This one takes me by surprise. How does he know about that? Before I can say anything, he answers for me.
“Sometimes I see you at sunrise, floating them into the water. I didn’t want to say anything because it wasn’t really any of my business.”
I open my mouth then close it again. It makes me feel a little violated to know that I was being watched. I push that thought aside though. He knows more about what I’m going through than anyone else in my life.
“I was… saying a prayer for them, I guess,” I mumble. “But since I don’t believe in God anymore, it’s more like a wish really. Stupid, right?”
“Do you think it’s stupid?”
I shake my head.
“Then it’s not. I’ve seen people grieve in a lot of different ways. No two people are the same, no grief is the same. You do what you do to get through it. If it’s helping you, and it’s not hurting you or anyone around you, do it. Do whatever you can.”
“What did you do?” I ask. “To get through it.”
He smiles then, and it’s the first time I’ve ever seen that smile from this side of the fence. It claws at my heart, and suddenly I get it.
“What makes you think I’m through it?” he says quietly.
It’s the smile I give when I want everyone to believe I’m holding it together when really, I’m falling apart.
“Don’t look so worried,” he says, throwing the stick into the fire and wiping his hands on his grey cargo shorts. “I don’t know if you ever get done with grief. It lives on, inside you, but it’s different. You learn to live with it. It’s like an old friend or a favourite shirt. You take comfort from it because it makes you grateful, not for having lost them, but for having survived it. Eventually, the memories don’t hurt as much.”
I don’t want to get comfortable with my grief. I don’t want to carry it around in my heart forever. I don’t think I’m capable of it. I think it’ll tear me apart long before then. It’s not a favourite shirt, it’s a monster with razor blades for claws.
“Hey,” he says, walking over to me. “I’m just trying to say that it’s not gonna be like this forever. It’s gonna get easier, but it’s never gonna go away altogether. You’ll never lose them because they’re a part of you and they always will be, and that’s exactly how it should be.”
I feel guilty for even thinking it, but I’m so sick of feeling like this. I don’t want to hurt like this forever. I just want to wake up one morning and not have this weight on my chest. I want to get through the day without feeling like I’m suffocating. I want to look forward to something, I want to look back and smile, not cry. I’m so fucking sick of all of it.
I don’t say any of this out loud, but I have a feeling he knows anyway. He pulls me into his arms and I let him because right now, I need all the comfort I can get. He draws me closer and for the first time, I notice that his skin is uneven beneath my cheek. I can feel the burns through the light cotton of his t-shirt and it makes me want to cry.
I shouldn’t be taking this much comfort from being so close to him. I shouldn’t like the fact that his arms are around me. I shouldn’t like the fact that he smells like sawdust and that he’s always warm. I shouldn’t want this, but I do.
I pull away from him slightly, while I still have the power to do so, and I look up at him to find he’s looking back at me. His eyes are the bluest I’ve ever seen them, yet also the greenest. He opens his mouth, as if to say something, but he doesn’t speak and I’m drawn to his lips and how soft they look, nestled in his beard. Heat crawls up the back of my neck like a slow-burning flame, setting fire to my pounding heart.
I want his lips on mine.
The world seems to shrink until it’s just the two of us, standing in no-mans-land, waiting for the inevitable.
His hand curls around my back and I arch upwards slightly, breathless. I want to feel like this forever. I want to swap this feeling for all the pain and the grief and the endless sadness that has consumed me for the past two years. His lips touch mine, softly, as if whispering a question, and I respond with a barely-contained hunger I don’t realise I’ve been harbouring until now. I close my eyes. His beard scratches my face, but I don’t care. I want him anyway. I’ve never wanted anyone more.
It’s just a kiss, yet it feels like an epiphany. My body roars to life as if it’s been dead all these months, igniting nerve endings and firing up every muscle, every vein, every cell. The effect is unparalleled. I feel as if I’m being reborn.
Then he pulls away, slowly but deliberately.
“Sian…”
The world stops.
Opening my eyes, shame slams into me and I push away from him, stumbling backwards.
What have I done?
He opens his mouth to say something, reaching for me, but it’s too late. I clap my hand over my mouth to stop myself from crying out.
