Page 51 of The True-Blue Romance

We fill the remainder of the drive into the city with general chitchat, our hands never untangling from between us. The ease I feel with Lee is new and exciting, like I’ve entered into a relationship after being married for twenty years. The idea of being married to Lee, waking up to him every day, suddenly makes me feel like I’m racing toward the finish line. Because I want it so badly that I can almost taste it. I want Savannah in her room at the house on the farm, the goats and bunny and future ducks out in the yard. I want to wake up with Lee in my arms and Lee on my brain for the rest of my life.

I pull up in front of the u-paint pottery studio and Lee shoots me a confused, but pleased sort of look. He loves arts and crafts. In high school he took pottery as his elective and made some of the most gorgeous pieces I’ve ever seen. We might not be throwing clay, but I wanted to show Lee how much I know him, and that I find joy in sharing things we like with each other.

“Pottery?” Lee asks, a slight tremble to his voice.

“We get to pick something and paint it, then they fire it and finish it for us. What do you think?”

“I love it. I haven’t done pottery since high school.”

I squeeze his fingers before climbing out of the car. I come around to his side just as he’s opening the door and open it the rest of the way, smiling down at him. “I remembered how much you loved it in high school. Thought this might be a good entry point before maybe taking a pottery class together?”

“A pottery class,” Lee repeats, eyebrows furrowed in thought.

“Yeah, I thought it could be fun.”

Lee shakes his head ruefully as he climbs out of the car. “You’re full of surprises, Joseph Rossi.”

“Nah, just a romantic.”

“Are you always like this?”

No, I haven’t always been. But I’ve always wanted to take care of Lee, and making him smile is part of the package. I don’t respond to him; instead, I just tangle our fingers together and lead us to the decently busy pottery studio. The employee welcomes us in, then tells us to pick something to paint, where to grab the paint, and that we just pay at the end. Lee untangles our fingers so that he can focus on picking something to paint. I watch him more than I look at the shelves for something to paint myself.

Lee comes to a stop in front of a shelf that contains animals. He looks thoughtful as he turns toward me. “Do you think I can paint two things?”

“Whatever you want,” I reply quickly, because he could ask for the moon on a platter and I’d make it happen.

Lee grins. “Okay. Thank you.”

“You don’t have to thank me. This is a date,” I stress, which earns me one of Lee’s adorable flushes. “We’re doing it together. What do you want to do?”

“Well, I want to do this little bunny for Savannah, but I also kind of want to do a mug.” He points to the other wall that contains mugs, plates, and bowls. “You can do a mug too if you want so we each have one. But you can do whatever you want.”

“No,” I say, voice thick. “I’ll do a mug too. We can use them for tea in the evenings.”

Lee’s smile turns warm, eyes crinkling in the way that undoes me. “That’s what I was thinking.”

Lee grabs the bunny that fits easily in the palm of his hand, and then we both end up in front of the mugs. I grab one for myself just as Lee grabs his own. We look around the large room, then find a small table for two in the corner that we make our way towards. We set our ceramics down before heading over to grab the paint. Lee takes a few minutes to look at paint before grabbing what he wants, and we return to the table with our arms full of paint.

“I hope Savannah likes the bunny. I’ll try to paint him like Buster.”

“Even the little black dot over his left eye?”

“Duh,” Lee says like I’m a total idiot. “He’s not Buster without the eye patch.”

“Pirate Buster.”

Lee laughs, loud and full, his shoulders moving with the sound. “Exactly.”

I decide to paint my mug with oranges all over it because it seems fitting. Lee’s tongue pokes out of the corner of his mouth as he carefully paints ceramic Buster—he’s sort of a perfectionist at this sort of stuff. My oranges end up looking like blobs, but it’ll always remind me of the orange groves and Lee’s laughter, so that’s all that matters to me. Lee’s mini Buster ends up looking like a perfect replica, and his mug has a sunrise over what looks like his backyard, featuring the goats and Buster roaming free for yard time. I want to lean over the table and kiss him silly, tell him I love him, ask him to marry me this instant, but I just barely contain myself because I think Lee would die of embarrassment if I did anything close to a public proclamation of love and devotion.

Just as we’re starting to check out, handing over our pottery for them to fire, my phone rings with Danica’s special ringtone that breaks through my constant Do Not Disturb setting. Lee turns concerned as he follows when I step away from the counter.

“Danica?”

“Hey, so, she’s fine, but we’re at the hospital.”

“What?” I ask, suddenly feeling sick.