took a lot to even phase her in the slightest.

“What?” I shouted back turning around to face him.

“I want you to stop being so damn hard headed and stop and listen to me for just one fucking minute!” I had never seen such a look of determination and anger on Jon’s face before and the sight of it made me stop and listen to what he had to say but it still didn’t make me want to make it easy for him.

“Fine! What do you have to say then Jon?” I asked slamming the brush down on the ledge of the stall door; poor Juliet was stuck in the middle of the whole thing looking back and forth between the two of us wondering what the hell was going on.

“I wasn’t expecting what happened last night to happen; I had no idea that you even liked me like that. You’re right at first I didn’t think that I was good enough for you but I took some time and thought it over and I know now that I am, or at least I could be. I really like you Lina, I have since the first time that I met you; I want to be with you.” Jon said never breaking eye contact with me; my mouth opened and closed a few times like I wanted to say something back but I just couldn’t find the right words. I still couldn’t decide if this whole thing was real or just his way of trying to make me not feel like an idiot for coming onto him.

“You can’t just change your mind in a day Jon; you can’t just go from not wanting me to wanting me just like that.” I said snapping my fingers as if to make a point; I needed to know if this was real, I needed to know if he really did want me.

“I never said that I didn’t want you Lina, I was just… I was scared. I didn’t think that I ever stood a chance with you and now that I know that I do I don’t want to miss it.” He took a few steps towards me but I held up my hands to stop him; it was so confusing, I wanted to believe him but at the same time I couldn’t.

“Jon, I can’t…” I started but he quickly cut me off.

“No, don’t tell me that you can’t, not yet. Just let me prove it to you; let me show you how much you mean to me, how much I want you. Come with me this weekend. I talked to your dad and he agreed to give us Friday off, just come with me this weekend and if you still feel the same way after that then I will drop it; we can forget the night ever happened and go back to being friends like we were before if that’s what you want.” His voice was almost begging me to believe him, just the sound of his voice and hearing his words made me want to forget about all the reservations I was having about him and run into his arms right then and there. The fact that he had talked to my father and got us a day off work so that he could prove to me that what he was saying was the truth showed me that he was serious about it; how could I deny him at least one more chance to prove to me that how I was feeling is wrong?

“You have one weekend.” I said before turning on my heels, grabbing the brush off the ledge and leaving the stall.

“You hear that Juliet, mean old Lina’s going to give us a second chance.” Jon whispered to the horse but I heard every word.

“I can still hear you, you know.” I shouted over my shoulder before returning the brush to the tack room and making my way back up to the house.

                I was still confused, still not sure whether I should let myself get excited about getting another chance with Jon or not; I didn’t want to get my hopes up in case this was some type of ploy to make me feel better, yet at the same time I couldn’t see him going through so much trouble if he really didn’t have feelings for me. The rest of the week went by quickly, while Jon and I would talk occasionally we really kept our conversations based on work and nothing else; I could tell that there was still a lot of tension between us and I couldn’t help but wonder how the weekend together would go. Would it be awkward the whole time, each of us trying to make things seem normal but not knowing how? Would things change and become comfortable between us once we weren’t around other people? I couldn’t be sure how things would go but I could only hope for that latter.

                We had agreed to take my truck instead of Jons because we had a three hour drive ahead of us and we wanted to make sure we had a reliable vehicle; not to mention Jons truck didn’t have air conditioning. We were supposed to leave at seven in the morning on Friday and by the time I made my way downstairs with my bags Jon was already waiting at the bottom of the steps with his things loaded into the truck; he took my bags and carried them out to the truck for me before opening my door and allowing me to get in before closing it behind him. Well if he was going for an award to be a gentleman today he would be on the fast track to a gold metal; the first part of the trip was mostly in silence with small talk back and forth every now and then but at least it wasn’t a complete awkward silence, we were just over two hours into the drive when I spoke again.

“So are you going to tell me where we’re goin’ yet?” I asked.

“Nope, it’s a surprise.” Jon replied looking over at me with a grin.

“What if I don’t like surprises?” I replied hoping to get an answer out of him.

“I don’t think that you would have come with me if you didn’t like surprises.” He replied still grinning; well clearly just asking isn’t going to get me anywhere so I have to fall back on option number two, the option that has never failed me with Jon, begging.

“Can’t you just surprise me now?” I asked looking up at him through my lashes; he looked over for a split second before turning his focus back to the road.

“Don’t even try that, its not going to work this time.” He countered wringing his hands on the steering wheel; clearly he was fighting with himself about telling me and I wasn’t even laying it on thick yet. Maybe this would be easier than I thought; he was always a sucker for my begging.

“But Jon…” I whined.

“Lina…” He warned drawing out the word.

“Please just tell me, I really want to know.” I begged moving my hand to rest on his leg to add to the effect.

“Damn it Lina!” He said shifting in his seat; I could tell he was seconds away from cracking.

“Please Jon!” I begged again and I heard him let out a sigh; yep, I win again!

“Fine! Were going to a town called Granbury.” He rolled his eyes after telling me like he couldn’t believe that I got the information out of him. My excitement level jumped about what he told me, I loved Granbury and I had spent lots of time there as a child and almost every year we would travel there for vacation but haven’t been for that last few years.

“I love Granbury; we have a cabin out there on the lake!” I said excitedly.

“Oh, so you’ve been there before?” Jon asked sounding a little disappointed. Crap I didn’t mean to ruin the weekend for me; I know that he worked hard to plan it.

“Just to the cabin, I never really spent much time in the town itself.” I hoped that would cheer him up a little and not feel like I ruined everything by disappointing him by telling him I’ve been there before.

“Well maybe if we have some time after everything I have planned you can take me out and show me the cabin.” he replied offering me a smile; at least he didn’t seem to be so upset about me ruining the surprise now.

“Sound’s good, I bet you will love it. I haven’t been there in years.” I say thinking back on the years I spent on out on the lake with my family and Bubba; it will be nice to visit it again with Jon this time even if we can’t get in.

“I bet its nice.” he replied before turning his attention back to the road.

“So what do you have planned for the day?” I asked to keep the conversation flowing to pass the time we had left on the drive.

“Surprises.” He replied grinning again.

“Didn’t we already cover this whole ‘I don’t like surprises’ thing?” I asked.

“We did but I don’t believe you for a second; I think that you like surprises but you also like getting your way and you might have gotten your way last time but I’m not budging on the rest of the trip.” Jon replied and I decided to test just how serious he was about that.

“But please Jon, I really, really, really want to know! Please pretty please just tell me.” I gave him my best puppy dog eyes when he looked over at me and was expecting him to break at any second; what I wasn’t expecting is when he started laughing and shaking his head no.

“I told you, I’m not going to break. So go ahead, beg all you want, it’s not going to get you anywhere. Besides, I kind of like hearing you beg.” He said with a wink before pinching my cheek; I pushed his hand away and sat back in my seat pouting. I was sure that I could get whatever I wanted out of Jon with some simple begging or a look through my lashes, what the hell happened to change that in such a short amount of time.

“Aw, are you pouting now?” He asked after seeing my cross my arms across my chest and let out a little huff of defeat.

“No! I don’t pout!” I said defensively.

“Sure looks like pouting to me.” He replied with another chuckle; I did my best to hold back my laugh knowing that he caught me but seconds later I broke and a laugh escaped my lips.

“Smiles look much better on you than frowns do.” Jon brushed a piece of hair behind my ear after I leaned forward and it fell across my face to try and hide my blush.