“Here is living, there, the city, is existing, don’t you think?”
“Then you should move out here if you don’t have to work. Spend your days surfing and whatever else you like.”
“I’d love to but there are things holding me to the city. Especially now.” He reaches across and takes my hand, and we sit in the strange peace we create, silently.
* * *
The nearby national park is a true desert, the ancient rock structures rising from the sand and towering above. I’d seen pictures but never realised how many of the jagged pillars were here, there’re thousands stretching across the desert. Amongst them, weathered low rocks with rounded tops look uncomfortably like tombstones. Alone in the eerie landscape, I wander with Guy through the taller rocks, gripping his hand.
We head to the lookout point, Guy eager to show me the sun drop behind the weathered spires. Sunset happens quickly in this part of the world, a sudden drop of the sun throws the world into darkness within minutes. Here, that darkness is preceded by a spectacular array of sunset colours, the rocks lit in front of a backdrop of burnt orange and deep red.
Lost in the beauty of the scene in front of me, I rest against the bonnet of the Jeep, barely noticing Guy’s arm around my waist.
“Now we sneak away to find the stars,” he says, drawing me closer.
We drive slowly into the shadows, and Guy cuts the engine. For a moment, I stare at the stars emerging from the dying sunset and soon they’re streaming above the alien landscape. The Martian feel to the place leaves me unsure if I’ll be able to breathe when I leave the car.
The door closes as Guy climbs out, breaking my reverie. I follow and the humid air filled with the scent of the sandy earth is breathable after all.
“Climb on the roof,” suggests Guy.
“The roof?”
“Yeah.” He clambers up and hangs his legs in front of the windscreen, holding a hand out. I join him, the warm metal sticking to my bare legs.
On the roof, we’re not much closer to the stars but surrounded by a canopy dropping to the ground behind the stones. Guy draws his knees to his chest.
“And here we have ‘how to feel insignificant 101’,” he says.
The purple and blue of the Milky Way leads a pathway through the night sky, bright and surreal; they rise behind the tall rock formation adding to the sensation of sitting on another planet. I tip my head back and the bright stars above fill the darkness and dizzy me.
“You’re quiet,” says Guy.
“I’ve never seen anything so beautiful,” I whisper. “I can’t believe this is so close to where I live.”
“Technically, what you’re looking at is light years away.”
I elbow him. “You know what I mean.”
Guy wraps an arm around my shoulder and I shuffle across the roof so he can hold me closer. “How incredibly sad that something so beautiful shines the brightest just before it dies,” he says. “Some of the stars are long gone, with the light from their death just reaching us.”
“Don’t say that.” The stars appear to swarm across the sky and I focus, wishing for a shooting star. “The stars aren’t all dead.”
“New stars are born all the time, there’ll be many burning at this moment that we can’t see yet because their light hasn’t had time to reach us.” He laughs softly. “I tell you to forget the past and we’re looking straight at it.”
“Stop analysing what could be a romantic moment,” I say with a sigh.
“Out here we’re alone, kissing under the light of thousands of stars.” He tips my face toward him and places a gentle kiss on my mouth. “In a world where I’m disconnected from everything but you. Is that romantic?”
“Better.” I touch his lips then look around. “We could be on Mars.”
“We could, but I’d rather not.”
I pull away and lie back attempting to make out the constellations around. “You’re right, I do feel disconnected. Looking at what’s out there we know nothing about is overwhelming.”
“Why are you afraid?” asks Guy as he lies next to me, staring upward too.
“I’m not afraid.”
“We’re both afraid of life and what it has to offer when really we should just ‘be’ together.”
I twist my head to him. “But you do that. You live for today.”
Guy continues to look upward and takes hold of my hand. “Todays like this, yes. Other days, I’m afraid. I worry that I’ve made another bad decision.”
“What about?”
“Lots of things.”
I squeeze his hand. “Can we stay with the stars?”
“If tomorrow we can watch the fire of a new dawn.” Guy says the words quietly, as if talking to himself.
“Of course.”
Rolling onto his side, Guy looks down, shielding me against the sky. “Do I make you feel like living?”
“What a strange question.”
“Since the night I met you, you’ve never mentioned what you almost did. I think you’re better now, not cured, but better. What’s changed?”
“Medication?” I suggest.
“Acceptance?”
“Of what?”
“That destruction and loss aren’t inevitable.”
“Why are you always so serious in the dark?” I whisper and touch his cheek.
“Because you can’t see me properly.”
“I think I see more of you than you realise.”
He looks away and doesn’t respond for a few moments. “I like that you’re living. Really living, like I told you was possible.”
“I don’t want to think about that night, Guy.” I reach out and curl my fingers into his hair. “But I’m glad you were there.”
“I would say I’m glad you were there too, but that would sound wrong.” My skin tingles where he gently traces my features with his fingers, like a blind man memorising the contours of his lover’s face. “I think I was afraid to live too, until recently.”
“Because you’ll be in pain soon?”
“No, because I don’t know what the future holds.”
We fall silent, and I attempt to make out his features in the growing darkness. “Do you want to talk about this?”
