Was It Even Possible?
We’d walked hand-in-hand and she kept looking down at the ring on her finger. “You okay with that? No second thoughts?”
“Nope. I think it looks perfect. It makes me feel.. giddy just looking at it there. I didn’t know I could feel this way.” We stopped on the boardwalk again and again and again. For her, for me. Oh, Lord. I remember that spot under her ear. Whewww. A breath rushed out of my mouth. “Now I remember. You have terrible breathing.”
“Yeah, well, it hasn’t kicked up this bad since the last time we were this close.”
“Nice to know I’m the only one that does that to you. I remember a promise you made once. Something about…”
“Going hiking, wasn’t it? Matching tattoos, that’s what it was. I promised to take you to Europe, that’s it. Oh yeah. Thursday night role playing. Hey, why you gotta pinch my ear? Okay, alright. Maybe I do remember.”
“Mmm mm? You don’t remember? Please. I saw it in your eyes every time you looked at me.”
“Okay, let go. I remember, love of my life. Let go!”
“Good save there.”
“Maybe something about putting a kiss on every inch of your body? Like I’d ever forget that promise.” I put my hand up, like I always wanted to do, and let my thumb caress her face, her cheek, her lips. It put a soft kiss on lips. “It’s not even the promise, per se, but that I think about it every time I look at you. Just to be able to show you how much I love by kissing every inch of you. I can’t count how many times I’ve looked at you and had it cross my mind. I remember thinking about it last Christmas, sitting there at the dinner table. Surrounded by every member of your family, trying to eat your mother’s turkey. Probably the first time in my life I was totally uninterested in what I was eating, because my lips were dreaming about kissing your lips, your neck, your back, up and down your legs…”
“I finally sat down to think about it: I’ll need two and half hours to fulfill my promise.”
“You are so… Are you serious or just pulling my leg? You actually… don’t even try.”
I leaned in and kissed her neck, then whispered in her ear. “Does it matter? Do you want to tell me to limit to 30 minutes?” I kissed down her neck. “It depends on how much time you really have.” I sucked on her earlobe. Two and half hours would be wonderful. Have more time free, oh, I’m up for that. Practice makes perfect. You have twenty minutes to get out the door, I can work with that.”
“If I only knew. That’s what you were thinking at the Christmas table? I apologize for underestimating you.”
“I don’t know what to tell you. You get under my skin. I was sitting at the table simmering, trying to not think about you. Which is totally impossible.”
“Do you honestly think you were so talented that I couldn’t see it in your eyes? It didn’t bother me in the least. But sometimes I had to look away or I would’ve dragged you back to my room so you could get to work.”
“Honestly, I thought you’d stopped noticing me altogether.” She ran her hands through my hair and placed a kiss on my neck. Again a shiver ran up and down my body. “OMG. Could everyone see it? John and Laurie, even your parents?”
“Well. Don’t ask a question if you don’t want to hear the answer. It’s not like it was something I could’ve talked about to any of them. I know my mother, mind reader that she is, doesn’t miss much.”
“Oh, jeez. Now I know what they thought about me all these years. Just like his father, a chip off the old block. One thing on his mind, not to be trusted.”
“That’s your greatest fear, isn’t it? Thinking you’re like him. But you’re not. This ring is on my finger because I know you’re not and I have complete faith in you. Probably more than you have in yourself. Well, we’re going to put it behind us, because you’ve wasted far too much time worrying about it. You’ve got other things more important to think about than your worthless father.”
“Okay. That’s intriguing. What other things?”
“Us. Me. Unless there’s something you want to add to our list.”
“No. Nothing but you. Or us.”
“Very good. You have our priorities straight.”
We finally reached the car. “Keys.”
I raised my eyebrows but handed them over. “Fine by me. I can a take a nap on the way home.”
“No. Not gonna happen.”
“No? Why?”
“How many miles? Let’s make a bet”
“How many miles for what?”
“Pick a number, based on the miles between here and home.”
“Ohh-kay. It’s maybe 140 miles back to Richmond. Pick a number, pick a number. How about 40? 50? Okay, 50 miles. Based on what?”
