“Sure. Although, they’re great kids. Of course I’m going to love them.”
“Darla just acted like having kids was the worst thing. It reminded me that I needed to thank you for being kind about it. She…just went on about how kids were such a drag and how she was never going to have any, and she asked about their mother and whether we shared custody and all that.”
“What’d you say to that?” Summer said with a laugh.
“I changed the subject. I didn’t want to go into all that, because it’s kinda complicated. Yes, she died. Then everybody gives me pity, then I feel guilty because I don’t feel bad about it necessarily other than that my children lost their mom, which is hard to explain and I didn’t want to talk about my personal life with Darla.”
“Well, that makes me kind of happy. That you don’t seem to have a problem talking about that with me.”
“I told you. I feel comfortable with you, in a way that I don’t feel with anyone else.”
They started out along the street, then he pulled out onto the highway, intending to take her to the waterfall outside of town. It was a pretty place that he didn’t visit nearly enough, and for some reason, he wanted to share it with Summer.
He had thought about it when he was taking Darla around, but for some reason, he didn’t want to be there with her. Maybe because he had never been there with Summer. Whatever it was, he had just had such an urge to go with Summer that he could hardly wait to get her there.
“Where are we going anyway?” Summer asked, looking around as they drove outside of town in the opposite direction of the farm. She probably was confused.
“I was showing Darla around town, and I thought of the falls. I didn’t want to take her there, and somehow all I could think about was getting you there with me.”
“Really?” she asked, looking a little charmed, when he really hadn’t meant to be charming. He just was being honest.
“Really.” He didn’t have any of the words. But he didn’t seem to need them. She seemed happy, and her eyes glowed as she glanced at him, and then the falls came into view.
There was a short walk to get to the larger falls off the road, and he parked the truck in the designated area.
“Can we hold hands?” he asked as he walked around the truck and opened her door.
“That doesn’t count as touching, does it?” she said as she hopped out, and he shut the door.
“I don’t think so,” he said, holding his hand out and watching as she slipped her fingers into his.
It felt good and right, not like the way it had felt when Darla had put her hand on his knee. He wanted to pull Summer closer, though, and he figured that holding hands was probably nota good idea either. But he wanted to have that connection. After the unstable morning that they’d had, which had been all his fault.
He shouldn’t have put himself in a position where Darla could reach over and touch him, and he shouldn’t have been afraid to move away from her hand, which would have given her the message that he didn’t want her touch.
It would have been the thoughtful thing to do for Summer, and she would have been justified in her argument with her friend. Instead, he sat there and allowed Darla to do what she wanted, because he hadn’t wanted to offend her.
He wished he could go back and do it over again, but he could learn from that, and not allow that type of thing to happen ever again, whether Summer was there to see it or not.
The trail was not difficult, and they moseyed back away from the road, from the little falls, and headed to the larger falls. There was an area set up where they could stand close to the falls and feel the water come down.
There was also a swimming hole at the bottom, but it was a little chilly for that.
“This is beautiful any time of year,” Summer said, talking a little louder to be heard over the roar of the water. It wasn’t a powerful waterfall, like a river, but it was still loud enough that talking softly was impossible.
“I agree. I’ve always loved coming here, and I haven’t done it nearly enough. I don’t even know if I’ve brought my kids here in the last year.” Actually, he figured it had been several years since the kids and he had visited this, and considering how much they enjoyed seeing the falls and swimming in the swimming hole at the bottom over the summer, he couldn’t believe he hadn’t done it, except… His life had been a little upside down.
“I think you can be excused from that,” Summer said, almost as though she had read his mind.
“I’d like to make up for those things. But you can’t ever get the time back, you know?”
“I know. I have a few things I’d love to be able to go back and redo, but I can’t.”
“Like what?” he asked, sitting down on the bench and keeping a hold of her hand as she sat down beside him, their clasped hands resting between them.
“Like today. I wish I could have looked at that and known immediately that it wasn’t what it seemed. I wish I could have said that confidently to Sunny and just trusted in your integrity.”
“You don’t know me that well. It’s perfectly okay for you to question what you see, when you have no idea the depths of my character.”