“No. Sorry. I’ve no idea why I mentioned anything. Ruining the moment, huh?”
I shift closer, holding my mouth close to his. “Kiss me.”
“I will kiss you for as long as the stars shine,” he whispers. Guy pulls me close and steadies himself as he slips against the roof.
I giggle. “Or as long as we don’t fall off the top of the car.”
“Phe, Phe, Phe,” he says with a sigh. “The girl who’s good for me.” He pulls me onto him, so I’m looking down, hair sweeping his face. The land around is silent, the only sound our breathing. Guy’s chest rises and falls against mine as I balance on his hard body.
“We could be the last people in this Martian world,” I whisper.
He holds my hair from my face and covers my face and mouth with kisses. “I think we probably are.”
“Just me and some Guy, in our world of stars.”
“You’re happy?” he asks.
“Are you?”
“Spectacularly.”
We kiss beneath the Milky Way, under the stars burning bright, their frozen moment in time shared with us. The stars’ past illuminates our present, and have already lived in a future we may never see.
* * *
The campsite is quiet and dark when the Jeep rolls to the locked gates. We hop out and Guy takes my hand, leading us to the tent. Guy flicks on an electric lamp hanging in the centre of the tent then sits on one of the sleeping bags.
“Are you sure you don’t want to sleep outside?” he asks.
“Very funny.”
“Getting naked then?”
Guy drags his t-shirt off and pats the sleeping bag next to him. What else did I expect sharing a tent with him? Sex is part of our deal, and I have no complaints about how good we a
re together, but the intensity of his lovemaking sometimes worries me. Each time, I’m aware we’re drawn tighter together and I’m frightened I’ll not be able to let him go. Am I fooling myself already that I can untangle myself from Guy?
“Don’t you feel as if you’re floating in the world after looking at the stars?” he asks. “I do. I want to touch reality – you – and ground myself back on Earth. Does that sound strange?”
“A little.” I sit with him and run my fingers along his chest; smoothing my hands across his shoulders.
“Was I too intense? I think I had a bit of an existentialist moment back there,” he says with a laugh. “Kiss me.”
I move closer, and we kiss in a way becoming too familiar, Guy’s gentleness and understanding pouring from his lips. As usual, he backs this up with something purely sexual and absolutely male.
“Do you know why sex when you’re camping is great?” he asks.
“Enlighten me.”
“Because it’s fucking in tents.”
I smack him in the chest and he laughs, catching my arms. Guy holds my arms out of the way as he tugs at my t-shirt, whispering what he’s going to do as soon as I take my clothes off and how if I don’t remove them, he will. My ability to resist anything Guy ever suggests is poor.
Guy’s correct; as always, sex with him is intense. Each time he takes a little more of my soul when his body melds with mine, as if we’re reconnecting with something once lost. Guy’s use of the word fucking plays in my mind afterwards; is this what he’s really doing? Perhaps Guy can deny what’s happening and finds closing off his feelings easier than I do.
Later, as I doze in his arms, Guy shifts away. “I’ll be right back.”
His loss of body heat hits and I snuggle further into the sleeping bag, against the hard ground, as I tug the smooth material up to my nose. I’m drowsy when the tent zips closed a few minutes later, at the point between sleeping and waking when moving is too much effort.
“Phe?”
I don’t reply. Guy shuffles around and then his warm body settles next to mine. He strokes my hair then kisses my forehead, impossibly sweet when that’s the last thing he was ten minutes ago.
“Bad decisions,” he says in a low voice. Who is he talking to? Me or himself? Guy shifts again and I hear him sigh, the comfort of his body against mine lost as he lies away from me.
We say so much to each other yet so little, on the edge of each other’s lives. He tells me I’m his, but I don’t think he’s mine.
Chapter Nineteen
We sit at the table outside the cafe where we first met. Technically, the second time. Each time we come here, whoever arrives first selects this table. Less than two months and we have our own place. What next? A song? Pet names?
Guy’s in one of his distracted moods, the days he isn’t tactile. I’m learning that he’s one extreme to another. Quiet and introspective, a force field around himself, or open and gregarious, sweeping everyone into his enthusiasm. I take these mood changes in my stride, understanding his desire to keep things hidden from others.
The morning after the star gazing, Guy wasn’t around when I woke, and he returned half an hour later from a beach walk. He was back to his bright cheerful self and no longer the serious man in the dark. Guy chatted about our trip to the Pinnacles and after a quick breakfast, we packed up and went home.
This is the first time we’ve seen each other since, and even though I was busy at work and tired, I couldn’t figure out if this week’s absence is deliberate. His current mood isn’t helping. Guy plays with the edge of his watch and when the meeting descends into conversations about the weather, I decide to push.
“How are you, Guy? You’re quiet.”
“What do we do next?” He lifts his eyes to mine.
“I don’t know, I... Where do you want this to go?”
“No, on the list, Phe.” He frowns. “Why? Are you worried about this between us?”
“No, should I be?”
“You know why. Because I’ll be gone soon.”
I shift in my seat and glance at the couple behind Guy, holding hands, heads together sharing a joke. The elephant in the room is about to trample everything.
