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13
Ifollowed his movement with a hesitant gaze as Rhys stood from the table.
“Come here,” he urged, taking my hand. “I want to show you something.”
Shaking my head, all I wanted to do was cower. I knew if I stood up, I’d run somewhere and pity myself. It wasn’t the voice of control, the mantra I’d tattooed on my soul over the last three months, but I’d done that assuming I’d never see Caleb again, or that it wouldn’t be there. In Italy, with… No.
“Mia,” Rhys knelt on the ground so our faces were level, lifting my chin with the tip of his finger so our eyes wouldn’t part, “ghosts aren’t real.”
Peering over his shoulder, I noticed the group stalled as a lethargic bus struggled to cross an intersection. I couldn’t see anyone’s face, so I looked back at Rhys. His dark eyes were wide with concern, his mouth open slightly as though waiting to say something to me once I stopped freaking out.
He tugged on my chin and lowered his hands to mine, pulling me out of my chair. Leaving our table, he motioned to the server that we’d return as we set off through the outdoor dining area toward the cobblestone street opposite the crowd. Rhys stopped us along an iron fence, moving to stand behind me with his arms wrapped around my shoulders, anchoring me to him.
“Look down,” he whispered, his chin nestled on my shoulder and words warm against my neck. “I’m taking you there after dinner.”
Even in the evening light, the white cliffs were blinding, and their beauty was intoxicating. The breathtaking view of the crystal water lapping slowly along the shore of white sand and rocks held me prisoner, as did Rhys. Letting myself exhale, my chest throbbed with the breath I’d held, and I turned around within his hold. His eyes were on the water below, but they fell on mine as I opened my mouth.
“There’s a woman in that crowd,” I revealed. Rhys’s hands fell to my lower back, his hold just as tight while I continued. “She’s carrying a baby. The baby I never had.”
“It’s not just the woman.” He read between my lines, the gray and fuzzy lines of my past I thought I could control by now. “Is it?”
His voice was quiet, almost muffled by the passing traffic and pounding in my mind. This was our romantic weekend, the bet we’d made and that he promised to fulfill, and I was nothing but guilty. I was guilty of not thinking of us, letting my past interfere, but grief and shock held me captive.
“No.” Admitting that was the first step. Wiggling from Rhys, I took his hand and began walking back to our table. I stumbled when he refused to move, his feet stuck just like my thoughts.
After a moment of looking everywhere but at me, Rhys finally approached and stepped ahead of me to return to our table. Watching him sit down and reach for his refilled wine glass, I was afraid to join him. I didn’t want to offend him, but I knew I had.
When I sat down next to him, I was expecting Rhys to avoid me, to act like so many other people in my life who wouldn’t confront how I was feeling. Instead, he placed his glass on the table and turned to me, just like he’d done in so many other challenges when he refused to let me go.
“The past is going to be everywhere we go, Mia. It’s all happened before, but that doesn’t mean it needs to control us now, or in the future.”
“The past doesn’t always find you across an ocean, with the person you love, flashing a past dream. Does it?” I mumbled my rebuttal, not even sure what I said until Rhys chuckled his reply.
“Go back about six words.”
I wanted to, but the crowd moved again and I saw him. Caleb. Him. His arm snaked around the waist of the woman he was with before they walked away, but not before he kissed the baby’s head. Imagining him with the life we wanted was excruciating, and I’d lost my appetite.
It was almost like I forgot how to talk, but I knew it was just the fact that I couldn’t even if I tried. There wasn’t anything to say, or even shout, that would get me back to where I needed to be. With Rhys.In Italy.
“Europe’s not as big as it seems. Just like New York,” Rhys broke my thoughts. “I see people I swore off in college, women I’ve dated, friends I’d lost. I buried my ghost though.”
Finally able to look at him, his words resonated deeply, and I remembered the phone call that led to our confusion and miscommunication when he was in France. “You’re not still haunted? Even with your old man in the Parisian café?”
Rhys smiled at me, softening my nerves. “That wasn’t about her, or him. That was about you. I explained that to you. You’re who I want to share my meals with, love.”
It wasn’t a promise, a commitment, or a confession. It wasn’t the mystical one finding me after all the work I’d done on myself, like mom’s ridiculous book suggested would magically happen. Considering that, I found the courage once more to watch the blur of the crowd. Staring at the back of their heads in the evening light, I couldn’t pick out Caleb, and I think it’s really because I didn’t want to. Feeling Rhys’s hand on mine, I closed my eyes and let his touch ground me.
“I’m so sorry, Rhys.” I was blinking hysterically, trying to stop myself from crying, from ruining our evening.
He took my wrist, playing with the diamond bracelet he’d given me, locking our eyes. “Let’s eat this meal. I’ll take you to the cliffs, and we can stir up whatever we want of the past and throw it into the sea.”
“Why are you so patient with me?”
The way he laughed and playfully rolled his eyes brought back my butterflies. “Because I’ve fallen in love with you, Mia.” Before I could respond, Rhys lifted his wineglass in the air with a widened grin beneath hopeful eyes. “Shall we toast to a fresh start?”
I didn’t want to always start. Letting his words linger in my thoughts, I realized that was growth and something we’d always be doing. Starting over could be a new positive for me, and for us. The sound of our glasses clinking was an ignition. I returned his gaze, preparing myself to fall into it.
I’d never eaten such delicious seafood, or even had wine like the bottle we shared before finishing our meal. It wasn’t easy to shake the ghost from my back, and the surprise of it all, so I kept telling myself it was a dream. All of it; Rhys, Italy, the ghost. I looked across the table and realized if I woke from that dream, the perfection of being with Rhys, he’d still be there with me, for me, and it felt right.
