AllFreeNovel
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We last stayed here on the anniversary of the day we met, when the pregnancy was still new. May isn’t the best time to come here, but the right time for us. This time as we drive along the narrow lane, nerves accompany me as I add more pressure to myself to be what Dylan needs. I want to, but I’m scared I can’t rewind to the person I was then.
Dylan leaves me in the car as he takes our bags inside, and I sit in the car fighting tears as I look around at the familiar dunes, the peeling paint on the chairs outside, and the house I associate with happy times. Everything feels unfamiliar.
“You coming in, Sky?” asks Dylan as he opens the passenger door.
I swallow as the wind invades the car and nod. Dylan steps back, but the moment I climb out, he hugs me close. “He’ll be fine.”
“I know,” I whisper.
I step into the cool house, and I’m hit with a wave larger than any in the nearby sea. Nothing changes here. Ever. I could be walking back in on the first day, the neat lounge room with the dilapidated sofa I slept on and snuggled with Dylan on. The dated kitchen where, well...that.
Everything hits. What could’ve been. Fate. Us. My life changing forever in a blink of an eye with a man who shared my past. I sink onto the sofa and silent tears track my face as the beauty of the life I lead swells inside.
“Shit. Did I do the wrong thing?” Dylan looks down at me, raking a hand through his hair, lips pursed in concern. “We can go home. It’s okay.”
I shake my head. “No.” My voice thick, I look up at Dylan, the man who’s somehow split himself between the two people who need him, and survived himself. The lines around his eyes and exhaustion in his pale face betray the stress he’s under too, and I’m happy I force him to hold onto his plans and escape the pressures at home. On those days, he returns energised from his days and channels his love into us too.
“We should take a walk,” I say. “I mean, I’d like to.”
Waves lap the empty beach. I’m not brave enough to take my shoes off and experience the freezing water so veer around, and for once Dylan keeps his distance from the water as we walk hand in hand. The seagulls cry above, the sea’s turmoil the only other sound, apart from the wind rushing into my ears. I pull up my coat hood against the cold.
I lead Dylan along the beach until we reach the place we first sat to eat fish and chips on the beach, sheltered behind the dune, another of our traditions when we visit Broadbeach.
This is where I need to be right now.
I turn to Dylan, tiptoe to place my mouth on his cool lips, and we stay a moment, mouths pressed together, reconnecting. Closing my eyes, I open my senses to the familiar: him. I have more love in my heart for Dylan than I can contain, the heart Dylan’s love for me wraps around and protects.
I push fingers into the hair brushing his neck, and search for this Dylan and Sky with a kiss. His mouth moves as gently as the hands encircling my waist, and we kiss as if this is the first time, as if this first moment never left us.
My recent doubts Dylan could still love somebody who rejects him through her unhappiness carry away on the breeze. We’re anchored together against the tides pulling at us, surviving as our souls grip each other tight. This was always meant to be and will never end. Our hearts understand each other even with the recent silence between them.
“I love you.” I hold his face, tracing my fingers along his rough cheeks, lips, skin, wanting to absorb the love in his eyes.
“I love you, summer Sky,” he whispers and takes my fingers to kiss them.
I tip my head back, eyes closed, and breathe the ozone—the freedom that attracted us both almost three years ago—and allow the wind to blow down my hood and play through my hair.
“This is where I need to be, right now,” I say to the clouds racing across the sky. “Here, with you.” I hold Dylan tighter. “I’ve come home. She’s here.”
The sun shone hot and heavy on us the last time we stood together on a beach, vows spoken in front of others. This time there’s nobody but us, and this is how things should be.
He rests his forehead on mine. “I’m happy to see her again.”
I tug Dylan by the hand and we run, feet thudding across the damp sand, back to the cottage. He lets my hand go as he passes; I’ll never win a race against Dylan. Close to the cottage, Dylan stops, and walks backwards smiling, cheeks reddened.
“So, we gonna snuggle?” he asks and raises his brows.
I laugh and attempt to charge past him, but he catches me around the waist and tips me over his shoulder and bursts through the door.
“I told you all the way back then how freeing this place is.” He dumps me on the sofa, and I pull him onto me.
“Freeing? I’ve been tied to you since the day we met here.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I do,” I whisper.
* * *
