He left the shirt on and traded the running shorts for a pair of buff-colored trunks he’d almost forgotten that he had packed. He kicked his duffel bag into the corner where it’d lived since he moved to Zelda’s. It had been weeks since he arrived here and she had yet to announce an expiration on the invitation, and he had yet to unpack. No clothes in the bureau. No shoes in the closet. So far, the only items he kept at hand were toiletries, and those were limited.
He’d been surprisingly comfortable at Zelda’s, for the most part. He’d slept more hours in this room than he had in the one he’d occupied as a boy at the inn. However, he wouldn’t kid himself into believing this had in any way, shape or form become home. None of it took away from the clock in his head that was winding down in expectation of the moment he would move on.
He might admire the long-standing residency that Zelda, his parents, and the Brackens and Mavis held in the town, the solid legacies they’d carved...but he’d be a fool to think he could plant himself as they had. Plunk down roots, buy land, stop being a drifter.
It wasn’t so much wanderlust anymore that kept him going, he admitted. What led him away was more the burden he created for the ones here. If there was one thing he refused to be, it was burdensome.
He didn’t know when he would leave, where he would go or how exactly he would part with the people he’d grown reattached to.
There was one person in particular whom saying goodbye to could be likened to torture.
He’d hate disappointing Mavis. But if he suspected for just one moment that he was burdening her...
Since meeting Mavis, Gavin had found that he could live with being blind. He could live with having no direction. He’d survived that way thus far. But he couldn’t live with encumbering her with his issues.
Swallowing some pain pills for the dull thumping on the left side of his skull, Gavin left his room and started down the stairs to the first floor. The old treads creaked and whined in places. There was one toward the middle of the first set that was shorter than the rest. It’d tripped him up a couple times after he’d moved in. He avoided it altogether, moving smoothly to the second set that turned sharply to the right to meet the house’s entry point.
He pulled up short at the figure waiting at the bottom. Back to the railing, she favored his right side, as always.
Now that there was some light, he noticed that her sleeveless shirt had a grinning Day of the Dead skull. Also, it was so elongated that it either hid her shorts or masked the fact that she wore none.
As he came down the last bit of stairs, ducking the low part of the ceiling, he couldn’t fight half an amused smile. “Where’s your red today?” he asked, scanning her closely. She’d taken her mango scent up a few notches. Or else he was that much more aware. Like a territorial mammal sniffing out its mate.
The word mate birdied the good part of his brain off a cliff edge. The only thing that tethered it back was the double kick of his pulse on his eardrums.
He’d been intimate with women. He thought he might have been in love a time or two in his past, but he’d never associated any female with the word mate.
Mavis reluctantly reached over the rail to the trestle table. When she revealed the straw-colored panama hat and the thick red ribbon plaited around its middle, Gavin couldn’t fight the single laugh that shot from his chest. He lifted his hand to the brim. Mavis let him take it.
He swiveled the hat over his fingertips. If the kiss had troubled her, would she have bothered bringing the hat with the ribbon? Would she have bothered to show up for him at all?
Silent questions grew thick between them. Finally, unable to bear another moment’s hesitation, she took the hat and the hand underneath it. “Come on,” she said, tugging.
“Where’re we going?” he asked. He buttoned up quickly when they were met by a small group of women in the foyer with yoga mats either arriving to class or leaving. Several of them greeted Mavis. She didn’t waste much time on small talk, steering him through the contingent to the wide sliding doors rife with golden light.
Gavin dug his sunglasses out of the pocket of his swim trunks. He followed Mavis through the door to the grassy lawn. He heard the breeze moving through the wispy branches of the wide weeping willow. Ducking under the limbs, he kept his neck low.
She sailed easily underneath, headed for the clean lines of the dock.
“Are you embodying the spirit of mystery more than usual today, or do you plan on telling me what you’re up to?” He tipped his gaze to the robin’s-egg-blue sky. The light wasn’t nearly as harsh as it had been in Mobile, even if the water’s fishy odor was strong. The angle of the sun was long and light. “Damn, it’s early.”