Then I’m running through the trees.
Oh God, oh God, oh God. What have I done? I want to crawl into a hole and die. Instead, I’m stumbling up the steps to the deck and crawling across the living room. I can’t go into the wardrobe because James will know. I don’t care how irrational that is, he’ll know. I know he will.
“Sian!”
Shit! I don’t want to face Luke. I can’t! What the hell was I thinking? I crawl across the floor, shaking and sobbing, into the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind me. I climb up the door, locking it, before collapsing to the floor again, sobbing like the madwoman I am.
How could I have done that? What was I thinking?
I’m sorry – I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to!
“Sian, open the door.”
No! No way. I sit on the floor, my back to the door, and cover my ears with my hands like a petulant child. I can’t see him, I can’t hear him, he’s not there. He’s not there and that never happened. Why is it that I lose the memories I want to keep, but I’m stuck with this one? I try to mentally send it to the black hole, but it stubbornly remains.
Luke pounds on the door and I jump.
“Sian! Open up!”
“No!”
“Come on, please? We should talk.”
“No! Go away!”
I sound like Kieran. My heart seizes and I double over as a fresh wave of pain batters me from the inside.
“I’m not going anywhere. Come on – please open the door.”
I can’t. I can’t face him, I can’t talk about this, I can’t think straight.
“Fine. I’m just gonna sit here and wait.”
I sob quietly, my hand over my mouth so he can’t hear me.
“Please don’t cry.”
“I’m not crying!”
“I can hear you. These doors are old. And thin.”
He’s right. I can hear him sigh and a small thump, like his head is leaning back against the door. I gulp back a sob and try to get a handle on the hysteria that threatens to swallow me whole.
“I’m not crying,” I say again, hoping he can hear the difference in my voice as I wipe my eyes.
“Good. Well, that’s a start. Can you unlock the door now?”
“Just go home, okay?”
“Sorry. Can’t do that until I know you’re alright.”
I open my mouth to lie and tell him I’m fine, to let him off the hook, send him on his way.
“Don’t even think about it,” he says, before I have the chance.
I groan, leaning my own head back against the door. Infuriating!
“We need to talk,” he says. “And I’m not doing that through a closed door.”
“We
don’t
need to talk!”
“Yeah, we do. Please – come out of there.”
“No.”
I pull my knees up tighter, trying to crush my ribs, and hopefully, my heart. He sighs, and I can just imagine him running a hand through his hair, like he does when he’s trying to make sense of something. I bury my face in my knees, squeezing my eyes shut. I just want it all to go away. Why won’t it go away?
“For what it’s worth,” he says. “It just happened. I shouldn’t have let myself get carried away. I’m sorry.”
My heart pounds, but I raise my head, confused. I thought I kissed him? Did he kiss me? Does it even matter? We kissed. I participated. I’m guilty of that, not him. He’s a free agent, he can do whatever he wants.
“What?” I mumble.
“I’m sorry – I got a little ahead of myself. I let things get out of hand. I should’ve known better, and for that I’m sorry. But for what it’s worth, I’m not sorry it happened. I’m just sorry it happened
now
.”
Now my head was really spinning.
“But you… I mean, I don’t…”
“Can you at least unlock the door so we can have this conversation face to face?”
I don’t want to have this conversation face to face. I don’t want to have this conversation at all, but it doesn’t look like he’s going to let me get away with that. Against my own better judgement, I slowly get to my feet and unlock the door. Luke falls backwards, still leaning against it. He bounces back in a heartbeat though, clambering to his feet. He looks like a giraffe inside my tiny, white-washed bathroom. A beautiful, hairy giraffe.
He stands in front of me, the hairy giraffe with the azure-blue eyes, and he sighs, as if the fate of the world is resting on his shoulders. Maybe not the fate of the world. Maybe just my fate.
“Thank you,” he says gently. “This is much better.”
“Why?”
“Because I need to see if you’re alright, and I can’t do that through a locked door.”
I want to say that I’m not alright, that I’m so confused I don’t know which way is up anymore. Instead, I just hang my head, fighting off nausea.
