57 Rhys
57
Rhys
The night was warm and pleasant. We walked to a restaurant near the beach and sat on the patio. The menu was in English, so I didn’t need to translate anything before the waiter came to take our order.
I looked at Ginger. She was precious, even if she’d taken a beating from the sun. Her hair was still wet from showering, and even without being combed or dried, it curled a little at the tips. She got embarrassed and nudged me under the table with her leg when she noticed I couldn’t take my eyes off her.
They served us a pitcher of sangria with fruit.
“Are you trying to make me uncomfortable?” she asked.
“What am I supposed to do? You’re hot.”
“Is that how you hook up with all the girls?”
“Why are you saying that?” I laughed as I poured two glasses.
“I was just thinking about that when we were on the beach.”
“You were thinking about what? You’ve got to be more specific, Ginger.”
“That. All the girls you must have shared the same moment with through the years. Lying on the beach, watching the sunset. Also, you never did tell me what happened with Alexa.”
“You already know. I wasn’t in love with her.”
“You’ve never been in love with anyone,” she responded.
“Yeah.” I took a sip of sangria and looked at her.
Too much, maybe. Too closely.
Because I understood then that there was nothing I liked more than that, looking at her and memorizing every little gesture, every frown, every detail of her face. She was wearing earrings that looked like small strawberries. Her lips were soft, juicy. I remembered kissing them. Licking them. Biting them. I sighed. Then I drank a little more.
We had dinner, and she told me her relationship with her father was still tense, even though they had talked a few times after she’d decided to leave the family business. Ginger picked at some fries while we ordered a second pitcher of sangria. Her cheeks were pink, her eyes bright and aware.
“Let’s talk about the list,” I blurted out.
“The list? Please, Rhys, I was drinking…”
“You’re drinking now, and you seem to be thinking perfectly clearly.”
“Let me clear that up: I was drinking, and I was lonely and sad.”
“Come on, Ginger. It’s your list of wishes.”
“A list of wishes I wrote on a napkin.”
“Who cares? Point one, travel somewhere, you’ve gotten that done. As for point two, having kids…are you sure? One, two, three? Like they were…I don’t know, artichokes?”
“Artichokes…” Ginger laughed.
“Or whatever. You’re twenty-three years old.”
“So? I’ve always wanted to be a mother.”
“Really?” I was astonished.
“Yeah. You should think about having kids. You’re about to turn, what…twenty-nine? You’re not that young anymore. It’s not just kids; what I mean is maybe you should think about finding some stability.”
After a pause, during which I could only hear the word stability echoing over and over, she said, “Forget it, let’s move on to the third thing.”
“Do something crazy,” I said.
“We’ve got plenty of time to think it over.”
“Four: sunbathe and not think about anything.”
“I think I took care of that today, but just in case, I’ll keep it up every day until I leave.” She drank what was left in her glass, and I took out my card when the waiter approached to take our pitcher away.
Once I’d paid, we got up and walked awhile on the boardwalk, slowly, slightly drunk, her hand grazing mine now and again unintentionally. Or maybe it wasn’t unintentional. I don’t know. Her dark hair was now wavy down her back. I reached up and touched it once or twice.
“Are you ready for point five?”
“God, no, Rhys!” She covered her face with her hands.
“Have a fling. Or a three-way.”
“That’s not right!” She stopped, crossed her arms, and looked at me, and the wrinkle in her nose and her sun-reddened face made me laugh. “I nixed the three-way.”
“I could still read it, Ginger. Now answer me a question…”
“No. I don’t want to talk about it.” But she was giggling as she said it.
“A three-way with another girl or another guy?”
“Mmm…a guy. So two guys.”
“Well, now. Very interesting.”
“It’s just an idea; really it was more to do something out of the ordinary than have a three-way per se. It doesn’t matter. You’ve probably had tons of them.”
“Yeah.” I noticed that made her uncomfortable, and asked why.
“It’s just that I’ve never done anything unexpected in my whole life. Look at you: all these countries, all these girls, all these experiences… You’re probably even bored of sex now, and I’ve hardly tried anything except missionary.”
“Jesus, Ginger.”
“What?”
I held my breath, leaned down to look her in the eye, and bit my lower lip. My heart was pounding. I had promised myself that I’d avoid this kind of situation this time, keep my hands to myself, maintain my distance…and already, I was failing, and it hadn’t even been twenty-four hours since I picked her up from the airport.
My lips touched her neck.
She shook in response. Tense.
“You don’t just get bored of sex. In different circumstances, in a different life, maybe we’d already be doing it, right here, right now, leaning against this car,” I whispered in her ear. “But what happened last time made things weird between us. So we’re going to try to stick to the rules…”
Ginger looked at me, confused. “Look, I think I can keep my hands off you without following any rules. But thanks for being so considerate and thinking of everything.”
“You sure?” I raised my eyebrows.
“Your success has gone to your head.”
I laughed, and she gave me a playful slap as we took off walking again down the wooden steps we had taken that afternoon to go to the beach. We walked on the sand in the darkness. The murmur of waves was audible in the distance. I don’t know when exactly, but we found ourselves laughing again about something stupid and lying in the sand without thinking about anything else. The moon was shining in the starry sky.
“Next one: dancing with your eyes closed.”
“That’s easy. But I want to dance for real. With my mind a blank. Not caring if I look stupid or people think I’m crazy.”
“I like that. Seven: cut your hair or dye it pink.”
“Yeah, but not right now. I’d like to do that at some important moment, you know. So the physical change represents an internal one. I’ve always wanted one of those haircuts French girls have, with the straight lines.”
“You’d look good like that. Now for the important one.”
“I don’t even want you to say it out loud.”
“Eight: start a small publisher.”
“Could we drop it for a minute? Seriously, I promise I’m not avoiding the subject, but I’m drunk right now, I’m happy, and look—I can make an angel in the sand just like when it snows!” She started moving her arms up and down.
I laughed. I wanted to tell her I’d spent lots of nights with lots of girls on the beach, but never one like her. Never with a person I could just be with, without hiding, without putting on that quiet-guy act everyone else knew so well.
Because Ginger brought out the best in me.
She made me not want anything more.
“What about the next one?”
“Have a cat that loves me?”
“Are you worried about getting one that hates you?”
“Of course. I’ll get one from a shelter if I ever have a stable job and my own place and all that. Do you realize, it’s as though I’ve never done anything worthwhile in my entire life? I feel like I’m starting from zero.”
“Is that bad?” I turned to her.
“I guess not, given the situation…”
“Last one.”
“That sangria was delicious.”
“Don’t change the subject. Falling in love for real.”
“Look at you, talking about falling in love!”
I sat up and looked at her. She was so relaxed…so happy…at the foot of the moon. Her clothes wrinkled, her hair mussed, just a few inches away…too close. Way too close… I sank my fingers into the sand, trying to suppress my desire for her.
“I don’t get it,” I said.
“What don’t you get?”
“The last part. For real . What does that mean? You’ve never actually been in love?” I heard her breathe deeply, her eyes still staring into the heavens.
“Maybe. Maybe love and being in love aren’t the same thing. What I want is to be crazy about someone. I want it to hurt not to touch them. I want to feel a tingle in my stomach, and I want to do it two or three times a day, and I want to have eyes for him alone. You know, the intensity of those first months, before your emotions calm down and routine sets in…”
I gulped. My heart was shouting at me.
My fingers sank deeper into the sand.
A kiss that never happened got lost among those words.