82. Megan
Chapter 82
Megan
Two Summers Later
Ollie hasn’t worn a t-shirt in weeks, and the endless sunshine in South West France has turned his skin a golden shade that makes me feral. All I want to do is lick and bite and suck and—
“Megan? Are you still there?”
I watch him carry his surfboard back up from the beach and try to stay focused on my call with Kara.
“I’m here.”
“So you’ll be at the house when we get there?”
“Yep. We’re planning to arrive the night before to get the keys from the owner, then we’ll pick up groceries in the morning so you can all come straight from the airport. Just let me know if there’s anything in particular the kids need.”
Hattie, Rob, Kara, and Luke are flying out to see us next week, with Meadow and their new baby boy, Nathaniel, coming too. The six of us will spend two weeks in a villa just thirty minute drive from here, and I can’t wait to see them all. We’ll have a pool, and a huge outdoor dining space, and there’ll be nothing to do but relax, and eat, and enjoy each other’s company.
Ollie watches me watching him, with an expression on his face that tells me I’m about to have a very good morning indeed.
I step back inside the van, keeping the phone angled towards me as he strips out of his board shorts and hangs them over the makeshift washing line. He grabs a towel to ruffle his hair, but it’s so hot it won’t be long before it’s dry.
He's extremely popular with the locals here, and I can't blame them for ogling when he looks this good. In the past I might have been jealous, but with Ollie I trust him explicitly, and feel rather proud, knowing it's me he curls up with every night.
“I’ve been researching local brocantes and there are a few I’d like to visit while we’re there. Think we’ll be able to get away and visit a few?” Kara asks.
“Definitely yes. And we met some people last night who recommended a few vineyards for wine tours.”
“Oh heaven,” she moans, while Ollie steps inside, pulling the door closed behind him.
I frown and waggle my finger at him when he pulls dry shorts up and over his hips. Jumping up onto the edge of our bed, he crowds the space between my legs, forcing me to hold the phone even closer to my face.
“I need to get going,” I tell Kara. “Text me a list of what you want for the house. Love you, bye!”
Hanging up before she can say anything else, I stow my phone away on the little shelf above our bed. My fingers stroke the birdsong tattoo that spans his ribcage, gently tracing across his stomach to circle the one on the other side. He snuck off to get it on the anniversary of our first kiss, a small line-drawing of a lamp to match the one we left in the flat. It had no place in the van, but I still smile whenever we go back home and it’s the first thing I see.
Ollie braces his hands on either side of me and I drag my nails down the sides of his stomach, hooking my fingers into his waistband.
“I missed you,” I tell him, my mouth pressed to the warm, salty skin of his throat. He was gone less than an hour, but even after a full year on the road together, I still can’t get enough.
“Can I run some renovation plans by you first?”
“Of course,” I say, cupping him gently and hoping this won’t take long.
“So I was trying to figure out where our baby will sleep.”
I freeze in his arms, pulling back to get a good look at him.
“Our what ?”
“Our kid.”
“What are you talking about? I had a period last week. I’m not pregnant.”
“Not yet.” He loops an arm around my waist and tugs me closer to the edge of the bed. “But one day you will be, and we’re hardly gonna leave them with your parents while we go off on our adventures, are we?”
He hops up onto the mattress, kneeling so his head grazes the ceiling, and maps out a line on the wall with his hands.
“I’m thinking I could build a kind of bunk-bed platform here that flips out of the way when we’re not using it. With a ledge so they don’t fall off, obviously.” He climbs back down to the space between our shower room and the pull out bench where we sit for dinner. “Or we reconfigure the storage space under the bed, and build a pull-out cubby. I bet there are some great YouTube tutorials for that.”
I haven’t seen him this animated in a while, and though we’ve both grown and changed a lot in the past two years, he’s still got that boyish charm and a boundless enthusiasm for life. We love our simple days of seeing where the mood takes us. Does he really want to give that up already? Do I? I'm more alive now than I was in all of my twenties.
“You’re still so young,” I whisper, and he rises to meet me, lifting my knee to hook it over his hip.
Becoming parents changes everything. We’ve seen it with Kara and Luke. They’re happier than ever, but there are definite challenges. Could we really live this life with a kid?
“I’m older than your dad was when you were born, and we’ve met loads of families who make it work. If it’s possible for them, it’s possible for us too,” he says. “And most importantly, you’re it for me. There are definitely kids in our future, so why not start thinking about it now?”
He may be nearly a decade younger than me, but he’s got a good head on his shoulders. We’ve handled van life through wind, and rain, and heatwaves, flat tires and roadside breakdowns in countries where we barely speak the language. Ollie has supported me through my shift to online working, and we even survived the day a bad egg exploded in the van. I know we can handle anything life throws our way.
He’s it for me too, and my desire to have children is no secret. I made that perfectly clear the night he found me drunkenly registering with a sperm bank. It’s not like we have to get started right away, but I’m glad we’re headed in the same direction.
“May I offer a counter-suggestion on the bed situation?” I ask, locking my other leg around his waist.
“Of course.”
“Maybe it’s time for our second van-build project.”
His eyes widen, and he lowers me to the mattress, climbing over me and bracketing my head with his forearms.
“That’s a big step, Megan. You think we’re ready for it?”
I tuck his hair behind his ears, wrap my hands around his neck, and pull him closer. “I think, my love, I’m ready for every kind of adventure with you.”