I raise an eyebrow at him. “Listen. I appreciate everything you’ve done and everything you’re doing. I know I freaked out earlier, and I can’t promise that I won’t freak out again because this is all still a lot for me. But I’m fine, Beck. Seriously. I’m not going to break, I’m not going to fall apart, so go.”
He has the decency to look a little chagrined. “I’m sorry, I’m doing it again, aren’t I? Pushing too far.”
I give him what I hope is a saucy smirk. “No, just hovering more than a helicopter parent.”
A soft chuckle escapes him. “Right. Okay, well, I’m your husband, not your daddy, so I’ll stop.”
Holy fuck.That might have been meant as a joke, but the air crackles between us at his casual words. I’ve never let myself think of Beckett in any sort of sexual way, but the innuendo that’s automatically layered into what he just said is undeniable, even if unintentional.
Beckett clears his throat, and yet again, his cheeks are rosy underneath the stubble he’s got going on.
“Is this the part where I say have a nice day at work, dear?” I say, trying to be flippant.
“Only if you’re going to have dinner and a drink ready for me when I get home,” he teases right back.
I heave an internal sigh of relief. Joking about our marriage I can handle.
Having feelings for my husband that go beyond friendship…I cannot.
While Beckett’s at his office, I take advantage of the springtime sunshine and sit out on his back deck with the sketchbook and charcoals he gave me. My hand flies across the page, creating abstract forms that slowly morph into a scene from my fondest memories.
Grandpa took me to Montreal when I was a kid. We ate poutine, toured the many museums, and did a walking tour of Montreal’s hundreds of colourful murals.
I loved every minute of it, but what I’ve drawn in the sketchbook stands out. Grandpa and I in front of the Atelier Circulaire.
In my memory, and on the paper in front of me, I’m a small girl looking up at him. Though I can’t see the wonder on my face since I’ve sketched us from behind, I can vividly remember thinking that he seemed larger than life. This man who took me in when his daughter and son-in-law died, who managed to deal with his own grief and loss while raising a grieving, confused, difficult little girl. It was that moment under the shadows of this amazing art space that I resolved to stop making his life a challenge and start showing him just how grateful I was to have him in my life.
That moment shaped a lot of my future decisions. I decided to forego art school and go to university for a business administration degree. I had already accepted that I would eventually return to Cliveden to be close to him as he grew older, although I didn’t exactly plan on doing it as soon as I did. His stroke was another moment that shaped the course of my life.
I rushed home from Vancouver right before my last final exam of third year. Walking into the hospital room and seeing Grandpa lying there, attached to monitors that beeped a steady rhythm, something inside of me broke.
I’d already lost my parents to a car accident, Mom dying instantly and Dad two days later in the hospital. He never woke up, despite eleven-year-old me crying every day, begging him not to leave me. It took Grandpa a week to convince me to leave my childhood home. I was positive it was a nightmare and that I would wake up to find Mom making pancakes in the kitchen while Dad danced like a fool around her.
But the nightmare was real. My parents had left me, and my grandfather was in a hospital bed, and I was terrified I would lose him as well. That was the day I decided that loving someone as much as I loved my parents and my grandfather was dangerous. It could only lead to pain and loss, devastation and heartbreak. And I swore I would never let myself feel that for anyone else.
After Grandpa was released from the hospital, the effects from his stroke thankfully mild, he convinced me to finish my degree in Vancouver. I promised him I’d move back to Cliveden as soon as I graduated, and I did. I got a job working for him in the mayor’s office, and I turned the other cheek to everyone in town who looked down on me, judged me, or assumed I was only back to continue causing trouble the way I had as a moody teenager.
I may not have lost him then, but I have lost him now. And I still cannot fathom how or why anyone would open their hearts so deeply to someone, knowing the end will come. What power does love have to overwrite that inevitable loss?
I lose track of time sitting outside with my thoughts and my sketchbook for company. When I hear the screen door to the patio open, I startle, turning in my seat to see Beck walk out with two bottles of beer in one hand and a pizza box in the other. He passes me a drink, then sits down on the chair opposite me, settling the pizza on the table between us.
“I thought I was meant to be the one with dinner and a drink ready.”
He just shrugs, lifting a slice out of the box. “I texted, but when you didn’t answer, I figured you were busy.”
Picking up my phone, I see that he did, indeed, send a message an hour ago asking if I wanted him to get anything for dinner.
“Sorry,” I say sheepishly. “I was sketching and I guess I got lost in it.”
“It’s okay, Cam. I’m glad you’re putting the supplies to use.”
His quiet demeanor is calming, his easy forgiveness, even for something as silly as missing a text, is comforting. Beckett makes everything simple without even trying. And right now, with my emotions raw from hours of reminiscing and sketching, and from our earlier conversation, it’s exactly what I need.
He spins the pizza box around, and I open it, then look up at him in surprise. “There’s pineapple on this pizza.”
He shrugs again, his lips curving upward slightly. “Fruit on pizza might be an abomination to me, but you like it.”
I let my mouth fall open in a comical expression of surprise. “All our years of friendship and you’ve never done this. You refused to pick it off or have it put on half, saying it contaminates the entire pizza. If this is what being married to you gets me, then we should’ve said ‘I do’ years ago.”
