Chapter 23
Chapter Twenty-Three
His mother couldn’t drive away with Darla soon enough for him, Gilbert thought as her car slowly pulled out and he threw up a hand to wave before hurrying across the street.
He saw Summer standing in the doorway of Sunny’s shop, and she didn’t seem to be extremely angry, which made his heart slow down just a little bit.
He had been afraid that she was furious with him, and he couldn’t blame her.
If he had looked out the window and seen some other man with his hand on her knee, he would have been hard-pressed not to go out and break the hand off.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t very nice when you were in here just a few minutes ago,” Summer said before he had even stopped in front of her.
“No. It’s me. I’m sorry I continued to do what Mrs. Tucker asked me to do, even though I didn’t want to.
Then Darla was touching me, and I didn’t know how to pick up her hand and throw it off me without being obvious about it.
That’s why I finally stood up and came over.
I…had her sitting outside of the shop, just because I wanted to be close to you. ”
She closed her eyes for a moment and then smiled, shaking her head.
Finally she opened her eyes back up. “I wondered why you sat there. I wondered if you were just trying to rub it in that you are with someone else, and I knew that couldn’t possibly be right, but it felt like that little bit.”
“No way. Absolutely not. I… I showed her the town, as quickly as I could, but that kind of backfired on me, because then I didn’t know what to do with her.”
“Oh, that’s terrible.”
“I know. So that’s how we ended up sitting there, and then finally I asked if she wanted a muffin, because that would get us standing up and get her fingers off me.”
“All right, so beware if the man asks me if I want a muffin. He might possibly be wanting to get away from me.”
“No. Not true.” He reached a hand out like he was going to touch her cheek, and then it dropped, and he smiled a little guiltily. “I want to touch you, but we made those rules, and I kind of insisted on them.”
“Yeah. I…thought about the rules and then thought about how unfair it was that Darla got to touch you and I wasn’t allowed.”
“Trust me. It wasn’t because I wanted her to.”
“Hey, you guys, why don’t you take a muffin? Seems like you had a pretty big morning, and… Summer, what I said before? He’s a good man,” Sunny said, handing them both a blueberry muffin.
“Thank you,” they said together as they each took a muffin out of her hands.
Gilbert waited until she left before he said, “What did she say earlier?”
“She was playing devil’s advocate with me. Because I told her about you and me kissing and how we had decided to slow down and make sure that we were building a foundation that didn’t necessarily include all the physical stuff right away.”
“And how did she take that?”
“She warned me that you might be saying whatever you needed to in order to get what you wanted. And that I didn’t know for sure that I could trust you, when I told her that I could.”
She said it so simply, like she did just trust him without him needing to do anything to earn it.
“And then I sat down with Darla and her grippy hands, and made it look like your friend was right,” he said as they opened their muffins and walked slowly along the street.
“Yeah. She did kind of hit me with that, but you came in, and I think when you talked to me in front of Darla, it convinced her that maybe I was right. Or she just thought about your reputation in town and realized that you didn’t get that reputation by not being the kind of man you are.”
“Well, whatever it was, I appreciate it.” He nodded at his truck. “I really did want to take a ride with you. I figured if I’m driving and sitting on one side and you’re over on the other side, it will be a little easier to just talk.”
“I’m down for that. Although, I have horses that are supposed to be here this evening. I got that text just a little bit ago, but with all the other things… I was jealous. I’m sorry.” She slowed down and then stopped, getting serious all of a sudden.
“I told you. I would have been jealous too. And probably a little violent. Unless I was able to get a hold of myself. I will work to try to make sure that never happens again.”
“And I will work to make sure that I can be nice even when my heart hurts a little bit.”
“I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“I know. I know that. You know how you have head knowledge, but sometimes you just can’t get your body’s reactions to go along with what you know?”
“You have head knowledge that your feelings don’t follow?” he said with a little smile.
“Yeah. Exactly.” They both thought about the discussion that they’d had earlier about how they needed to acknowledge their feelings but not necessarily live by them.
He walked over to her side of the truck and opened the door.
He held out his hand so he could hold her muffin while she got in.
“Thank you.”
“Sure,” he said, having already finished his muffin. He’d lost his appetite a little bit while he was leading Darla around.
He walked around the front of the truck, after closing her door, and got in.
“That was about the worst morning I’ve had in a really long time,” he said as he started his truck.
“It wasn’t my favorite morning either, but I think we can put that behind us. I’m looking forward to the horses coming, and I know the kids are going to be excited about it.”
“Can I thank you again for being so nice to my kids?” he asked as he looked in the rearview mirror. He turned his signal on and pulled out.