“You’re a navy man,” she said, letting him go. Her tall Grecian sandals twined up her calves, almost to the knee. They slapped against the planks of the dock as she made her way to a small boat.
“I was.” He watched without much shame as she bent down to untie the dock lines. “Why? You need a captain for this...vessel?”
“Not yet, Prometheus,” Mavis said when the dog tried to step into the boat. “Not yet. You’re going to need counterweight.” Waving an arm at Gavin, she said, “Come.”
“No,” he said, snatching the dock line from her.
“No, you’re not getting in first? Or no, you’re not coming?”
She probably meant to sound sarcastic, as always, but he heard the waver under it all. Fighting not to touch her, he took the hat from her fist and placed it on her head. “Ladies first.”
Taking his offered arm for balance, she stepped into the canoe, then clambered over the first seat to sit at the bow.
“Go ’head, beastie,” Gavin said, tapping Prometheus on the back. The canine arced lithely from the dock’s edge to the middle of the boat, which pitched into a drunken rock. Mavis grabbed for the sides and Gavin crouched quickly to grab on, too. “Still dry?” he asked wryly when the rocking subsided.
“Still dry,” Mavis confirmed.
“Oars?” Gavin nodded approval when she lifted two for inspection. “Casting off.”
“Careful,” she said as he shoved off the dock with his feet, hands on either side of the boat. At his smooth transition from dock to boat, she groaned. “Cat.”
As they strayed from Zelda’s with the current, he remained standing long enough to peel the shirt from his shoulders before settling on the center seat and taking the oar Mavis offered. If he’d felt at home anywhere, ever, it was on the water. “Where to, Frexy?”
“Downstream,” she claimed, shifting so her back was to him. She positioned her oar across her lap before falling into the rhythm he set, dipping in and out. Without looking back, she alternated strokes. When he dipped port, she dipped starboard. The arm action was so deft and intentional, he no longer had to wonder where her shoveling muscles hailed from.
The weather wasn’t just favorable, he realized as they set a course; it was gorgeous.
They paddled around a series of corkscrew bends. The gentle laps of sun and exercise and the sound of the water sluicing around them...even the tug of tidal resistance against his oar relaxed him. The quiet call of small birds and the shouts from people along the river’s grassy bank helped erase the pounding in his head. He and Mavis fell into a companionable, working silence as they explored the river’s snakelike parameters.
The river widened; the current quickened. Gavin caught the white flash of a shiny mullet as it made its oxygen-seeking leap from the depths. Prometheus barked at it. He barked louder at the reedlike motion on the shore from an unfazed heron.
“Osprey,” Mavis cried out, stopping her oar long enough to grab the lid of her hat and jut her nose to the sky. “See it?”
Gavin could make out the shadow and predatory glide of the large river hawk near the tops of the trees. “Affirmative.”
“I think I see its nest,” she
said, dipping her oar to port to bring them closer. “Up there. Top of that bald tree.”
Gavin squinted. Osprey nests were high, large and normally easy to spot if you knew where to look. He shook his head, unable to see it for the backdrop of other trees. He fell back into rhythm with Mavis and shook off the puff of gloom.
Not today, he thought. There wasn’t room enough in this boat, what with him and the dog. Gavin wouldn’t let it crowd its way between him and Mavis. Somehow she’d known he needed this today. She always seemed to know exactly what he needed. That was the miracle of her.
Mate. Miracle. He doubted she’d go for either classification so he did his best to stop thinking. Onward. Onward was better than the way he’d come. And it was the first time in months he had admitted as much.
Hell. She was part of that, too, wasn’t she?
Mavis. It was Mavis at every turn. Sunk, he mused, dipping his paddle deeper as the current picked up and the river stretched. Sink. Sank. Sunk. Like an old B-24 in blue Adriatic water covered from tip to tail in rust and barnacles.
It was a good thing he liked water.
