Here With Me

Relief mixes with the adrenaline in my veins, and I want to pull her against my chest and hold her. I want to slide my hand down the back of her head and feel her safe in my arms. I want to kiss her gently.

I guess I’m overreacting.

“You sure you’re not hurt?”

“I’m fine.” She nods. “But this is stuck.”

We walk around to look. The rim is in a muddy rut, and I trace her route a few paces until I find looks like a broken keg tap hidden in a clump of grass. Snatching it up, I carry it back and toss it in the bed of my truck.

“Found the culprit at least. Probably some kids threw it out.”

“Idiots.” Mindy grumbles, glancing at the jagged piece of metal.

“I don’t know if I can lift this thing.” I squat beside it thinking. I don’t have a spare tire, and I’m not sure Taron can help me. “Where were you headed? I can give you a ride.”

She sighs and pulls her bag over her shoulder. “Here.” She waves a hand toward the pond. “I was going to sit on the pier and do some sketching. I probably could’ve walked.”

We leave the vehicles in the field and walk slowly toward the old fishing pond. A pipe rises in the middle, aerating the water by spraying it in an arc over the surface.

“You’re going to sketch the fountain?”

“I had this image in my head of a boy with a fishing pole sitting on the bank…” Her voice drifts as she studies the scene. “He could be framed by peach tree branches and blossoms, like it’s his world…”

“That so?”

Clearing her throat, she shakes it away. “Or I don’t know. It’s probably a dumb idea.”

“I like it.” I think about fishing out here with my dad all the time as kid, and I think about the day I found her crying and alone, the day my life changed forever.

The day she put her hand in mine.

She pulls out the sketch pad and starts flipping pages. I catch glimpses of pencil drawings, but a few of the pages have color on them.

“Can I see that?” I reach forward to stop one of them before she flips it away fast.

“What?” Her brow furrows, and she turns back. “Oh…”

Her shoulders rise, and she tries to cover it again. I stop her. “Hang on, what is it?”

“Sawyer…” Her tone is pleading.

It’s a watercolor of a couple in a bed. They’re both dark-haired. The woman’s is long and flowing in waves around her shoulders. She’s lying on her back with the man above her, and her fingers are threaded in the side of his hair.

It’s so familiar, so much emotion is in their faces, their lips almost touching. It looks like us. I want to ask… but I see pink in her cheeks and change my mind.

“It’s really good.”

“Thank you.” She takes the sketchbook out of my hands and quickly closes the cover.

I want to hold her that way. I want her fingers in my hair, pulling me closer to her like she did in bed last night.

“You doing okay today? Sorry I had to take off this morning. You know. Harvest.”

“I know.”

She does know. She’s grown up in this world. A long time ago, I told her she could tell me anything… I think about telling her everything. I’m not sure how she’d take it, but I can guess she’d want to help. I’ve seen her at the nursing home with the old ladies.

Then she’d be trapped here, the same way I’m trapped.