The Heart's Ashes
Page 62

“Many things, sweetheart.”
“Let me guess—you can tell me, but not today.” I rolled my eyes.
“Maybe you’re more switched on than I thought you were.”
“Or maybe you just always say the same things.”
David took a breath, looking at his watch. “So—lunch at your dad’s today, huh?”
“Oh my God.” I slapped my own head. “I totally forgot.”
“It’s okay, you still have an hour.” David pulled me back down as I stood, his strong, almost cool arms heavily pinning me to his chest. “Let’s enjoy this time before Emily and Mike come home.”
“I wonder where they are. It’s not like him to leave it so long without contact, you know, a message or something.”
“My love, they’ve been gone for one night.”
“I know. I’m just worried.”
“Well, we’ll text him after you’ve been to your dad’s today.”
“He’ll be happy to see you,” I noted in a soft voice. “My dad, that is.”
“Do you think that’s a good idea, Ara? I’m not staying. It might raise questions if I go with you today.”
“Then we won’t tell him you’re not staying.”
“Ara.” He glared down at me. “Your dad will rip my arm off if I don’t promise to stay with you.”
“Then promise.” I shrugged.
“Stop it.”
“Why? Why won’t you just stay?”
“You know why.”
“I don’t care why.”
“No. I know you don’t, which is why you always seem to be in some kind of trouble, or conflicted by something,” David said, his tone short, abrupt. “Start caring about cause and effect and you might start to get some resolution.”
“I don’t want it. Going over reasons, David, has only ever caused me heartache. I just have to keep wishing for the unattainable and trying to believe there’s magic in the world.”
“My Ara, so full of hopes and dreams.” He kissed my hand and placed it back down on his chest. “It’s one of the other things I really love about you.”
“Well, I have to hope.” I pushed up from the bed and moved away quickly. “If I don’t, I’ll die inside—stop feeling, stop dreaming—like you.”
Parked at the centre of the drive, wedged between the daisy-lined path to the porch, and my dad’s old Buick, David shut the engine off and we just sat there, silence filling the empty space around us. “What is it, my love?”
“It’s just...I haven’t been back here since I moved out, David. I’ve been dreading this lunch for weeks, knowing I couldn’t bear to look over there, at the school, and see that place—knowing that you’re no longer there.”
“I’m here for now.” He smiled, melting my tension.
“I know. It’s just kind of bizarre—how it all turned out. I mean, I wasn’t supposed to be here. I should be in Perth, at school, married. Don’t get me wrong, I like this better.” I grinned, touching his arm. “But I get sad thinking how good it could’ve been if you were just a normal guy.”
“Well, what would it have been like?” He took my hand, turning in the chair to face me. “If I were just a guy, what would’ve happened between us?”
“Well.” I smiled widely, imagining everything in my head as I spoke. “We would’ve spent every waking minute together; my dad and Vicki would’ve started complaining, setting up scheduled visitations so my grades wouldn’t drop. But we would’ve snuck out to see each other, anyway. Then, one day, probably sooner than later, we’d have got married. Maybe started a family and complained about how we get no sleep, and how the mortgage is killing us. You would’ve found a job working at a place you hate, and I would’ve whinged about getting fat from having kids.” David squeezed my hand; I took a deep breath. “Then, when we went to our high school reunion, everyone would’ve made snide remarks about how old we look and how we were once the couple of the century—the headline gossip, and now, we’re nothing more than completely normal, old, and nearing the end of our meagre existence.”
“And you would have wanted that?”
“Wouldn’t you?” I looked into his intense, emerald-green eyes.
“More than you know. I just—I never thought it’d be something you dream about.”
“It’s normal.” I pressed my cheek to my shoulder. “I always liked normal.”
“What if,” he started, shuffling a little closer, then leaned in to lift my face, “what if the doors that never opened for us, Ara, are hiding the paths we only thought we wanted? Maybe our destiny is down the road of something more magnificent. Maybe we will get our happy ending and realise that normal was never going to be enough for us.”
“Now who’s the dreamer?” I smiled through a teary gaze.
“Everyone has a dream, my love, it’s just whether or not we’re willing to fight for that.”
“You’re not,” I said.
“I am.” He squeezed my hand, making me look at him again. “Sweetheart, I’m fighting for us every day. You just don’t know it—you don’t know what I’m risking by being here.” He swallowed hard. “I’m the worst friend in the world.”
“Why…what are you risking?”
“Your life!”
“Huh?”
“Don’t you get it? Your life is at risk because I can’t stay away from you, Ara. Do you understand how much you mean to me? That I’m willing to risk your life to be with you.” He laughed then. “It’s the stupidest thing I ever heard.”
“No. It’s not.” I shook my head. “It’s the most romantic.”
His lips turned up on the corners. “Come on, let’s go see your family. I can’t wait to get my arm ripped off by your dad.”
“He’ll be happy to see you, David. He won’t rip off your arm.”
He smiled his secret smile, and opened the car door. “We’ll see.”
Hand in hand, we walked the once creaky porch step and heard Vicki’s voice float through the house before we even knocked. “Ara’s here.”