Chapter 48
Will
“I wish you could kiss me and never stop. That’s all. One kiss, then another, then another. And when we stop to catch our breath, it’s already dawn.”
“I think I can handle that,” I tell her.
Her lips seek mine, and I don’t resist.
Kissing is like rereading a book. You know the ending, you know the movements, you know every millimeter of the other person’s mouth, but you don’t want to stop. Turning the page is an act of anticipation and consummation, just like kissing every inch of someone’s skin.
Greta pulls off my shirt, looks for the waistband of my pants, tries to lower them. I’m panting as I grab her hands and stop her. She’s still crying. Silently now but persistently. I kiss her cheeks and taste the salt on them as she finally unknots the drawstring of my sweats.
“I don’t know if this is the best…”
“I need you, Will. Now.”
I breathe a long breath as her hand strokes me on the outside of my underwear, and I try to calm down. “Are you sure? We could, like…just hug, or we could go out and look at the stars. Maybe that’s best.” I feel she must need some distance.
But she grabs my face, makes me look at her, and says, “Please, Will. Please.”
I do as she says. I let her take off my clothes and help her take off hers.
We drop everything on the floor, and I settle down on top of her.
We’re naked, and even though I’m taller, every part of our bodies seems to fit together: our breath, our stomachs, our legs and knees, our mouths, my member on top of her.
Our lips are swollen, red, damp. But none of it is enough.
I kiss Greta’s neck, her breasts, her hips, I kiss her between her legs, and I hear her moan and she arches her back and asks for more.
Soon, I sink inside her. It feels so good to be doing this when the rest of the world is asleep, and I see her face and I can’t think of anything more.
There’s no guilt, no doubt, no fear. Just Greta.
Greta and her legs surrounding me. Greta and the satisfaction bringing a smile to her face.
Greta and my desire to freeze this moment because I’ve learned after falling several times that every beginning has an end, that every tree ends up getting cut down for firewood, that happiness is a glimmer that ends in confusion.
Like the pleasure that’s making us tremble now. Ecstatic, ephemeral.
I freeze for a moment. Then I get up to go to the bathroom.
She’s still lying there staring up at the ceiling.
I lie beside her and hug her. Your body feels tailor-made to fit with mine, I think.
I know it’s corny, the kind of thing you can only believe when you’re so wrapped up in someone you can’t see beyond them. But I don’t care.
“You all right, Greta?”
“Yeah. A little sad. A little happy.”
“How about a longer explanation?”
I can feel her laughter through the palm of my hand resting on her belly.
“I’m sad because it’s hard for me to accept that what we’ve been doing is coming to an end, but I’m happy because I’ve made it here and it’s been…a revelation. I wonder if my sister knew me better than I knew myself back then.”
“It’s possible.”
“I think we have a distorted image of what we are because we change so much every day. Maybe the heart is more elastic than the brain, no? Because that would explain why we choose a couple of labels and hold on to them for the rest of our lives. Maybe it’s easier to stick with this idea that you’re introverted or crazy than to have to constantly redefine yourself.
Remember what I told you about colors that time?
For me, you were purple, but deep down, we’re all rainbows. ”
Greta turns and rests her head on my chest. I wonder if she can hear my heartbeat.
If she notices my silences. It’s that sometimes I can’t follow her; I feel she’s so far ahead of me, going faster, leaving me behind.
And I can’t run after her because I’m chained down.
And the chains are mine, but I don’t remember where I put the key.
I close my eyes. I’m dreaming, but then her touch awakens me. I feel the tip of her index finger on my belly button, tracing out a circle, climbing up my chest.
“Greta. What are you doing?”
She pauses a few seconds. “I’m…skating.”
“What?”
“I’m skating on your skin.”
I try to pay attention to the design she’s tracing out. Her nail digs into the flesh and then proceeds slowly downward. I don’t know why it matters so much just now, but I can’t stop staring as I watch the gooseflesh rise beneath her finger.
“Will…”
“Hmm?”
“I want to try out those skates. If it weren’t one in the morning, I’d ask you to take me straight to the rink you found in Lincoln.”
I sit up. “Are you serious?”
“Yeah,” she whispers.
“Then let’s do it.”
“When?”
“Now. Come on.”
I throw on the T-shirt lying at the foot of the bed while she gawks at me incredulously.
“Have you lost your mind?”
