Chapter Five
“Great. I’m being stood up,” I mutter to myself, toeing at a pebble with the tip of my shoe. I puff a stray lock of hair out of my face with a huff. “Get allll in my head about going on a date, and for what? Nothing. Guys are fuckin’—”
Suddenly, a tap on my shoulder has me rearing back on a slight shriek. Caleb, with a horrified look on his face, manages to catch me before I stumble back. And I am—in no way—instantly mesmerized by how strong his arms are as he saves me from falling on my ass.
Once he rights me and gives me a once over, he holds his hands up. “Sorry. I really didn’t mean to startle you. I just wanted to agree with you that guys are assholes, yes. And this one is also very sorry for being late. Got hung up just before leaving the house.”
“Oh, uh, that’s alright.”
He shakes his head. “You don’t have to minimize it for my benefit, L-A-U-R-E-N. It’s okay to be annoyed about something like that. Not a good look for me to start a first official date off that way, and I know that. I would have texted to let you know, but I don’t exactly have your number.”
I pull my phone out of the back pocket of my too-tight skinny-jeans—the ones that I am so thankful that I had stashed away in the backseat of my car, since they came in handy to have tonight. “We can fix that,” I say suggestively, opening my text messages and handing it over to him.
After his thumbs quickly tap out something, he hands me my phone back and I peer down at the message he sent to himself:
Me
You really are a knucklehead for keeping me waiting like that. You owe me dinner now. ;)
I snort, deadpanning, “Wow. Suave.”
He runs his fingers through his waves of hair, then signs, “Head and Shoulders, actually. I still haven’t found a way to make dandruff look cool yet.”
A giggle erupts out of me, making me sound way too much like a giddy middle-schooler. “Suave and witty…”
He smirks. “And flake free. I am pretty much a package deal.”
“All without a lick of egotism,” I snark.
His throat bobs in a silent chuckle. “It’s all false-bravado, trust me. I only get this way around gorgeous humans with whom I’m trying to woo.”
I feel my cheeks heat, and he grins bigger—imperfect, yet dazzlingly white, teeth on display. God, I’d love to know if he comes by those naturally, or if he has some brand of whitening strips he swears by. “Do you find yourself trying to woo many people?”
“No, not at all, actually,” he answers quickly.
“However, there has been this one woman, who I keep bumping into at all of my appointments, that keeps seeing me at my most vulnerable moments. And yet she still invites me to go grab coffee with her afterwards, it’s the wildest thing—it’s almost as if I haven’t scared her off or something.
It seems as though she’s given me hope for dating again, when I least expected it. ”
He winks, crooking his elbow out for me to link into.
When I do, he starts guiding me out to the edge of the breakwater, helping me up onto the first of many large, square blocks of granite that form the nearly two mile path that juts out into Ternbay Harbor.
At the end is Neville Beacon, a smaller lighthouse in comparison to Stormhaven Light, which stands on a craggy island further off shore.
There’s a slight breeze in the air, which sends a wave of goosebumps traveling up my arms, since I’m only in a tank top.
I really didn’t think of how the breeze is out over the ocean when I shed my cardigan in the car.
Without missing a beat, Caleb unzips the hoodie he showed up wearing, and drapes it over my shoulders.
And it smells fucking amazing.
“Are you sure you’re not going to be cold without this?” I ask him, grasping at the edges and burrowing into it.
He grins. “Positive. I may have grown up inland, but I spent every summer here in Ternbay. I know how it gets out here on the water. I mainly wore the thing hoping it would wind up on you by the end of the evening anyway. It’s a good look, you in my hoodie.”
We continue hopping rock-to-rock in a comfortable silence until we’re about three-quarters of the way out, and that’s when he pulls us aside so we can sit on one of the benches that are bolted to the stones. “See that cottage back there?” He points to a property a ways up the coastline.
I nod.
“That’s my place. I told you I didn’t live far from here.”
“Oh! That looks so cute! You mentioned you spent summers up here. Is that where you spent them?”
He nods. “Yes. I bought the place from my parents. Now that my sister and I are all grown, they have turned into snowbirds and had no use for the place. It’s perfect though.
When I wanted to escape the memories in the place Aaron, my husband, and I shared together in Cumberland, I simply recalled where I had some of the best childhood memories.
I wanted Cameron to have those experiences as well. ”
“Who’s Cameron?”
