The Same Deep Water (13 page)

****

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 are 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.

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.”

“I like to switch my mind off sometimes. Especially when people mention death.”

Guy’s expression freezes me in the moment; and with that, I let go of my anger, guilt worming its way in instead. “Oh. Crap. Sorry. I didn’t think the conversation might upset you too.”

He shakes his head. “No, I apologise for triggering whatever I did in you.” Guy opens a cupboard and drags out a packet of rice. “What do you have that will go with this?” When I don’t respond, he opens the fridge and pokes around inside as if he’s a resident. “Is this all your food?”

“A lot is. Jen’s spending more time with Cam recently.”

“Cute,” he remarks. “Poor guy.”

“That’s bitchy.”

He shrugs and sets a tub of sour cream on the counter. “I don’t like most people. They make my head hurt.”

“But you have friends, I’ve met them. Not many or often, but they exist.”

“Acquaintances. I prefer not to become attached to people.” He pulls out a kitchen chair. “Sit.”

Confused further, I do as he says and place the still packaged bouquet on the wooden table in front of me. Is he saying in a roundabout way he doesn’t want to become attached to me? One of our silences follows as I lose myself in those thoughts and he chops up vegetables.

“Most people,” he says after a few minutes, not turning.

“You’re confusing,” I say.

“I confuse myself on a daily basis.” Guy pulls another chair out and sits. “I don’t talk about myself and you don’t either. That’s why I didn’t respond earlier. I thought we were the same, that you didn’t want me to pry.”

“Do you want me to ask you questions?”

“Sometimes, but usually no. As I always say, I want to live for now and not dwell on the future. You need to do the same, but not dwell on the past.”

“You worry about the past too, Guy.”

He taps the table. “Too much. I like my present. Life’s been pretty cool since I met this girl on the edge of her life.”

“So we drop the serious?” I ask.

“Unless you want to talk about your family?”

“No.”

“No worries, so about the surfing...”

I stare. For a man who can be intuitive, he still holds the ability to surprise me with his crass disregard for my feelings. “Really, Guy?”

“If we’re not going to look backwards, let’s look forward. You have a fear of water. I want to help you face that. Come on, I jumped out of a plane and I’m terrified of heights!”

“I didn’t know that.”

Guy shrugs and returns to the steaming pan. “What’s the point in a bucket list filled with easy things? You’re challenging yourself in everything you have written.”

He’s looking at the list, re-pinned to the fridge by a magnet, partially obscured by flyers for the local pizza place.

“Not quite everything.”

“Hmm.”

The meal is joined by relaxed chatting about a new movie we want to see and I push him to tell me more about his experience skydiving. At the time, I never considered Guy could be frightened; there was no hint of nerves when he walked away from me across the field that afternoon.

We cuddle on the sofa, as I lie against Guy’s chest and he plays with my hair. Lost in a TV drama for half an hour, Guy surprises me when he speaks.

“This has changed. Us. We’re not just physical anymore.”

I look up at him. “Is that worrying you?”

“A little.” He touches my lips, and I spot the intense Guy returning. “Please don’t do it.”

“Do what?”

“Fall in love with me.”

I swallow, stomach tightening at his words. “I’m not. Won’t.”

“I care about you too much to let that happen. I don’t want to ruin us. I mean, I probably will anyway, but don’t help me.”

I take Guy’s hand. “Don’t do this.”
Don’t spoil this.
“Let’s make the most of our time.”

I shuffle around and place my hands on his chest, eager to quieten him with a kiss. “So we had an argument and that pushes us into the ‘normal couple’ realm; but we’re not, and I don’t expect us to be. Okay?”

“Okay.” The veil of seriousness drops from his eyes, a relief in his expression that unintentionally hurts.

I don’t expect us to be a normal couple, but the desire to edges in more each day. I wipe the thought from my mind with a kiss, throwing the inner fears and frustration into a fierce embrace until the thoughts are wiped and replaced by the physical lust I have for him. Denial is easier if the emotion is twisted into a different direction.