Before Him

“Do you?”

“Maybe the better question might be whether I believe in love at first connection. Because I do, right here with you.” I can’t explain what this feels like, just that it feels huge. Like I’ve been drawn to her, like I would’ve found her wherever she was. And now we’re standing on a precipice, hand in hand, and the beauty is right there before us. All we have to do is take the plunge. Maybe that’s why it’s called falling in love because it’s impossible to resist, and it all happens so fast, it’s impossible to do anything but . . . let go.

Her small smile lights me up inside like a flame before something contradictory flickers over her face. “This is crazy. We can’t get married for only one night. What about tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow, we’ll still be married. I can’t see anything wrong with that.” I begin to hum along with the vaguely familiar bluesy doo-wop tune from the wine bar. Words about being blind to the sky and having eyes for only one girl.

Can relate. I mean, is it even dark out right now?

“You’re smiling.”

“Who wouldn’t smile at The Flamingos?” she says, ducking her chin to hide it anyway. I guess my expression must show my confusion as she adds, “The song.” She whisper-sings the next line. “I Only Have Eyes for You.”

Right?

“It’s one of my nana’s favourite songs.” There she goes, hiding her smile again.

“The gin rickey drinker?” My finger at her chin, I lift her gaze to mine. “I reckon that must be a sign.”

That her laughter isn’t a denial feels like a tiny explosion in my chest. I wrap my arms around her and pull her closer so she can’t see what her reaction does to me.

“A sign I should give up gin rickey’s for champagne?”

“A sign that this was meant to be.”

And with that declaration, I begin to twirl her around the pavement.

11

Roman

Present

UNPLEASANT REALITIES

I wake and almost hit my head on what I belatedly realise is the roof. My heart is beating out of my chest thanks to this lurch from sleep and an impending sense that I’m missing something.

“Fuck.” I rake both hands through my hair and do the goldilocks thing. Whose bed am I? Then I realise I’m in a rental rather than the usual hotel room, but none of that is the cause of my heart working to the beat of a death metal tune.

The coffee shop. Kennedy. The kid.

At the risk of sounding like a bad karaoke ballad, it’s all coming back to me.

Fuck, the time!

Flinging off the sheet, I dive for my phone, and I blow out a steadying breath. It’s just gone nine, and Kennedy said she’d meet me here at ten. At least, I guess she’s coming here. Unless she and the kid have skipped town. I push the thought away as unlikely. Yesterday was obviously a shock to her too, but she was pretty formidable in the face of, well, me.

Pretty and formidable and in my face? Jesus, I need coffee. I feel like shit, but that’s hardly surprising considering sleep was elusive for much of the night. Then, when I finally did drop off, I fell into a pit of vivid dreams. Dreams of Kennedy. Of Vegas. Of that night, from proposal to consummation. Of how we’d ended up outside a dive bar off the Strip. I knew I’d have no problem securing service, even with her lost fake ID, because I’d already been there the day before. I’d struck up a conversation with the guy behind the bar when I’d found out they were stocking Riposo Estate labels. Wine from my family’s winery back in Aus.

But even with that knowledge, we never made it inside because I was reluctant to share her attention with anyone else because . . . because I wanted her like I’d wanted nothing else. Before or since. I don’t just mean I wanted to know what she’d feel like under me or how she’d taste because I wanted to turn her inside out. Inside out and upside down, I wanted to know her in the ways and places she didn’t ordinarily show. The private side of her. So that’s where my dreams had led me last night. Not exactly the dreams of the righteous but definitely of the amorous. At least, until I got lost in a fucking maze. I rub my hand down my face, halting mid yawn as I remember my dad was there—in the maze. I even remember what he said.

Lost, are you, son? Can you draw any parallels?

Dad speak for “pull your head out of your arse”, I guess.

I glance around a bedroom that’s little more crawl space than room. Loft space maybe? Whatever. Though the bed is king-sized, the roof line is low. I pretty much had to crawl across the wooden floor to get into bed.