“Oh, sorry. I thought I’d brought him up before, but I guess not. He’s my son,” Caleb explains, beaming proudly. “He was a part of the package deal when me and Aaron started dating. The same day Aaron and I got married, I signed the adoption paperwork to make us official as well.”
I give him a soft smile. “That’s so sweet!
I probably should mention that I also have a son.
He’s my whole world,” I admit, unwilling to stifle my own cheesy grin as I gush over my boy.
“He’s made me the woman I am today.” Being quite protective of Brody, that’s all I’m willing to divulge to Caleb at this time.
He nods. “Cameron’s sixteen now, starting to spread his wings a little. He seems to like it here. Adjusting well and all that.”
“I imagine he took the death of his father hard. He was, what, twelve when it happened?”
Caleb bites his lip. He looks like he’s warring with himself over how to respond as he gazes out over the breakwater, studying the waves lapping against the granite stones. Finally, he signs, “Aaron didn’t die.”
My brows knit. “Oh. But I thought—”
He raises his hands, cutting me off. “He suffered from an”—he pauses to finger spell A-N-O-X-I-C, then continues—“brain injury. He’s alive, but he’s never been the same Aaron, nor will he ever be, I don’t think.
He’s in a persistent vegetative state, they call it, totally dependent on caregivers, per the last update I was able to get from one of the nurses I was able to text with. That was over a year ago.”
“You don’t have any contact with his caregivers anymore?” I ask, perplexed.
“I was still recovering myself when his parents sued me for his POA, citing that I was too reckless—since I was the one who landed him in the hospital in the first place—to be able to exercise good medical judgement for him. Have you ever tried to go to court and not be able to speak? Lack of decent court appointed lawyers and an even bigger deficit of interpreters are giant barriers…”
“Oh, no. Caleb, I’m so sorry…”
“Needless to say, they won that case. They also, as his POA’s, signed the divorce papers on his behalf before allowing me no contact with their in-home nursing staff.
And it's not like I can just drop by their house for a visit, either. They tried to fight me for Cam too, but luckily they had no case there. I had already adopted him.”
“Caleb, I’ve gotta say, they sound like assholes.”
He huffs a breath out through his nostrils. “It’s all my fault, I suppose. I was the one stupid enough to plan that weekend getaway for our first wedding anniversary. He wasn’t as ready as I’d thought he was for such an adventure. ”
“You couldn’t have known,” I tell him, wiping a stray tear off his cheek.
Gosh, I hate that I'm even thinking this right now because it seems less than sympathetic, but how endearing is it for a man to be so unashamed to cry?
To not be so, I don't know, unguarded about showing their emotions?
I mean, it's terrible that he had to go through such trauma, but—dare I say, it's a little comforting to know that I'm not the only one here with a fucked up past?
“I’d fight harder to see him too, but I doubt he’d even know I was there, since I can’t speak to him out loud.”
“Oh gosh, Caleb. I’m sure he would be able to sense your presence on some level. I really do. Maybe they would allow Cameron?”
“Oh, they would, but he doesn’t want to. He is positive they’d try to badger him into leaving me, and that’s something he’s steadfast about not doing. We may not be flesh and blood, but he’s never seen it that way. Thank heavens for that. I’d be lost without him. He’s given me purpose again.”
“I imagine,” I sigh. “Wow, Caleb—I’m honestly speechless. That’s a lot. Thank you for sharing that with me though.”
He nods. “Sorry. This was heavier than I planned on getting tonight. At all, really.”
“No, don’t be sorry. You have absolutely no reason to apologize.”
If you only knew what I’m too wary of unleashing on you from my own past. All the guilt I still sometimes feel about not pursuing the asshole that assaulted me because who knows if he could have done it to more women.
Everything I have to go through to remind myself that I’m not too damaged to move on.
The freakish amount of anxiety I feel about a simple date—I mean, seriously. This isn’t normal!
“I just feel bad that I keep bringing all this doom and gloom, when I’m supposed to be keeping things light.
You already see me at my worst with all these appointments too.
I guess I just feel comfortable around you.
” He shifts, offering me a weak grin. “Let’s move on to less gloomy topics, shall we?
This sunset—” He gestures out over the open water.
“Is absolutely stunning,” I finish his statement for him.
“I was actually going to say it looks okay, I guess, but pales in comparison to you.”
I giggle at the flushed feeling tickling my cheeks. “Alright, spill… what’s your flaw?”
“What do you mean?”
“There’s absolutely no way you’re so full of all this charm without having some sort of giant red flag.”