“You just get dressed.”
She does, but nervously, then grabs the skates.
When we step out of the RV, the morning damp surrounds us, and before I can think twice about it, we’re halfway there.
I turn to Greta and find her asleep with my jacket draped over her.
I look at the road. I’m not sure what I’m hoping to accomplish, and I’m not used to just following impulses rather than planning everything out in advance—I’ve tried it, and it doesn’t usually turn out well.
But I keep going. I keep driving into the night.
The skating rink is in a big building next to a deserted mall. When I turn off the engine, I see only two cars in the entire lot. Obviously, the gate is closed. I don’t have a plan as I lean over and wake her, muttering her name. She opens her eyes slowly.
“We’re here,” I say.
She looks up, smiles, throws off the jacket even though I tell her she can keep it on when we get out. We walk toward the metal fence. There’s no doorbell, of course. There’s nothing. I walk back a few steps, look up, and sigh.
“Will Tucker, are you trying to figure out if you can climb over it and let me in?”
“Yeah…”
“And I always thought you were the prudent one.”
“Whatever. You think you can climb up on my shoulders?”
“Are you fucking serious?”
“Hell yes. Do you want to skate or not?”
“Yeah, of course I do.”
“Come on, then.”
I crouch down, and she crawls over my body. When her feet are on my shoulders, I grip her around the ankles. She grabs the top of the fence as I stumble to right, and she starts to lose balance. She screams so loudly, you could hear across the state.
Thirty seconds pass, and then…
“Who’s there?”
A flashlight sweeps across the fence.
“Over here!” I shout. Greta looks at me as if I’ve lost my mind. Which I may have. “Here, by the gate. Any way you could let us in?”
It’s silent for a moment. Then the security guard opens the lock. He’s young, with wavy blond hair and an oval face. He points his flashlight at us like a gun and I smile while Greta remains silent next to me.
“Sorry to take up your time,” I begin, “but we came here from far away. Really far.” I’m trying to give the story some oomph.
“It’s three in the morning,” he says.
“Yeah…and so we were wondering if we could come in and skate for a minute. I realize how weird that is, but we’re not thieves or anything.
We’re just…” I lean in as though I need a little privacy.
He doesn’t know how to react. “This is my girlfriend and she really needs to skate again. She loved it when she was a girl, but then…”
“Then what?” He’s intrigued.
“Her dream got shattered.”
He shakes his head. “Come back in the morning. We open at ten.”
He steps back and starts to shut the door, but I step in and block him.
He clearly doesn’t like that, but I put on a relaxed face, trying to summon the Will who was able to convince everyone at college to change the location of the graduation party—the Will who could show up at a job interview and convince everyone he was so necessary, so self-assured, so efficient that they took it for granted he’d soon be running the company.
“Didn’t you ever do anything crazy for love?
” I ask him, and before he can think it over, I say, “I can pay you. Even if you don’t want the cash, just make this one exception.
You can tell your grandkids about it one day.
You’ll remember this moment, and instead of wondering all your life what would happen if you had let that couple in, you can find out. Please. I’m begging you.”
When he squints at me, I know I’ve won. “I’m risking my job here.”
“I promise you, no one will ever know.”
“Ten minutes,” he says.
“Twenty.”
“Fifteen. And not a second more.”
He looks back and forth before opening the doors to let us through. He unlocks the little gate that opens onto the ice and turns on a few lights, but it’s still quite dark. He points at the clock. He’s already started timing us. I nod and thank him.
“I can’t believe we’re doing this,” she says when he disappears.
“Hurry and put on those skates. I’ll give you a hand.”
Greta seems distracted as I take off her shoes and pull the skates from the box. I can barely feel the cold, with so much adrenaline rushing through my veins. I take her hand and guide her out onto the ice.
“You okay, Greta?”
“I think so. Better than okay, actually. I’m not sure if I’ve ever felt this good.”
I smile with the certainty that I’m the luckiest man in the world as I watch her glide away.
At first, her legs tremble, then she gathers strength.
And she starts to soar. She’s like a bird that’s just escaped a cage after years without stretching its wings.
Her entire body arches gracefully, her face relaxes, she lifts her arms and laughs, and that laugh echoes inside me.
Watching her, I’m hypnotized. I lean against the low wall around the perimeter, knowing this moment is a gift and unable to believe the long series of coincidences that led us here.