“Sure. Although, they’re great kids. Of course I’m going to love them.”
“Darla just acted like having kids was the worst thing. It reminded me that I needed to thank you for being kind about it. She…just went on about how kids were such a drag and how she was never going to have any, and she asked about their mother and whether we shared custody and all that.”
“What’d you say to that?” Summer said with a laugh.
“I changed the subject. I didn’t want to go into all that, because it’s kinda complicated.
Yes, she died. Then everybody gives me pity, then I feel guilty because I don’t feel bad about it necessarily other than that my children lost their mom, which is hard to explain and I didn’t want to talk about my personal life with Darla. ”
“Well, that makes me kind of happy. That you don’t seem to have a problem talking about that with me.”
“I told you. I feel comfortable with you, in a way that I don’t feel with anyone else.”
They started out along the street, then he pulled out onto the highway, intending to take her to the waterfall outside of town. It was a pretty place that he didn’t visit nearly enough, and for some reason, he wanted to share it with Summer.
He had thought about it when he was taking Darla around, but for some reason, he didn’t want to be there with her. Maybe because he had never been there with Summer. Whatever it was, he had just had such an urge to go with Summer that he could hardly wait to get her there.
“Where are we going anyway?” Summer asked, looking around as they drove outside of town in the opposite direction of the farm. She probably was confused.
“I was showing Darla around town, and I thought of the falls. I didn’t want to take her there, and somehow all I could think about was getting you there with me.”
“Really?” she asked, looking a little charmed, when he really hadn’t meant to be charming. He just was being honest.
“Really.” He didn’t have any of the words. But he didn’t seem to need them. She seemed happy, and her eyes glowed as she glanced at him, and then the falls came into view.
There was a short walk to get to the larger falls off the road, and he parked the truck in the designated area.
“Can we hold hands?” he asked as he walked around the truck and opened her door.
“That doesn’t count as touching, does it?” she said as she hopped out, and he shut the door.
“I don’t think so,” he said, holding his hand out and watching as she slipped her fingers into his.
It felt good and right, not like the way it had felt when Darla had put her hand on his knee.
He wanted to pull Summer closer, though, and he figured that holding hands was probably not a good idea either.
But he wanted to have that connection. After the unstable morning that they’d had, which had been all his fault.
He shouldn’t have put himself in a position where Darla could reach over and touch him, and he shouldn’t have been afraid to move away from her hand, which would have given her the message that he didn’t want her touch.
It would have been the thoughtful thing to do for Summer, and she would have been justified in her argument with her friend. Instead, he sat there and allowed Darla to do what she wanted, because he hadn’t wanted to offend her.
He wished he could go back and do it over again, but he could learn from that, and not allow that type of thing to happen ever again, whether Summer was there to see it or not.
The trail was not difficult, and they moseyed back away from the road, from the little falls, and headed to the larger falls. There was an area set up where they could stand close to the falls and feel the water come down.
There was also a swimming hole at the bottom, but it was a little chilly for that.
“This is beautiful any time of year,” Summer said, talking a little louder to be heard over the roar of the water. It wasn’t a powerful waterfall, like a river, but it was still loud enough that talking softly was impossible.
“I agree. I’ve always loved coming here, and I haven’t done it nearly enough.
I don’t even know if I’ve brought my kids here in the last year.
” Actually, he figured it had been several years since the kids and he had visited this, and considering how much they enjoyed seeing the falls and swimming in the swimming hole at the bottom over the summer, he couldn’t believe he hadn’t done it, except… His life had been a little upside down.
“I think you can be excused from that,” Summer said, almost as though she had read his mind.
“I’d like to make up for those things. But you can’t ever get the time back, you know?”
“I know. I have a few things I’d love to be able to go back and redo, but I can’t.”
“Like what?” he asked, sitting down on the bench and keeping a hold of her hand as she sat down beside him, their clasped hands resting between them.
“Like today. I wish I could have looked at that and known immediately that it wasn’t what it seemed. I wish I could have said that confidently to Sunny and just trusted in your integrity.”
“You don’t know me that well. It’s perfectly okay for you to question what you see, when you have no idea the depths of my character.”
“But other people know your character.” She shook her head. “Anyway. I want to do better.”
“If Desire had gotten mad at me, she’d have been mad at me for at least a week and wouldn’t have talked to me for three or four days, just to punish me, until I came to her, begging for forgiveness and half of the time not even knowing what it was I had done wrong.”
She lifted her shoulder, as though unimpressed. Like being better than Desire wasn’t exactly her goal.
He supposed that Desire didn’t set a high bar, and Summer cleared it easily.
Regardless, he felt like he and Summer were doing things right.