“You’re scared,” he says, his hand sliding down my arm until he takes hold of my fingers.
I’m instantly covered in goose bumps and I want to shake him off, but he’s so warm and I always feel so cold these days.
“It’s okay to be scared,” he whispers. “But it was just a kiss.”
It wasn’t just a kiss though. It was so much more than just a kiss. Kisses don’t happen in a vacuum, they come surrounded by feelings and emotions and cravings and all the stuff I shouldn’t be feeling.
“Talk to me,” he says, his fingers intertwining with mine.
I close my eyes, because this is all so unexpected. I don’t want to want him. It scares me to want him. I cry out silently for James, because he needs to guide me here, but all I hear is the pounding of my heart over the silence that builds around us. It pushes down on me until I have to speak.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, opening my eyes but not raising my head. “I don’t know what to say.”
I should shrug him off, I should step away from him, but I don’t. God, I wish I could.
“It’s okay, you don’t have to say anything. It’s not the right time, for either of us.”
He’s right. It’s not, and I nod in agreement, finally able to meet his eyes. It feels very much like I’m being let off the hook, and the relief in my face must be obvious because he smiles.
“Let’s not think about it anymore. Let’s just… put a pin in it.”
“Put a pin in it?”
“Yeah. Y’know, sweep it aside. Carry on regardless. Business as usual.”
“Business as usual?”
He rolls his eyes but it’s with amusement, not frustration.
“Are you gonna repeat everything I say? Is that a thing now?”
I’m tempted to do just that, because it’s easier when he’s smiling than when he’s digging deep into my soul with his eyes. I don’t, though. I just nod, and his smile widens into a grin. He lets me go and there is suddenly space between us. Space to move, space to breathe, space to think.
He glances towards the kitchen.
“Got any coffee? I find I can’t drink coffee unless it’s from my special mug lately. I blame Ana.”
I nod, and that’s all the encouragement he needs. He heads for the kitchen, leaving me standing in the bathroom, reeling.
“Want one?” he calls.
It’s like it never happened.
***
Luke takes great pains to show me over the next day or so that things haven’t changed between us. He gives me space, but he also keeps me on his radar. Geezer comes to visit, and Luke isn’t more than ten minutes behind him. I begin to wonder if he’s sending him over, if it’s some kind of plan. We share a couple of meals together. He finally takes his tea-towel and pillow-case home with him, but insists on leaving his coffee mug at my place. He clearly means to put the incident behind him.
I’m still not sure I can. I don’t quite understand what happened between us. I don’t know if I was the one who initiated the kiss, or if it was him, or whether it really matters. I still don’t hear anything from James, or Kieran. I feel like I’m being pulled in different directions.
Tonight we’re having dinner at his place again. Again, it’s a joint effort. I help him wash the dishes in a plastic basin, filled with lake water that he’s boiled over the fire, then we sit and watch the sunset together from the campfire. As I head back home through the trees, I can feel him watching me. It stirs something in me, something that won’t settle. It’s as if the kiss we shared has woken up a sleeping dragon.
Companionship is all very well, and I’m grateful for his friendship, but I can’t stop thinking about how his lips felt on mine. I hate myself for it, but I can’t let it go, no matter how hard I try. Part of me rationalises it away as craving much-needed comfort. Part of me berates myself for betraying James.
I pace the cottage, unable to sleep. I stare at the wall, at the lake, at the empty page in my notebook. I make three more paper boats and fold them carefully into my bedside drawer. I stand up and throw the glass of wine I never even touched over the side of the deck and onto the lawn. It’s not helping. Nothing’s helping.
The lake is black as ink before me, and my head is alive with voices, but not the ones I’m waiting on.
Wash your face. Freshen up. You’ll feel better.
Nanna’s voice echoes in my ears, but I’ve already decided that I’ll go one better. Too wound up to run a bath, I decide it’ll be quicker and easier to have a swim instead. So I do. I walk down onto the lawn and strip off my linen dress, dropping it on the grass as I walk. The night is warm and still, but the thought of Luke’s hands on me yesterday raises goose bumps once again. I leave my underwear on and wade into the water, sand gritty between my toes, until it’s deep enough to dive under.