The sun picked up on the chain of freckles on Mavis’s neck and shoulders. Her arms. He could lean forward and lay his mouth over each dot, draw lines between, map her out until he knew precisely what her constellation would add up to. Andromeda? Aquila? Cassiopeia?
Gavin felt a cool kiss around his ankles. His oar stilled over the river’s surface when he glanced down. “Uh...we’re leaking.”
Mavis looked back at the water gathering at the bottom of the boat. “Oh, that. We’re nearly there. We’ll dump it once we hit land. The canoe should be good for the paddle back.”
Gavin swiveled his head to the left and right, combing the trees.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Looking for Dilbert,” he said.
Mavis chuckled in that hummingbird way that went straight to his blood. “Row, Nemo, row.”
The murkiness started to bleed from the river and the scent of marsh hit Gavin’s nose. Soon, the river would funnel into Weeks Bay. Beyond that, it would thread like a needle into the mouth of Bon Secour before meeting Mobile Bay and, beyond Fort Morgan and the barrier islands, Gulf waves.
Mavis chose to disembark before they found the river’s end. She steered to a sandy spot on the starboard bank. The boat bumped ashore. Prometheus took his leave first, leaping over the canoe’s port side, drenching Gavin in the process. He gave a startled laugh when the mongrel arced like a noisy porpoise in and out of the water.
“Don’t let your shirt get too wet,” Mavis pointed out. She’d tossed her oar onto the sand and tucked a small basket under one arm.
Gavin frowned at the T-shirt he’d hung across the bench. Lifting it, he saw that the tails were already damp.
“We’ll hang it,” she said, grabbing it by the neck.
Gavin stood to take her arm as she threw one leg over the bow. When both her feet had touched down on the grass-and sand-strewn turf, he reached up to adjust the hat on her head, keeping her shaded. Her eyes met his briefly before she moved off to drape his shirt over a fallen tree.
“Where’d the mutt go?” Gavin wondered, trying to find Prometheus among the thatch of undergrowth encroaching on their beach.
“Marking trees. Chasing snakes...” She spread a towel on the flattest patch of ground. “Whatever it is menfolk do when they make camp.” Setting the basket in the center of the towel, she returned to the boat. “Let’s flip it. It can dry while we eat.”
“You brought breakfast.”
“It’s more brunch at this point.” Mavis grunted as she yanked the canoe deeper into shore.
“I’ve got this,” Gavin said, nudging her aside so he could heft the boat and upend it over his head.
She sighed as he walked the canoe to shore. “Brute male strength is so irritating.”
“Chalk it up to my long list of faults.” He set the boat on a bed of dry leaves, hoping it would drain properly. “No discernable holes,” he said, tipping his sunglasses up to check the hull.
“There’s a crack,” Mavis claimed. “Just a sliver. I fix it, but the patch never holds.”
“She’s yours?” he asked of the canoe.
“Kyle and I are both water signs, for a reason. He lives for a sail,” she said, picking up the discarded oars. “I live for a good paddle.”
He ran his tongue over his teeth and looked pointedly away from the oars. “I’m trying to figure out what you’re wearing under that shirt.”
Her scoff didn’t ring true. “Try cooling off instead.”
Gavin was going to have to, at this rate. The fresh air and exertion had helped him leave what he’d seen behind closed eyes in his curtained room at Zelda’s. Now here they were, just the three of them. No river houses in sight. No boats. A long towel spread between them.
Gavin took off his sunglasses, tossed them onto the basket. Before she’d finished laying the oars against the canoe’s hull, he was knee-deep in river. Without much of a thought, he pushed off the silty bottom with his feet and dived all the way under.
* * *
MAVIS WASN’T WORRIED. Why should she be? SEALs could hold their breath for an ungodly amount of time. As she opened the basket to arrange its contents on the towel, the seconds ticked by on the inside of her head, growing louder.
She wasn’t going to wring her hands over him. Gavin was an excellent swimmer. At the farm, as boys, he and Kyle had swum often—Kyle more leisurely and focused; Gavin restless and pacing, like a shark.
