Chapter 13 Stargazing #2
“Okay. Be down after PT.” I wink, then turn to Todd, because I do have physical therapy soon, which Todd always gets some shots of, but I also have a date to plan for tonight, and I’m going to need some help.
“Are you ready?” I ask from where I wait for Brooke at the top of the ladder. It took me the afternoon and a little help from Todd and my neighbors to set up our date for tonight, but I think she’s going to like it.
“Almost,” she calls back. I can’t imagine how she could possibly be preparing for this date, given the lack of personal items or space she has to do so, but I’m about to have my first official date with the only woman I ever want to date again, so I’m not about to rush her.
When she appears at the bottom of the ladder, I send a silent prayer of thanks that I decided to plan our evening outside and not in the privacy of our home. I like to think of myself as a strong-willed man, but I’m not that strong.
My wife is breathtaking.
She’s wearing a black tank top with tiny straps, revealing almost every inch of her shoulders, only partially covered by the wavy, raven-colored hair cascading over them and down her back.
Her loose-fitting, floral printed skirt falls to her bare feet but accentuates her curves in a way that has my hands flexing, desperate to trace.
It’s a pairing I’ve seen many times over, but it feels like tonight I’m seeing her in it for the first time. Every perfect curve. Every bare length of skin. Every detail she chose for this night will be forever etched in my memory.
I reach out my hand and lead her up the ladder, pulling her into my arms as soon as she reaches the top. “I think I’ll die if I don’t kiss you,” I mumble into her hair. “Like, right here. On the spot. My heart will stop.”
She laughs, tilting her chin down and into my chest. “So dramatic.”
“It’s true.” I kiss the crown of her head and wait—So. Very. Patiently—to see if, and how, she’ll respond.
Slowly, Brooke’s eyes drift up, her lips so close I feel her breath against mine. She presses her hand against my chest, right where my heart is beating double-time for her. “It feels solid to me.”
“Brooke… Love,” I smirk, using the moniker I’ve taken to when I’m desperate to tell her how deep in this I am with her but know she isn’t ready to hear it just yet. “You aren’t a medical professional. I don’t think we should take the chance.”
“Definitely shouldn’t risk it.” She nods once and begins to say, “I think you bette—”
But I don’t hear the rest. Taking her gesture as the only signal I need, and then her small hum of pleasure when our mouths meet as my reassuring confirmation to stop talking while I’m ahead.
When I step back, Brooke’s in a well-kissed haze. Inwardly, I beat my chest, because I did that! But she shakes herself from it pretty quickly as a throat clears nearby. Then, the previously silent group I conveniently forgot about, chuckles and mumbles amongst themselves.
“Here we were thinkin’ we’d be the entertainment,” Gloria drawls, slapping her husband on the arm to make sure he’s getting the whole show.
“Sorry, y’all.” I laugh, then kiss Brooke’s nose which she swats away when she realizes I knew about our audience all along. “I couldn’t help myself.”
Ocean starts strumming his guitar next door, the second plan for our night set into motion. I reach out my hand in offering to my wife as Sadie begins to sing the first lines to what I’m now considering our song.
“Will you dance with me, Brooke?”
When her hand slides into mine and the other reaches gently around my shoulder, so as not to put too much pressure on the injury, the whole circle of fellow contestants cheer. Brooke tilts her head back and laughs into the clear, May night sky.
She hums along with the cacophony of harmonizing couples as they sing “Can You Feel the Love Tonight,” and I sing it quietly in her ear. It’s cheesy and a little awkward given the fifteen people—Todd included—witnessing me romance my wife, but, somehow, it feels right for our first date.
“You know what this reminds me of?” Brooke asks, her temple resting against my cheek.
“Hmm?” I twirl her away, and only settle once she’s in my arms again.
“Senior prom…”
I can’t help the groan that escapes. “You let Batman take you.”
Brooke laughs again. “Bruce was not that bad.”
“And his voice was not naturally that deep.”
“But I didn’t dance with him all night.”
She didn’t. She danced with me, much to Batman’s dismay. And though he was the one to take her home, I picked Brooke up twenty minutes later when her mom and husband number four were fighting so loud she couldn’t fall asleep.
She worries her lip between her teeth, the face she makes when she wants to say something but doesn’t know if she should. “I…” she hesitates as her eyes take in every angle of my face. “I wanted it to be you. I’m sorry I…”
“Hey…” I pause our steps, trapping her hand against my chest. “It’s always been you and me, Babe. And being your friend—the person you’d choose to dance with or come home with over all the other guys you could’ve—that has been the greatest honor of my life.”
She’s still holding back. “Tell me your fear, sweetheart.”
“What if this… us…” She licks her lips and trusts me with another small piece of herself. “What if I’m never ready? What if I’m always afraid?”
“One pitch. One hit. One game, Babe. One day at a time, right?” I promise, “I’m not going anywhere.”
I know she hears me, but rather than acknowledge it, she tangles her free hand in the hair at the nape of my neck and whispers, “You’re almost due for a haircut.”
“We’ll get there, too,” I assure her, and I know it’s true. One day, we’re going to share everything with each other, and I’ll be the one to whisper away her doubts until they’re nothing but a distant memory.
“Tell me an uncertainty?”
“I’m not sure… if you’ll let me kiss you goodnight?”
Brooke purses her lips in a smile. “You’re breaking all the rules, aren’t you?”
“Oh, we’re way past those rules, Babe.” I kiss her cheek and spin her again as the song around us comes to a close. “And I think we’re better for it, don’t you?”
“Yeah, Ruth,” she agrees, a perfect blush blooming across her cheeks. “I do.”
The crowd disperses to their individual Tinkerbells as soon as the song ends, turning off the Christmas lights dangling from their roofs so that the only lights we see are the candles Todd procured for me with the production team and the stars above.
Todd gets a few shots of us eating the picnic dinner I scrounged up from our lightly stocked kitchen, then leaves us as silently as he came.
When we finally settle into the makeshift pallet on our roof—made from the spare blankets of all the other contestants who donated them to my cause—Brooke and I stargaze under a perfect summer sky until we can’t keep our eyes open any longer.
And for the first time, my wife willingly falls asleep in my arms.