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“You didn’t tell him yet?” Nancy whispers, completely audible to everyone in the room, and this I will attribute to the wine.
“Tell me what?”
Gram rests a hand on mine but looks at Nancy and yawns theatrically. “Oh my, I’m getting so tired. Nancy, don’t you think we should get ready for bed?”
“Oh. Yes, I—” Nancy stretches, sloshing some wine over the side of her glass, and covers a fake yawn. “I do think we should begin getting ready. Why don’t you kids go explore and let these old ladies get some sleep.”
“I’ll get this,” I tell Gram as she stands to tidy up. I pull her in for a hug and hold her longer than normal. “Night, Gram. Night, Nancy.” They retreat to the bedroom of the suite, where they’ve asked our room steward to separate the king bed into two twins tonight, and suddenly I’m alone with Sawyer. I feel his eyes on me while we clean up from dessert.
“So, are you going to tell me what that was all about?”
“Yes.” I’m surprised by the fluttering in my stomach. I’m not normally a butterflies kind of person, but looking at Sawyer, knowing what I’m about to tell him… Flutter, flutter, flutter. “Can we go for a walk?”
“Yeah. Sure.” He slips into his sneakers and waits while I look for an extra layer, but I’ve packed up a lot of my things already and can only find my heavy sherpa.
“Here,” he says, pulling his old sweatshirt from his backpack and extending it to me. “It’s yours, if you want it.” It’s this gesture that kicks the butterflies into overdrive, because it doesn’t feel like he’s just offering a sweatshirt. This is part of him. It smells like him, it’s warm like him. His alma mater’s logo is fading from the front. He’s offering me himself, piece by piece, and I want to take it all.
He opens the door once I’ve pulled on the sweatshirt, and I slide my cruise card into the side pocket of my leggings. “Where to?” he asks, and we head upstairs so we can walk outside. It’s a nice enough night, with a clear sky that makes it chilly but showcases thousands of stars.
We’re nearly alone up here, and we’re halfway through a lap around the deck when Sawyer breaks the silence. “So.” He buries his hands in the pockets of his sweatpants and watches his feet. “You wanted to tell me something?”
I nod, though he’s not looking over at me. It feels like the butterflies are climbing my throat, like speaking without nervous vomiting is about to be the greatest challenge of my life.
“Gwen? Are you okay?” He’s stopped two steps ahead of me, and I realize that I stopped first. He steps to the side to allow another couple to pass us, nodding a greeting as they go around. Another couple. Is that what we are? A couple? Is that what we could be?
“I, um—” There’s a tiny chip in my polish on my toenails. I didn’t notice it until right now, and it’s suddenly the only thing I can look at. It’s safe to look down there.
“Gwen.” His voice is like a blanket, all warm as it wraps around me. God, I love the way he says my name. I want his lips to breathe it like this forever, this gentle, it’s okay tone, the care embedded in that one syllable.
I shake my head. “I have no right to ask you this.” When I turn, ready to walk away and bail on everything tomorrow, he reaches for my hand and weaves his fingers into mine.
“Talk to me. Please.”
I take a deep, shaky breath and find courage in the fact that he’s still holding on, still here, asking me for more. “I wanted to take you on a date.” There. The bandage is ripped off, and I lift my gaze to meet his.
Surprisingly, he’s smiling. “You want to take me on a date?” he repeats.
“Mhmm.” I nod. “Tomorrow. In New York.”
Sawyer crinkles his nose. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”
This is not how I saw this going. This is not the reaction I had expected. “I’m sorry?” I pull my hand away and wrap my arms around my waist, holding myself together. I can handle rejection, but it’s hard when it comes from a person I really don’t want to reject me.
“You don’t have to take me on some pity date, Gwen.” He retreats to the glass half-wall that runs the perimeter of the deck and props his forearms on the railing. I follow him, annoyed.
“It’s not a pity date.”
“Then what would you call it?”
“I’d call it a date. Can’t I just take you out because I want to?” I narrow my eyes at him, challenging him to push back again.
He traces lines along the metal rail. “I heard you this morning, loud and clear. We’re looking for different things, and I’m fine with that.”
“What if we’re not, though?”
His fingers stop and he raises his gaze to meet mine. “What?”
“What if… what if I don’t know what I’m looking for, but I still see you? And what if I know I really like you and want to see more of you?”