“That’s for me to deal with,” I say stiffly. “But this is a shadow I don’t want over us. Over you.”
He lifts a hand to push hair from his face that’s no longer there, a habit that’s hard to kill, then sips on his coffee instead. I pray he’s not going to start a conversation about the negative again.
“Can I choose the next item on the lists?” he asks.
“You chose last time.”
“Fine. You choose. There aren’t many we can still do locally so we should start our plans to go away.”
I nod, not only are we stepping further into each other’s lives, but out of the world we’re in.
“I’m curious why so many things on your list are ordinary,” he says. “I’d expect you to have more imagination.”
“They may be ordinary to you, but there’re things on the list that are a huge step outside of the ordinary for me,” I retort.
“Not just because this way you’re sure you’ll achieve them all?”
I sit back and cross my arms. “What about surfing?”
“Easy.”
“For you.”
“Easy to achieve, I can teach you less than half an hour from where you live, hardly a big ticket item.”
Images of myself in the water trigger the anxiety, in turn pushing irritation with Guy’s dismissal of something huge to me. “Just because you already surf! Surfing can still be a big deal to someone else! I don’t mock your list items!”
“Sorry.” Guy’s long fingers curl around my hand and he squeezes.
We sit in silence for a few moments, Guy’s hand circling mine. I stare at the coffee rings on the table, at my hands, at the people around. Anywhere but at him.
“It’s the water, isn’t it, Ophelia?” he asks. “You don’t like water. I noticed at the beach.”
“I can swim.”
“But you don’t want to?”
I pull my hand from under his and sit on my hands. “Because of what happened to me. My family drowned and I nearly did, remember?”
“Right.”
I look up at him, shocked at his nonchalance. “Did you hear what I said?”
“Your family drowned and you nearly did, so naturally you’re scared of going underwater. You told me before. I get it.”
“You ‘get it’. Don’t you think this is a big deal to me?”
“Phe, people poke and prod at others to spill their thoughts and fears. If you wanted to talk about this, you would, I’m not asking you to.”
“But you’re so cold about what’s so difficult for me to talk about!”
“What do you want me to say? I’m sorry for your loss? Well done on getting out? Phe, if you want to talk to somebody about what happened, I’ll listen.”
Each word he says pushes my anxiety higher, anger building that he doesn’t care. “Wow. Thanks.” I stand. “I have to get back to work.”
Guy doesn’t move or attempt to touch me and before he can respond, I storm away.
Usually when memories of the day the water stole my family emerge,I'm dragged back and prepared for the inevitable nightmares. Today the thoughts are funnelled into anger instead. I didn’t want platitudes or concerned looks, but I didn’t expect him to be this dismissive over the fear the situation causes.
* * *
Guy’s reaction circles my mind for the rest of the afternoon, dragging my thoughts back to the bordering argument every time there’s a lull in my work. I question my decision to allow him close, to want him and all the doubts over whether this relationship should go ahead. Then I worry I’m overreacting; but when the fear is triggered, it sweeps logic away.
The cloud of frustration hangs over me the whole way home on the bus, my patience with being jostled by strangers leading me to growling at them.
&nbs
p; This is bad. I’m bothered by what Guys says and does. Really bad. Head bowed against the possibility of eye contact with anybody, I step off the bus.
Guy waits at the bus stop, beneath the metal roof, a bunch of pink flowers in his hand. I stop dead and step out of the way of the flow of bodies.
“Flowers on special offer again, were they?” I ask snidely. “Looking for a random girl to give them to?”
“No. I bought them for you. I want to explain.”
A young woman throws me a curious look as she passes, then lingers her gaze on Guy before looking back to me and raising an eyebrow.
“About what?”
“Why I reacted like I did to what you told me.”
The bus door hisses closed behind me and the smell of diesel accompanies the bus’s departure. Guy holds the flowers out to me. “Don’t throw them off a cliff this time.”
The cellophane crinkles as I take hold of the pink roses. His half-smile pisses me off. “I didn’t throw them. I kicked them.”
Guy steps forward, placing his fingers lightly on my cheek. “Sorry, Phe. I don’t want to upset you.”
His concern is genuine; his gesture an apology made in front of giggling school kids and amused looks from passersby. Why do this in public?
“Come back to mine and talk,” I say.
He scrunches his nose. “Am I welcome? Jen thinks I’m a psycho.”
“She does not!”
“I heard her say that!”
“I don’t care what she thinks.”
Guy wraps an arm around my shoulders as we set off to my place. “That’s an improvement for you. You care what everybody thinks.”
I could retort that I don’t, but he’s correct. Or he was.
The house echoes as I close the door.
“I tell you what, I’ll cook. A peace offering,” he says.
I rub my head in confusion, at his barrelling in and taking over my evening when I’m still pissed off with him. “You don’t need to do that. I invited you in to talk.”
“We can talk too. I want to take care of you. You worked and I didn’t do anything today apart from piss you off.”
Take care of me? I indicate the rainbow of stains on his fingertips. “You painted today.”
The Same Deep Water Page 12