What Rosie Found Next by Helen J. Rolfe

either been out of town or busy working and he was getting anxious. He needed to take this opportunity to delve a little deeper, find out what his parents were hiding.
    He decided to try his luck in the shed and see if he could find anything amongst the paraphernalia inside. He rummaged through a carton of tools, packets of seeds stashed in a box, an old tea chest containing nothing more than old books that hadn’t made the grade for the inside shelves. He pulled out boxes full of surplus plant pots, he even looked beneath a tool bench that hadn’t been used in years, but apart from a cricket bat and deflated soccer ball, nothing.
    He perched on the tea chest, arms resting on his legs. Yet another fruitless search. If only his mum hadn’t seen the article fall from the bookcase that day. Given the reach of internet searches, it could’ve given him all the information he needed. Hearing his parents’ conversation that night had not only confirmed there was something going on, but it had confirmed the secret was specific to him. There had been no mention of ‘the boys’ as she often referred to them, only him by name. This wasn’t about Tom, or Ben, and that made him feel isolated and determined not to let it go until he found what he was looking for.
    With Rosie asleep upstairs, Owen continued his search inside. He checked the bookshelves in the lounge room, climbing up on a set of steps so that he could check the very top but there was nothing. He doubted he’d find anything in the kitchen, but he rooted through each and every cupboard, looked beneath platters, in recipe books in case papers were hidden in those, even lifted up saucepan lids.
    He felt as though he was losing his mind.
    He tiptoed up the stairs to get the key to the study and then came back down and started on another drawer of folders and papers in the filing cabinet. He was truly amazed at the amount of bumf his parents had hoarded over the years as he waded through everything from old utility bills and insurance details, to information on family healthcare plans.
    When he came up with nothing, again, he leant back in the chair. He looked up at the pictures on the walls of him and his dad in their uniforms, father and son team, and another black-and-white photograph of his grandad. He hadn’t told Rosie about any of this, shown her any of the pictures that told a lot of his life story. He assumed she hadn’t been in the study either if her confusion about his pager was anything to go by, but he’d pushed the boundaries with her tonight and perhaps it was time to stop doing that. Something about Rosie told him she was trusting, and any deception, no matter how playful he intended it to be, wouldn’t be something she’d thank him for. And that mattered to him.
    After he’d been through one more drawer, tiredness got the better of him. Upstairs in his bedroom he dug out a fresh T-shirt and a pair of jeans, ready for his early morning training session, and climbed into bed. The rain pitter-pattered lightly against the window pane and the smell of the wet outside drifted in through any cracks it could find. Owen stared up at the ceiling, arms folded behind his head. Rosie was the first girl he’d ever wanted to let close to him, but what was he playing at? She was temporary. Plus, she was spoken for, and had the need to settle down … a need he had never shared.
    Turning onto his side to get some sleep, Owen also knew he needed to find out more about himself before he could let anyone else in.
    *
    Owen was up and out before Rosie the next morning. He arrived home filthy dirty from practising lifting techniques in the mud brought on by last night’s rain, and there was still no sign of her. He dragged out a lonely slice of quiche from the fridge and a tub of sliced up watermelon. Halfway through a slice of the pink fleshy fruit, he realised why he hadn’t seen her. She was in the pool.
    He moved to the doors leading out to the deck but kept