“Have a good night,” I call after them.
“You, too.” Junie grins and does her best attempt at a wink. It bears a closer resemblance to an owllike blink, and I laugh even though I’m blushing like crazy.
Can everyone tell I’m crushing on Ian?
Not hard, nothing I can’t control, but still, it’s there. I wonder what it’ll be like announcing our engagement to the group. Waiting until after Cassie’s wedding was my idea, my little escape hatch in case something goes wrong. I don’t expect it to, but it’s not like I have much experience planning a marriage of convenience.
I jog back to the gym and swing through the doors, careful to lock them behind me. As I scan the fitness room, I spot Ian over by the free weights using a bottle of pink disinfectant to wipe down the equipment.
“Thanks for saving me,” I say as I join him next to the weight rack. “You don’t have to stay and clean up.”
“I want to.” He smiles and re-racks a dumbbell that required both hands and significant sweat for me to lift. He manages one-handed. “Besides, there’s not that much to do.”
I bend down and start rolling up a yoga mat, conscious of his eyes on me. “You were fantastic,” I tell him. “Super-patient, and I loved how clear your directions were.”
“They were a great group.” He racks the last dumbbell, then drops to a crouch to help me with the yoga mats. “Is it just me, or does Aidan have the hots for Junie?”
“It’s not just you,” I say. “She and I have had a lot of talks about it. She’s making up her mind how she feels.”
“You think that’ll be in the cards for them?” he asks. “Dating, marriage, kids, that kind of thing?”
I know he’s not asking out of ignorance. Forty years ago it was unheard of for people with Down Syndrome to have those things, but Ian knows better than most how perceptions have changed.
“I hope so,” I say carefully. “People with Down Syndrome have the same need for love and affection and companionship as everyone else.”
I let the words hang there a moment, wondering if he noticed I slipped “love” into that list. Even if he doesn’t see it as a vital part of marriage, he has to know it’s a basic human need.
He doesn’t react. Not to the love thing, anyway.
“I’m happy for them,” he says with a genuineness that makes my heart ache. “Everyone deserves those things.”
So do you, Ian.
The words are on the tip of my tongue, but I stop myself. Will he someday come back to the idea of true love being in the cards for him? Part of me hopes so, but then I feel guilty. We’ve promised to keep love out of the equation, and there I go floating it out there like a big bubble of hope.
“Seriously though, you were amazing with them,” I say, steering the conversation back to neutral turf. “I’ve done so many community outings like this where people patronize or condescend and talk to them like little kids,” I say as I stow an exercise mat in one of the cubbies. “Either that or they go the opposite way and assume everyone knows right from left or basic spatial things we all take for granted. I love that you struck the perfect balance.”
He doesn’t say anything right away. Just wipes a machine I’m pretty sure is clean by now. When he speaks, his voice is gravelly. “I miss him so much.”
I don’t need to ask who he means. I rest a hand on his shoulder, aching for him. “Shane was one of a kind.”
“I forget sometimes.” He turns to face me, and the anguish in his eyes takes my breath away. “I’ll push him out of my mind and I’ll be going along with my life and all of a sudden it hits me like a sack of rocks to the gut. And I hate that. I hate feeling that way.”
“I know.” My eyes are stinging, and I turn away so he won’t notice. No point making him feel worse. “I know how much you loved him.”
“That’s what I mean,” he says softly, folding me into his arms from behind. I lean back against his chest and close my eyes. “Love sucks,” he says. “Love is pain and hurt and loss and disappointment, and I can’t do that again. That’s why.”
I nod and swallow back the lump in my throat, grateful he can’t see my face right now. “Understood.”
And I do understand. But?—
“Ian, did you ever think—think that maybe you can’t always control it? That maybe you don’t always get a say in whether you love someone or not?” My voice barely shakes, and I’m proud of myself for getting the words out. “Sometimes it just happens.”
He doesn’t say anything right away, so I steel myself to turn and face him. When I do, his eyes are haunted. What is he thinking? Did he hear that as cautionary advice, as a warning that I’m at risk of falling?
“I can control it,” he says softly. “I’ve spent the last decade making sure of that. Making sure it can’t happen again.”
The graveness in his expression makes my chest ache. He means it. He believes every word he’s saying. And yet?—
