‘Ah yes, follow me for the big reveal!’ Reaching for his hand, the novelty of which she knew might never wear off, she pulled him up and guided him into the lounge, watching as he, like everyone else who had spent time in the room, walked straight to the wide window with the exceptional view.
‘Wow!’
‘Yep, wow!’ It was delightful to see he was as impressed as she’d hoped he might be. It was important to her.
‘It’s incredible! Like you’re almost in the water, over the water – not sure how to describe it!’
Wilkie stared at the river and sipped his hot tea. Lilly blinked as if her eyes were the shutters of a lens so she could capture this moment for always. His hair resting on his shoulders, his unshaven chin, his eyes still a little puffy from lack of sleep. His pale skin, covered in dark curls that tufted on his chest, his lower back, his shoulders and shins.
‘This is some place.’
‘I never take it for granted. I think that’s why I paint it a lot, or try to. I want to capture it, but it’s never the same one minute to the next.’
‘An impossible task, then.’ He turned to smile at her, tea in hand, wrapped in the peach-coloured blanket that had been next to her skin since she was a small girl. She liked the fact that when he wasn’t here she would be able to put it against her body, knowing it carried the imprint, the scent and essence of him.
‘I guess so, and yet, oddly, that doesn’t put me off. In fact it makes me more determined.’
‘Tenacious, undaunted and beautiful. You really are the whole package, Elizabeth-Roberta.’
She didn’t feel the need to correct him, giggle or play dumb, because this morning she felt beautiful! Felt alive! And knew for a fact she was tenacious, which meant she would keep painting until she got the picture just right.
‘I wanted to ask you, what season would you be, if I’m spring?’ She sat in the chair and folded her legs beneath her.
‘Ah, I’d be winter, no doubt.’ He spoke without hesitation, suggesting he’d given it some thought.
‘Winter?’ she laughed.
‘You seem to disagree!’
‘Yes, I disagree! Surely not winter.’
‘You don’t know me.’ He turned to face her then, his tone cool, wintry.
‘I know enough.’ This the truth,hertruth: that after the physical union they had shared, the way he had looked her in the eye as his face hovered mere inches from hers, the intensity with which he had held her tightly, breathed against her, found a mutual rhythm that was as hypnotic as it was binding, she knew him enough. Her first ...
‘And that’s another adorable thing about you.’ He smiled. ‘Your transparency, your trust. It’s all still there, intact, because experience hasn’t yet taught you to think differently.’
‘That sounds ominous!’ She pulled a face.
‘It’s the truth. You have that guileless exuberance of youth that is a magic elixir!’
‘I see.’
‘You don’t. You can’t possibly,’ he countered, as if reading her mind, ‘but don’t think of it as a negative thing. It’s wonderful.’
His words and tone verged on the patronising, and she didn’t like it, folding her arms around her body and looking out towards the water, wanting him gone in that second, punishment almost for making her feel like a child.
‘I am almost double your age, Lilly. Double!’
‘And?’ she fired back, facing him now.
‘Not so disastrous, maybe, with you at seventeen, but if you were fifty ...’
‘You’d be a hundred!’
‘And if you were seventy ...’
‘A hundred and forty – now thatisold.’ She widened her eyes.
