Track 51 Unwritten
Track 51
Unwritten
Maggie
From the moment Maggie stepped off the ferry, everything felt surreal. On the one hand, she felt completely comfortable. Since she and Matt had been faking a relationship for days, it was just more of the same. But on the other, for the first time in her life, her future felt unwritten. Her belly was brimming with butterflies at the thought of being alone, truly alone, with Matt. When she pictured it, she couldn’t stop smiling—and blushing. She pressed her lips together, worried that she looked like a loon, until she glanced over at Matt, who had an even bigger grin on his face. She relaxed and smiled some more.
As much as being alone with Matt was all she could think about, she was happy that it wouldn’t occur for hours. The day was still celebratory, wedding-wise, and would be until the six o’clock ferry when the newlyweds would receive their grand send-off, along with Dylan, Bea, Paul, and Veronica, who were all headed to the airport.
Between now and then, she found herself waiting with bated breath for Matt’s every touch. His hand on the small of her back when holding open the door for her, his finger gliding over her lip where a bit of errant catsup, excuse me, ketchup, lay. Right now, his foot was entwined with hers on the beach. Pinkies linked as well, they lay on a blanket surrounded by his family—and hers, she remembered, hers too. How had her life changed so dramatically in a week?
She thought of Jason and felt guilty for having not reached out since he left. She sat up and checked her phone. He was already in the air, but she texted anyway.
You are the very best. I’ll love you, always.
She sent it feeling awful that she had nearly forgotten about him over the last few hours, even though those had been his instructions.
“You’re starting to burn,” Dylan warned, eyeing Maggie over the cover of the novel she was engrossed in. She tossed a can of spray sunscreen at Matt to do the honors.
“I got you.” Matt smiled, holding her ponytail out of the way. She arched her back as the cool spray shocked her. He began rubbing it in, gently and methodically. She tried her very best to play it cool.
In hindsight, she had been extremely conscious of Matt’s touch since they’d first met, although she hadn’t allowed herself to entertain thoughts beyond kissing him. Which, thanks to the bratty girls at the bakery, was behind them. Now his touch had a domino effect that went way farther than her lips.
If the thought of it was too much to bear, what would the reality be? She took the can from him.
“I got it from here, thanks,” she managed—barely.
“You OK?” Matt asked quietly.
“Yes, yes.” Even with the two yeses, she wasn’t very convincing.
He softly brushed a wayward curl aside and whispered in her ear, “I know this is weird. We’ll take it slow,” thinking he was reading her mind. If he only knew that her mind was ripping his clothes off.
In the hour before the evening ferry, she and Matt sat on the back deck drinking cold lemonade and playing gin while everyone else flew by in a mad rush of packing and showering. Matt had won three games in a row, and she didn’t even care. She was completely in her head.
“Maggie! I just picked up a jack, and you threw another one down—gin.”
She barely reacted.
“What are you thinking about?”
“Later,” she confessed, not knowing if he would understand what she meant. It could have been, I’ll tell you later —or, I’m thinking about later.
“I know we have put this all out of order.”
He got it.
He took her face in his hands and kissed her gently on the lips.
“We can just do more of this…later.”
He kissed her again, pushing the cards to the floor and pulling her close to him. His lips tasted salty from the ocean air, his tongue cold and sweet from his last sip of lemonade. Her breath caught in her chest, and she could swear her heart skipped a beat.
“It’s time,” Jake’s voice bellowed from the house, and they both jumped to attention, whichever cards had survived the kiss now flying to the ground.
The goodbyes at the ferry dock were chaotic and touching. Matt bounced around between everyone—receiving last-minute instructions from his mother and unsolicited advice from Dylan—while Maggie spent most of her time saying goodbye to her mom.
“It looks like rain,” Bea said, pulling a zip-up from her tote, adding, “Do you want to take my jacket?”
And they both laughed at how her maternal instincts had kicked right in. Maggie was glad for the laughter. She didn’t want a long, heavy goodbye.
Matt and Maggie stood on the dock, dramatically waving as the ferry pulled out of the basin. A giant just married sign was draped across the back of the boat, along with a cacophony of cans clanging in the wind. It was storybook stuff until a few drops of rain landed on their faces, snapping them out of the moment.
As they jumped on their bikes, the light drizzle quickly escalated to a deluge, the rain falling in relentless sheets and soaking through every layer of their clothing. Their hair stuck to their foreheads and necks; fat droplets streamed down their faces, outrunning their legs. They pedaled home at double speed, laughing at the turn of events.
On their arrival, Maggie shouted above the noise of the storm, “This is like that scene in The Notebook !”
“Well, that’s a lot of fucking pressure,” Matt yelled back, pulling her into his arms and attempting to outdo Ryan Gosling’s iconic rain kiss with Rachel McAdams.
“How’d I do?” he asked afterward, running his fingers through her wet hair. She grinned and kissed him again until a bolt of thunder sent them running for the house.
Maggie kicked off her sandals and watched Matt peel off his sneakers and socks before following him upstairs. He playfully jumped up and down on both feet when he reached the second-to-last step, where the squeak rang out for no one to hear but them.
They were alone.
In the bedroom, they stood and faced each other. Dripping and cold. Their clothes plastered to them like, well, plaster. Maggie reached her hands straight up over her head for Matt to peel off her dress. He did, and she stood, nearly naked, shivering. He pulled the quilt from the bed and wrapped it around her. Peeling off his clothes too, she opened the blanket wide like the wings of an eagle to let him in. And there they were, skin to skin, slippery and cold, pushing back against heat and desire. A chill sent shivers up both their spines. They laughed before looking into each other’s eyes, taking in each other’s desire, letting it breathe and build in intensity for a long minute.
“Matt?” Maggie whispered, cautious of breaking the spell.
“Ye—” he said, his answer jumbled in his throat.
“Can we maybe forgo the bunk beds tonight?”
A huge and mischievous smile crossed his face before he scooped her up and carried her to the guest room. Kissing him along the way, Maggie kicked closed the door behind them.
“You’re sure about this?” Matt asked, the wild desire in his eyes fading, replaced with something far deeper—an intensity that felt undeniable. Like it had always been there. Like it was written in stone.
I’ve never been more sure of anything , she thought, but only managed one word.
“Yes!”