“You picked it. Too late to change it. Sorry.”
“Why?” Suspicion rising up, knowing I’d been set up.
“It is about 140 miles back to Richmond, like you said. I’m going to start driving right here, so you need to use your time wisely. I’ll be driving but of course we do need to stay on the road. You need to take your time and carefully inspect the ‘investment’ you so recently purchased. Touch, taste, however you want to do it.” My mouth dropped open. My face flushed as the blood rushed into it. “So, Lover. How many miles will it be until we need to pull over?”
The oxygen left my lungs and I felt like I was hyperventilating. “Wow, David. I’m impressed. I would’ve thought some part of your brain would’ve already been thinking about it.”
“Honestly, Wanda. I thought it was more likely you were going to say no….” I still felt the fear within me. “I’m still afraid I’m going to wake up and find out it’s all just a dream. Honestly, I was scared and out of hope but I couldn’t keep it inside any more. I’m surprised I had the nerve to ask. Let alone actually hear you say yes.” With that I choked up.
“Hey. Hey.” I tried to look up but my state of mind had been low for so long. “Someday soon all those doubts will go up in a puff of smoke and you’ll wake up my arms and realize it’s true. I feel like you’ve got some sort of PTSD from growing in that damn family of yours. I’m not sure how I’m going to act the first time I see your Dad. It’s not to going well, I can tell you that.”
“Well, that’s going to be something to see.”
“I’m so sorry, David. I wasn’t playing with you, I swear. I’ve just know you have to work through things your way, until you’re ready to bring them out into the light of day. When we started out I didn’t think the day would end up here. I thought the odds were against it but I hoped.” She kissed my cheek. How can she kiss my cheek and make it so sensual? “We need to call my mother and thank her. She could see you were simmering and suggested we take a trip.”
“How do you do that?”
“What?”
“How do you kiss my cheek like that, with so much feeling that it makes me tremble?”
“You have to put everything into it, every bit of love, no matter where you put it. Why?”
“I was wondering why, when you kiss me, it reaches all the way down to my toes but all our kisses under the mistletoe did nothing for you and not much for me either. It’s not like I wasn’t trying.”
“That’s because you didn’t know you loved me then. And as you said, I hadn’t ‘unthawed that heart of mine.’ Don’t worry, we can work on that. I think we need to sit down and write up our Bucket List.” She said with a wicked smile, then leaned in to dart her tongue out and put a lick on my neck.
Again a shiver. The devil couldn’t stay hidden long though. “No, Wanda. I’m a traditional kinda guy. We’re going to wait until after the wedding. It what’s expected.” Oh, man. If ever I wanted to sound totally sincere, it was at this moment, because I didn’t mean it for a second. No, she wasn’t going let me waste my time with that line of hokum at all.
She backed me up against the car and pinched my ear. Again, gently, sensually. Not as painfully this time but she did have my attention. She leaned in and gave me her best kiss, which took my breath away, made my knees weak, and reduced me to jelly. I crushed her to me and ravished her lips and took a deep drink of her. She took a deep breath and whispered in my ear. “You think you’re being funny, don’t you? I don’t think so, David. Not happening. We have alot ground to make up and you have obligations you need to take care of.”
“Obligations? Already?”
She nuzzled her nose up across my jaw line, which sent another incredible shiver up and down my body. She pushed up against me, grinding me into the car. Somewhere from deep in my body a moan rose up and escaped. “You said quote-unquote, ‘Someday, I’m going to use that same kiss on every inch of your body.’ I’m not waiting four months, six months, or a year for my reward. I’m not sure I can even wait until tomorrow. So, let’s see how creative you can be.”
I pulled her into me and wrapped my arms around her, resting my face against her neck. For the first time in.. in forever, I laughed and it spilled out of me. “I’m allowed to be this happy?” Her head nodded up and down. I could feel her smile and then she put a kiss on my neck.
She spoke quietly into my ear. “I know you didn’t behave in high school. Do you honestly think I’m going to let you behave now?”