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“Sorry, my bad. When you politely asked with a strong current of abject fear in your voice,” I corrected and got that sassy half smirk that drove all the men who played against him mad with annoyance. “Why did you not simply come out and say you didn’t want to go sailing?”
“Because you love it and I wanted to talk to you about why you bolted on me, among some other things. Plus, I didn’t want you to think I was a sissy. I mean, it’s stupid to be scared of something like water. I can take a bath without floaties.”
“Well, your bath is a far cry from a lake,” I pointed out as I watched his animated face. He was the most expressive man I had ever met.
“The point still stands. People drown in tubs all the time, but I can soak my ass in one. You don’t see me freaking out when I lower my backside in the ice tub at the barn. I’m embarrassed.”
“No need to be embarrassed,” I said, lifting his scarred hand to my lips as he watched me with a gaze that was slowly shifting from shame to something else. All it ever took between us was a touch. “We all have our fears, things that we do not wish others to know about.”
“Well, I’m going to be honest with you about it from now on. I’m good right now because you’re looking at me like I’m a treat you found in the bottom of one of Madame’s picnic hampers, which takes my mind off the fact that we’re miles from the shore and I don’t swim so good.”
“So good or not at all?” I felt that was important to know.
“I can doggie paddle.”
“Ah, well, then you can keep your head above water.” He pulled a face. “That is important. We will work on teaching you to swim so that will be a fear conquered. I am a skilled sailor, rest easy. I would not let you come to harm.”
“Yeah?” I bobbed my head as my lips moved over his knuckles. “Okay, yeah, that’ll be good. Anything else you want to know about me? I’m an open book.”
“Well, I always wondered if you really had as many relatives as you say you do or if you like to embellish.”
He snickered. “I’m Italian and Irish, and all of them are good Catholics.” I waited for more but that seemed to be all he was going to say on the matter, so I let that go. I tended to think he embellished but even if he did it was…no, I was not going to say charming. Endearing. “Can I ask you something now?”
“Yes, of course.” I clasped his hand tighter. A cool breeze blew down into the berth, the rich scent of water riding on it, filling my lungs with courage.
“Why did you bolt?”
I knew that would be his first question, and justly so. I placed our hands on the table. He dropped his other hand atop our tangled fingers. I did the same, creating a small mound of clasped fingers next to the cheese and empty wine glasses.
“I left because I was scared,” I admitted, wishing now that I had filled up our wine glasses for a good gulp, which would do wonders. His head tipped slightly, but he remained silent. For once. I wouldn’t have minded him going off on a tangent about a fictional cousin.
“Of me?” he asked, his voice low and raspy.
“Yes, of you, and the feelings that have begun to grow for you.”
“Hey, I got feelings growing inside me for you too.”
“That is…that is good.” I was floundering, far worse than if Philip had tumbled over the side. At least he could paddle like a dog. I felt like a rock thrown into the lake. “I am…I do not…I…my eyes are not good.”
“Nah, they’re fine. Sometimes I have trouble with your Us but your Is are top-notch.” He smiled at me, the imp alive in those dark eyes of his, and my thoughts scattered to the wind.
Shaking free of his beauty, I plowed on before I lost all courage.
“No, not my English, my eyes.” I blinked at him. “I have a condition called Stargardt’s Disease, which is a form of juvenile macular degeneration that will slowly rob me of most of my central vision.” There. It was out. Now he could start to distance himself.
“Oh shit, you’re going to go blind?”
Right, here it came. The initial burst of pity and then the slow pulling away. “I shouldn’t. But I will have trouble with central vision which will make some daily chores very difficult.”
“Okay, so what can we do about it? My grandma Rosie had something like that and went to get shots in her eyes, and it helped a lot. I’d be happy to drive you to the eye doctor if Barney can’t and lucky you for falling for me, I got a good knowledge of cars. So I can do them delicate things like wiring and such on your Pa’s Cabriolet right now, and then you can drive it before your eyes get too bad. Also, I like to read out loud to people, and I know you love to read so I can read to you like I do to the kids at the pediatric ward. I do great voices. My best is a pirate, so if you got pirate stories among all them books in the library up there in the chalet, then I’m your man.” Yes, yes, he was. He was my man. For now, at least. Perhaps once the rush of well-meaning wore off, he would—“Hey, I see you doubting my word. Don’t never doubt Phil Greco. I like you a lot, and that’s why I got hurt when you pulled a fast one after that amazing night. But I get it, you got scared, thinking I might not be a good guy but rest assured that my ma raised me right. I don’t run when someone I care about has a problem. And this eye thing…it ain’t nothing to be ashamed of because no matter what, I’m always going to think you got the most beautiful eyes of anyone I ever met. Hand to God.” He lifted our joined hands into the air.
“That was…well, it was a lot to process,” I choked out as our hands came back down to the table. Philip held them tightly, his eyes soft and overflowing with affection. Not disgust or pity. Lord but I detested the pity that most people heaped on me. That was a key reason that I told no one now. I did not want their wretched condolences. I simply wanted to be accepted as I was now and how I would be later in life. “You’ve been sneaking into the garage to work on the Cabriolet?”
“That’s what you fixated on out of all that?” he asked, starting to snigger.
“Well, yes, the last time we spoke about the car, I distinctly told you that—”
He rose from his seat, the life jacket pushing up under his whiskery chin, to lean over the table and kiss me on the mouth. Paper meet flame. Whatever this pull was between us, it was not lessening in the least. If anything, it was growing like a wildfire, leaping out ahead of those trying their best to contain it.
