Chapter Twenty-Five #2
were only about one foot apart, but the cat remained just out of reach. I heard the snap of branches and steps behind me.
I turned around. My mother had a grimace on her face and squinted up at Dave, unimpressed.
“Just leave him,” my mother muttered, batting at mosquitos. “He’ll figure it out. And if he doesn’t, he’ll be some lucky hawk’s dinner.”
“That is the most boomer bullshit I have ever heard. Don’t listen to her, Okanagan! Go back to the house, Mom, he doesn’t
like you. You’re probably the reason he’s up in that tree.”
“Elise!” Sarah scolded me.
“It’s fine, we’re a family that expresses our feelings now,” I said, half joking.
My mom laughed but did as I said, retreating back toward the cabins, muttering to herself. I had a moment where I was able
to see exactly who she was going to be as an old lady.
Dave gripped the trunk of the tree, one arm stretched out toward the cat, softly encouraging him to crawl down toward the
treat in his hand. He wasn’t giving up. I’d been attracted to Dave in all sorts of scenarios—slow dancing, watching him direct
our little movies at camp, cuddling up on the couch, helping me learn to ride a horse—but right now was possibly the most
attractive he’d ever been, luring Okanagan toward him with soft psst psst psst sounds. Eventually Dave’s calm, consistent presence allowed the cat to move toward him.
He scruffed him and put him inside his backpack. Okanagan yowled at the injustice of it all, but was, a few minutes later,
on the ground, safe. Weirdly pissed at us for saving his life.
“He must be starving, he’s been gone so long!” Dave said, his face flush, exhilarated. “I thought I was going to fall so many
times. I can’t believe I got him!”
“That was amazing,” I said, reaching into the bag to pet Okanagan’s head, giving him a handful of treats.
He ate them up fast, coughed, and then kept eating more. I picked him up, still in the bag, and marched him down to Dave’s
cabin, where Sarah and I looked him over for wounds. Dave followed with the ladder.
“He seems OK. Scrawny. Desperate to drink water,” I said.
Sarah looked at Dave, who was pulling off his sweaty T-shirt and the splashing water on his face in the kitchen sink.
“Gonna go check on Katie,” she said, backing out.
“Don’t let him go back outside for a bit. We might need to watch him and see if he needs a vet.” I continued to focus on petting
Okanagan as he ate and drank, so that I wouldn’t look at shirtless Dave.
“I think he looks pretty OK,” he offered. I could see him opening his dresser drawer and pulling out a clean shirt before
coming to join me on the floor, both of us staring at the cat. I forced myself to look away from him, at his sexy late-in-the-day
stubble, his eyes I could get lost in. Dangerous, eye contact. Trouble. So I looked around the room instead, feeling the heat
coming off his body now safely in my periphery. Even his sweat smelled good, earthy and herbal.
“That was really hot,” I said, not looking at him.
“Really?” He sounded delighted.
“Literally never seen any human doing anything sexier.”
I leaned over and smelled him. “Even your stress sweat is fucking hot.”
“No way,” he said, grinning, moving his face close to mine.
We kissed rough and passionate, rolling around on the floor next to the cat food and various rescue detritus. Then my mother’s
voice interrupted the vibe. She yelled my name from the porch like I was the lost cat.
I ignored it. But it took me out of the moment long enough to see that Dave had set up a single bed. It was done up with a
Superman duvet and covered in plush toy animals. Baby had stolen a toy bunny and was disembowelling it on the living room
rug, while we remained distracted.
“Is Finn coming back this weekend?” He’d left on Wednesday to go back to Stirling.
“Yeah, I figured we’d have a cabin weekend.”
I moved away from him, slowly; I felt like I’d rip his clothes off if I didn’t.
“Oh, that’s so nice! Will the wedding be a problem?”
“Finn loves parties. And if he’s bored, I’ll just take him swimming or to ride the horses. Do you like kids?”
“Who doesn’t like kids? I hope to have my own someday.”
“Oh, wild. I guess I didn’t picture you with kids.”
“Should I be insulted?” My face burned. How did this man see me? Not that there was anything wrong with not wanting kids,
but being a mom was on my list of hopes for the future. We’d talked about it when we were young. I stood up from where we’d
been lying on the floor.
“No, no. It’s just when he was here before, you didn’t really try to hang with us.”
