Chapter 8 #2
I rowed us into a shaded spot, and we floated while I prepared our poles.
My wife chatted, her voice barely above a whisper, about her life…
how her grandfather enjoyed his garden, occasionally he would go fishing, but not along the bayous, and how her Nonna loved to cook all that he brought home.
She shared with me stories of her childhood so easily, and when she grew quiet, I asked her to tell me more.
I was almost starved for the companionship, the idea that my heart would confide in me about all her memories.
She was so animated during the high times that the boat kept tipping from left to right with the fast pace of her hands.
“Whoa!” She laughed, grabbing for me instead of the sides of the boat. “My hands are like two motors, and they’re almost too much for this boat. I’m going to tip us over.”
“I will save you.”
“Even from alligators?” Her eyes took in the muddy water for a second before they came back to me.
“From all that I possibly can. I will defend you until my last breath.”
“I know.” She stared at me with so much love in her expression, it made me roll my shoulders. I had seen my brother, Brando, do this from time to time when his wife became…softer with her words or the way she looked at him.
I had not thought I would do the same, but it was an odd feeling that sat in my chest when my wife did it to me. It was different from anything I was familiar with. Perhaps I would grow accustomed to it. Perhaps not. This was her power in my life.
I cleared my throat. “Tell me more stories, Vita Mia.”
“More?” She laughed. “I’ve filled this entire bayou up with talk.”
“My heart needs this.”
It took her a second to respond, and when she did, she whispered, “Okay,” and rubbed her hands on her shorts before she began again.
After not enough time, she quieted again, perhaps finding it hard to remember more stories, but I had a feeling her mind had snagged on something unpleasant. An issue she repressed but sometimes brought into the light at times such as these.
“Your mamma and papa have lost a great deal,” I said, reading her emotions as if they belonged to me. They did. She belonged to me. All of her.
She blinked and then shrugged. “I didn’t miss it all that much. Not when I had grandparents who loved me as much as mine did.”
“True, but this does not mean your parents have not lost a treasure. Your father understands this now. Your mamma will some day. Both will always have an incomplete heaven.”
“I’ve forgiven him,” she whispered. “I had to for my own sanity. I’ve forgiven her too. What else can we do?”
We both grew quiet until she gasped and tightened her grip on her pole.
“Something just tugged at my line!” she whispered.
I grinned and moved behind her, my head over her shoulder, to help her reel in her catch.
However, I did not expect her to yank as hard as she did, and for the fish to be as small as it was.
She turned her head toward me, and the pole hit me in the head at the same time our eyes connected.
Even behind the dark depths of her lenses, I could sense how wide her stare had become.
The fish swung around on the line, smacking me in the back of the head before hitting me on the side of the face.
My wife.
She was hysterical with laughter.
“You—” she barely got out “—you…yougotsmackedbyaboneyfish!”
I looked down at its flopping form in the bottom of the boat. “Sac-a-lait,” I said, pronouncing it just as Eva had when she had given me the name. “Or, properly, crappie.”
She became eerily quiet, then exploded with laughter so hard, I had to stop her from falling out of the boat.
“You said crappie!” She began laughing again, the sound of it echoing through the trees.
The leaves shimmered with a soft breeze, glistening in the sun, and I understood the feeling.
They were reveling in her warm happiness.
She screeched with laughter when I took her in my arms, the boat rocking tremulously, and bit at her neck. “You are laughing at me, my wife.”
“I am! Well, not at you, per se. With you. Or at the situation.” She brought her shoulders up, her laughter still contagious.
“You are so serious all the time. No man would ever dare to challenge you, or they know what’s coming.
But…” She had to compose herself. “But that little fish was slapping you around! And then you said…” She waved a hand in front of her face, trying to breathe.
“Crappie.”
She screeched, and her laughter seemed to echo for miles.
It had the same effect on me as it did the trees.
I began to quiver, the sun hot on my face, and…
laughter. Laughter barreled from my chest. It sounded as if it was ripped from it, but it mixed with hers, and together…
we could not stop. When we finally did, we both sighed, and I kept her in my arms as we floated without direction.
We both became comfortable, my wife against my chest, and allowed the water to take us where it would.
This time, I told her stories, stories of when I was a young man raising my brothers. Perhaps my stories were not as warm as hers, but they were mine, and I was offering her a part of my life I had never offered to anyone before.
I had found my net. My secret keeper.
All was safe in my world.