Tim
It’s been four days since Nat and I had thatalmostmoment in the bathroom, and each one has been filled with palpable tension.Delicioustension.
The way she looks at me when she thinks I can’t see her…
It’s breaking me in the best way. Every time she looks away, I want to pull her face back,makeher meet my eyes…because if she does, I don’t think she could hide anymore. I don’t think she could stop herself from giving in to us any more than I could.
And today’s the day I kick things up another notch.
Nat always used to hate that she was four months older than me, but I never gave a shit, even when I was a kid. I can tell from the rueful smiles she gives me whenever I’ve wished her a happy birthday across the years that she’s still not crazy about it, and this morning was no exception. Still, I managed to start the day out right by giving her breakfast in bed, the way I’d always pictured doing if we were together. Of course, if things were different, I’d have woken up next to her, instead of in the spare room, and eased her awake with my tongue and fingers…
Not this birthday. Hopefully for her thirty second, though. Or, if I’m lucky,mythirty first.
Eleanor had to go to school, but she was full of excitement this morning. I think she prefers watching other people have their birthdays than having her own; she gets so excited watching people open their gifts, and if there’s one knack our daughterhas, it’s for buying perfect presents for people. The t-shirt with ‘I do all my own stunts’ printed on the front went down a treat, and she and her mother both cooed over the yarn and crochet hooks. I know nothing about wool, but Nat was thrilled with it all, and that was lovely to watch.
She’s already started making something, twisting the hook over and over in a way that looks impossibly complicated to me. I’ve got her set up on the bed, stacks of pillows behind her, and she’s wearing a long, loose button up dress to accommodate the casts. I need to stop thinking about lifting the hem with one finger, starting at the ankle and slowly moving up, because otherwise I’m not going to be able to focus on the rest of the day. And there’s some things I definitely want to make happen.
“Bye, Mum.” Giving her an enthusiastic smacker on the cheek, Eleanor looks up at me. “Any chance I could grab a couple of coins for the vending machine, please?” She gives me a fairly subtle wink. Clearly, she wants a private word.
“Have a good day, sweetheart,” Nat calls.
When we get to the front door, El holds out her hand with a sweet smile. Not just a pretext, then. “Alright,” I say with a faux sigh, and hand her a couple of pound coins.
“Thanks, Dad,” she says, giving me a brief, hard hug. “Check out what’s in the fridge,” she adds quietly, beaming and pleased with herself, before slipping out the front door.
With a sense of amused trepidation, I head to the kitchen, bursting out laughing when I open the fridge door. A punnet of rather luscious looking strawberries, a tub of whipping cream, and a good bottle of champagne wait patiently on the bottom shelf for the romance to kick off. I make a mental note to ask mydaughter exactlywhereshe managed to obtain alcohol, and head back upstairs.
I stop by the spare room and pick up the wrapped gift I have for Nat, full of heady anticipation.
My turn.
The smile she gives me when I walk in pulls an answering one from me. Given that her injuries are threatening the last thread of her career left to her - teaching children how to dance - she’s kept remarkably positive, not giving in to despair. “Where there’s a will, there’s a way,” she said to me when I gently approached the subject with her, and I know that she’ll fight for a full recovery. And if that doesn’t happen, she’ll find a way to stay in dancing. I’m not worried about her.
I hand her my present. “One more.” It’s large and flat, and my insides tingle at the thought of her opening it. I spent ages putting this together last night when we’d all gone to bed, and if anything, it ramped up my feelings for her even further to do it.
“Tim,” she scolds me lightly, “you’ve done enough. You really didn’t need to buy me a present as well.”
“Open it,” I order her quietly. Her eyes briefly flash with enjoyment at the order, and I store that away for later, but her attention quickly returns to opening the gift. Her face lights up in a way I haven’t seen in forever when the wrapping paper is off.
It’s a large photo frame filled with a collage of mementos of us. Just her and me. Things I kept and treasured over the years because they were all I had left of our relationship. A run of four photo booth photos, our younger selves pulling faces, laughing, and winding up kissing because we always did. Ticket stubs from a trip to the cinema for our first date, to seePaul.Notes we slipped each other in class, just silly little messages and after school plans; I kept almost all of them, and this is just a selection. A polaroid of us kneeling by her mother’s Christmas tree, looking so baby-faced and happy. A program cover from the time she danced the role of Kim in an amateur production ofEdward Scissorhands,and the five star review of her performance underneath, cut from the local newspaper. It was the role that got her the place in the Sadler’s Wells class. This, and a few other little things, were items I kept in a box and looked at endlessly, until last night. Now, they’re hers.
Starting right now, we can make some new memories, rather than living on the fragments of before.
“You…” She gapes at it, trying to take it all in. “That’s… Oh,Tim.” Her eyes are wet as she smiles. “It’sus.”
“All we were,” I agree, settling on the bed next to her and looking it over with fresh eyes now she’s seen it. “But not all we’re gonna be,” I mutter.
Her face jerks towards me, and I decide to back off. I’ve planted the seed. It’ll be good for it to sit there for a bit. “So, what do you want to do today? Birthday girl’s choice.”
It takes her a few moments to reply, and when she does, her voice is a little husky, clogged with emotion. “Um… Don’t you have to go to work?”
“No. I took the day off.” I was allowed some time off to look after her, but I’ve had to go in here and there to accommodate it. Today, however, I’ve booked as leave.
She visibly melts a little. “Oh. Thanks.” She casts around the room for ideas. “To be honest…I was planning on hunkeringdown with a box set. And I was going to ask you to bring some snacks up before you left. But since you’re not leaving…”
I grin, and hand her the remote. “Sounds perfect. What are we watching?”
She takes it, biting her lip.That’s my job. “Well, I actually haven’t seenRivalsyet, but we can watch something else - ”
