I couldn’t help it…I started laughing. William was adorable in spite of the aggravation.
His dark brown eyes moved up my body slowly, stopping just above my chest, and where his gaze touched, my skin warmed. Damn, Jenna…you’re out of control tonight.
“Anyway…” I said, steering the conversation back on course. I willed myself to not think about how much William was intriguing me with each passing minute. “I want to know what went on inside your head while you were fighting the duel. What exactly was it that caused the distress?”
He took a deep breath and then released it. “It was the crowd. I hadn’t counted on that. I knew exactly what I was doing out there. I had a plan and I would have won, but…” He shook his head. “I hadn’t planned on all the faces and the noise.”
“And Doug made it worse once he found out.”
He nodded but didn’t say anything. His hands fidgeted as they rested on his knees.
“So does that mean you don’t do crowds at all? Theaters? Sporting events? Concerts?”
“No.”
“Really? How do you see movies?”
“I wait until they come out on Blu-ray, or I go see them at Adam’s house. He has his own theater.”
“Wow. But what about big movies that you don’t want to wait for? Like what about the new Star Wars movie?”
He shook his head. “I can’t. Even if it’s a movie I really want to see.”
I frowned, wondering what that must be like. “Oh, that’s rough. But maybe going to some places like that and exposing you to larger groups of people would help get you used to it?”
He seemed to think about that and then shook his head as if dreading the thought.
“Okay…well, there are techniques you can use to help calm you down. Visualization, breathing. When I was younger, I had really bad panic attacks. They were usually brought on by loud noises, so I had problems with certain types of movies, too.”
He looked up from the floor, appearing surprised. “You’re afraid of loud noises? Why?”
I hesitated. “Because…when I was little, the city I lived in was bombed pretty much constantly.” His gaze rose slowly from my chin to my nose before it stopped.
“You lived in Sarajevo?”
“Yes. That’s where my family is from. How’d you guess?”
“It wasn’t difficult. You said you spoke Bosnian as your first language. Sarajevo is the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina, in what used to be Yugoslavia.”
“And you know more about it than ninety percent of Americans.”
“The city was under siege for almost four years. Your family came here to escape that war?”
I sidestepped the small pang that I’d long since grown accustomed to. It was only like a distant shadow in the background now. “Yes—well, only my sister and I. We lived there ‘til I was five, and then we were able to leave to go to Croatia before ultimately coming here with my aunt. But…my parents stayed there. My grandma was sick and elderly, and they didn’t want to leave her. But at the same time, they wanted us kids to be safe so they made a difficult choice.”
William rubbed at the stubble on his jaw and I tracked the motion, noting how square and masculine his features were. His perfect cleft chin was crisscrossed by a prominent scar that made me wonder what it tasted like. I swallowed, barely listening to his words as he continued. “It was a terrible war. I read a lot about it and watched documentaries. I didn’t know that you were from there.”
I nodded. “I was little when I came here. I didn’t speak English, but I was only five so I picked it up fast.”
“And these techniques you’ve learned? Have you ever taught them to someone before?”
I smiled. “Trying to test if I’m legit?” His features clouded, so before he could ask, I continued. “Yes. I work with other war refugees. You know that’s my job, right? Ann and I both work at the International Refugee Support Center.” At least until I began traveling with the Faire in June. The thought of leaving the RSC was one shadow over that bright spot of moving on. “We help refugees from places like Iran, China, Cambodia and now Syria, with all that’s going on there.”
“I’m not a refugee.”
“You don’t have to be for these techniques to work for you. You have a trigger—something that stirs panic. For me, it was loud noises…anything that sounded like bombs or rifle fire. For you, it’s crowds. We can work on that.”
I scooted across the mat until our knees were almost touching. “Here…let me show you. This is simple breathing.”
“I already know how to do that.”
I laughed. “Okay, true. Everyone knows how to breathe, or we wouldn’t be here. But there is a right way to breathe.”
He looked skeptical. His eyes flicked to mine and then immediately darted away. “I didn’t know there was a ‘right’ way to breathe.”
“Well, there is. It’s the way that’s healthy for your diaphragm and your abdominal muscles. It’s probably counter to what you’ve always thought. When you breathe in, your chest expands, and when you breathe out, it contracts. But it should actually be the reverse. If you breathe correctly, it will trigger a sense of calming in your nervous system. Here…give me your hand.”
William tentatively held out a big hand and I took it. Placing it on my stomach, I took a deep breath in and then exhaled it. “Do you see what I mean?”
His fingers moved ever so slightly against my abdomen, and through the thin cloth of my baby tee, my skin reacted to his touch—really reacted to his touch. Tingles everywhere, like I’d been shocked by static electricity. I resisted the urge to move away and chanced a glance at his face to see if he understood what I was demonstrating.
He frowned. “Do it again.”
I did and he paused. I waited.
“One more time.”
I complied and he didn’t say anything, just moved his fingers again then splayed them across my stomach. His fingers were so long that his hand covered most of my belly. After another moment of no commentary from him, I looked up. He had the biggest grin on his face.
Well, he might not think his brain behaved typically, but right now he was acting just like a typical man.
I batted his hand away. “You get the point.”