“Well, I wasn’t sure where you were at. I didn’t want to intrude on the small amount of time you guys have together. I remember
when I was a kid and my mom introduced us to her boyfriend, I felt so invisible, like she didn’t care about us. I didn’t want
Finn to feel that way.” It sounded like excuses, but it was the truth.
“Oh, that’s thoughtful. I was just kind of worried that, I don’t know.”
“Doesn’t mean I don’t like kids. Why do you think I wouldn’t?”
“I just thought, you know, you want to make movies and it must be hard to do both.”
“Plenty of women do. Sarah Polley has three kids and won an Oscar a few years ago.”
“Of course, of course.”
Was this his way of saying he didn’t think I was talented enough to do both? Or was Ben right about Dave? Were we not compatible, lifestyle-wise? Was the fact that I wanted to climb him like a tree every time he was near me make the reality of who he was, or how he saw me, a blur?
“Have you been thinking we can’t date because I don’t like children? Didn’t we plan this out at camp, we’d have two kids?”
“No, no. It’s just . . . dating a single dad is no picnic. The last woman I dated found it too difficult. Like if you look
at Ben’s life, you just fit better into it. You can see it. I can see it. Right? Plus, we were kids back then. Now it’s real
life. I can’t just jet off to LA. I want you to be happy in life.”
“Are you trying to push me toward Ben now?”
“No, no, not at all. Not even one little bit.” He was flustered now, pacing around the room. I was pissed.
“I thought you knew me. I felt known by you in a way I haven’t ever experienced. Like that night, that felt like . . . an
otherworldly kind of intimacy. Have you ever felt that way before?”
He hesitated. My heart dropped. Of course he had. He’d been married!
“Not like that, no,” he whispered.
“So why does it feel like you’re pushing me away? Like you’ve already decided we can’t be together?” The feeling that he’d
be dropping me again felt like being thrown into the bottom of a hole. I couldn’t breathe. He took a deep breath in. He shook
his head.
“I don’t know, I don’t know,” he said.
In that moment, knowing that I loved Dave felt like the most certain thing in the world. Maybe we didn’t have the practical
details of our lives figured out, but how could he not know? Or not want to know?
“We agreed to talk after the wedding, so should we just do that? Did I rush this?”
“Yes, let’s do that. I feel a bit unprepared going from cat saving to a heart-to-heart.”
I picked up Okanagan and tried to shake the severity of the moment off.
I wasn’t going to let Dave see me spiral.
I felt a coldness overtake my body. “You’re coming with me, pal,” I said to him.
“If I can learn to, kind of, like my mother, you can, too.” I laughed nervously for no reason, the way I do when I don’t know what else to do.
I felt so much shame for being so certain, for wanting so much. I had to shut it down.
Okanagan squirmed in my arms until my firm grip made him give up and start purring. I crossed the grassy threshold between
the cabins, pushed open my screen door with one foot, and put him down on the floor and closed it behind me. “You stay put
for now, kid,” I said, and filled his bowl with kibble.
Katie, Sarah, and my mom were sitting around the kitchen table making lists. My mom had packed her things, as everyone had
pre-booked hotel rooms in Wellington for the wedding weekend. The sight of her suitcases made me feel such relief, but also
some pride that we’d made it so many days together in this tiny little house in the woods.
“Where were you?” my mom asked. “I wasn’t sure if you were going to come to the hotel with us or stay here.”
I couldn’t tell Dave what to do, but I could do something for the moment of peace I needed to process the day. “Guys, you
go back to the hotel. I need to sleep. Dave is arranging the chairs and porta-potties. I gave him my credit card and the timing
info. It’s going to be fine. But I feel like I haven’t slept or had silence or time to myself in weeks. And I just want to
cuddle with Okanagan and sleep.”
They looked stunned, but agreed.
Katie hugged me. “Thanks for dealing with Mom,” she whispered.
“Boy, do I have an update for you,” I said.
After they left, I got in my PJs, climbed into the real bed that didn’t make my back hurt, and fell asleep listening to Okanagan licking the three cans of wet food I’d put out on his little plate.
Then he curled in behind my legs and started purring.
The hurt I felt about Dave turned to steely anger and back to sadness over and over.
He knocked on the door at one point. I heard his tentative voice say, “Goldy?” Okanagan’s ears perked up. But I didn’t answer.