The idiots. She used to despise their games. Who could tread water the longest? Who could sit on the bottom of the pond the longest? There were times she thought their heads would never break the surface again. One time when she nearly dived in to save them, they’d come up laughing, making her realize that the game had changed and they’d been counting to see how long it would take her to come in after them.
She stopped following them to the pond after that.
Gavin’s head popped up near the other bank, spraying mist. Mavis set the glass in her hand down before she could lob it at him.
Slowly, he swam back. First freestyle. Then he flipped over and paddled backward. As he swam closer, turning over again, her fingers loosened around the glass.
She hadn’t seen him relaxed since he’d been back. Not completely. The edge was always there, relentless even when calm took hold. She’d memorized how it wormed along his taut jaw and wove itself in invisible streams at the creases of his eyes. Shadows, too. His was a face full of shadows.
Not now. Repose had taken hold and for the first time in a decade, Mavis saw the old Gavin. The young Gavin.
She swallowed. Her heart knelled against her breastbone, rocking and ringing as if to proclaim itself out loud.
Stupid, she thought, and went back to prepping brunch. This path she’d somehow chosen toward him. Stupid, Mavis. She’d told herself she would be his friend, that she was ready to be his confidante, his buffer.
Colliding headlong with him as she had three days ago on the porch...it was foolish and dangerous and so not what he needed.
Not that she’d planned this. What kind of a hot mess could’ve planned this? He was Gavin. She was Mavis. It didn’t matter what life had wrought for either of them. It didn’t matter that they seemed to understand each other on an existential plane...
Somehow, her fate seemed tied to his in an irrevocable manner that was both frightening and irreversible. She wasn’t scared of what went on inside his head. She wasn’t scared of where the journey might take them.
She was scared, however, that she could see fighting his battles beside him long into the future. She was scared that she wanted that—to be beside him.
He was a runner. He never stayed in one place. Always moving. Always roving. Swim or die, he seemed to say every time
he moved on.
It was an act of survival. It was as ingrained in him as the mystery of all of it. Even as she embraced it as part and parcel of who he was, she admitted that it might be the one thing about Gavin that terrified her most.
Prometheus cut through the undergrowth, tongue lolling playfully, panting. Mavis silently thanked him for cutting through the fabric of her thoughts and tossed him a Milk-Bone. He yanked it out of the air with his teeth, making quick work of the snack. Mavis ran her finger through the clean water she’d poured into his water bowl next to the towel, pleased when he moved to it to freshen his palate.
His fur was warm from the sun when she ruffled it above his collar. Fingers sinking in, she lowered her cheek to the flat top of his head when he came up for air, answering the touch by pushing lovingly against it. “You’re with me,” she murmured. She hated the ache inside her. She hated how it made her question—everything. “Right?”
Sitting back on her heels, she braced herself as Gavin stood. The river sluiced off him, a glossy coat. It tuned her in further to his potency. Muscle and bone didn’t so much cohabitate, as each fought for ground, bringing his struggles to the surface. The survivor—warrior Gavin—was there in rippling arms, pectorals, abdominals. His thick quads were outlined by his buff-colored trunks pasted wet against his skin. She couldn’t even look near his waist where his distinct V-cut was on parade.
Embattled Gavin—haunted Gavin—was there, too, and it was loud in the strain of his rib cage and the knots of his collarbone and high shoulders.
As he splashed to shore, he ran his hand over his face, then back and forth over the crown of his shorn head. Mavis’s attention snagged on the fangs of the wolf. The wildness of it, the primal nature...it suited.
He wasn’t tame. He snarled. He spooked. He made the hairs on the back of her neck stand sharply on end. He was a wild thing that appealed to everything offbeat inside her. He made her answer in places she didn’t normally have to think about on a regular basis. She chastised herself and nearly thought better of the gesture she’d brought him here to make. Frowning, she lifted the hot foil-lined packet between her hands as his wet feet dredged into the sand. “Here.”
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