My Better Life

I let out a stunned laugh.

“Was it as good for you as it was for me?” He gives me a leering smirk and I laugh, shaking my head.

“I can’t say that I noticed your rod.”

“Oh. That hurts. That really hurts.”

I grin at him, then nod at the flower. “Let me take care of that. It has to cool.”

He nods, glowing with what I’d call happiness, if I had to name it.

I wonder for a moment, why can’t I just reach out and take happiness too? It’s right there in front of me. Except, in glassblowing, and in life, sometimes if you reach out without a thought for protecting yourself, you get burned.

I take care of clean-up and making sure everything is set while Gavin walks around the studio, studying me from the corner of his eye, keeping track of my movements. I feel his gaze on me, as soft as a morning kiss, the entire time.

When I’m done, he nods at the door. “We should head home for lunch.”

I bite my lip, hard, dissuading myself from kissing him. “Thank you for the flower. It’s the best present I could’ve ever asked for.”

“I’m not sure it’s all that nice looking, I was distracted by my instructor.”

“Really?”

He grabs my hand. “Yeah. I kept thinking about how much I loved her.”

I stop walking just short of the door. He looks down at me and raises his eyebrows. “What?”

That’s it.

I’m done fighting this.

Gavin wants to stay.

The kids want him to stay.

Even Gran wants him to stay.

And me, I want him too.

No, even more than that, I love him.

So, I’m going to reach out and try to break away from the past, like glass from the punty. And if I do it right, we won’t break, and neither of us will get burned.

Gavin said we should start over, we should believe that this is our first anniversary, so that’s what I’m going to do.

“What is it?” he asks again with a small smile on his face.

I shake my head. “I was just thinking, I feel the same.”

As we head out the door, I send up a prayer: please, please don’t let this shatter into a million pieces.