AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I held the bottle out to her.“We’ve only been walking for one.”
On the drive, I worried this was a terrible idea for a date. April had been saying since she returned that she wanted to climb Old Man of Storr, a large rock formation that made up part of the Trotternish Ridge on the north end of the Island. Considering how she was faring now, I was glad I’d kept her from doing it alone. Her honest enthusiasm as we pulled into the car park had eased my nerves. That enthusiasm had steadily waned as we made our ascent, and I couldn’t help but find the entire thing hilarious. April out of her element was a sight to behold. She was grouchy and maddeningly adorable. We stopped often and she’d already drunk the majority of our water supply. I didn’t care how long it took, April was making it to the top if I had to carry her there myself.
About a mile back, we’d veered off the tourist trail in exchange for this quiet route without a single other soul in sight. It would be worth it when we reached the top for the undisturbed views over to isles Raasay and Rona, but it meant saying goodbye to the stone staircase that made the climb considerably easier. She straightened, accepting the offered water and taking several mouthfuls.“Don’t give it to me in time,” she said, clearly unsatisfied with my answer,“give it to me in steps. How many more steps do I have to walk?”Damn.I wanted to kiss her when she was like this, though I didn’t think she’d appreciate that right now.
I eyed the trail again, calculating.“Two thousand maybe?”
“Twothousand?”She groaned and her hair swept back like liquid fire as her head dipped between her shoulder blades, wispy curls sticking to her neck and temple.“I shouldn’t have asked.”
“Want me to carry you?”
“How? You’re already carrying the camping equipment and Dudley.”
I shifted Dudley’s sling to my hip, patting the small space around my waist she could squeeze into.“Right here, princess. I won’t drop you.”
She considered it for half a second then shook her head manically.“Nope, not happening. Let’s get this over with.” She stalked ahead with harsh strides and I chuckled again, my chest the lightest it had ever been as I admired her sweetbehind the entire way up the incline.
“You were right. Thank you so much for bringing mehere.” We were the only people for miles but still she whispered in the small enclosure of our tent. The sun had begun to dip by the time we made it to the summit and she’d marvelled at the views while I made a quick dinner over a camp stove, followed by poorly made s'mores. April laughed openly as chocolate and marshmallow trickled out from the layers and down her wrist, leading me to eat more chocolate from her fingers than I did my own crackers. We spoke about everything. Favourite movies. People we remembered from childhood. Books we’d both read. Romance novels I hadn’t read but was suddenly desperate to. The things she loved most about acting—a wistful gleam entering her eye that made my guts twist. The only thing we didn’t talk about was the future.
Snuggled deep in our sleeping bags, dogs snoozing soundly at our feet, we’d left the entrance to the tent open. As dusk began to colour the sky in shades of pink and purple, we watched the sun disappear behind the rock formation, bringing with it the old man the mountain was said to resemble into profile. I’d never been able to picture him before, thinking the peak appeared more like a bird tail than a man. But with April’s freckled finger tracing the outline in the air, I saw him.
“It’s like looking at an ancient giant on his throne,” she whispered.“Watching the world change around him and never being able to reach out and touch it. It’s sad.”
Like me,I thought.Like me before you, princess.
That was the moment I allowed myself to admit I was in love with her.Of courseI loved her, a part of me had loved her since I was fourteen years old. I couldn’t tell her, but I’d hold that perfect little ember deep inside my chest, right alongside that dark part of myself that wasted years believing I’d never get the chance to love anyone.
She barely made it an hour before she slipped inside my sleeping bag, and when we made love, it was through hushed groans and giggles. Her body was soft and achingly warm beneath mine. The squeeze in the sleeping bag was so tight, I could only just inch my trousers past my hips, unable to get a hand between us to touch her in all the ways I wanted. We didn’t kiss, too busy staring at one another in the hazy twilight. Wind rattled the tent as our cries grew, coming thicker and faster as the minutes ticked on, both of us desperate to drag the connection out as long as possible. It was more intense than anything I’d ever experienced in my life, and when I came, a tear rolled down my cheek and fell to the ground, like a wish to the land that I might somehow get to keep her.
As humans, we demanded a beginning and end to make sense of the world around us. But forthis, there would be an after, but no end. My love for her was as boundless as the mountain we lay upon. When she left me, my love would remain, burning just as fiercely as it did now.
My final thought before sleep found me—April’s hair still tickling my nose—was an old Burns poem we’d recited at school,
Till a’the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt wi’the sun;
I will love thee still, my dear,
While the sands o’life shall run.
30
APRIL
Sweet Nothing – Taylor Swift
Iwoke with the sun.
It rose so early during the long summer months, it must only have been a handful of hours since we’d fallen asleep, happy and sated, whispering secrets back and forth until we could whisper no more. Something had changed during our short stay on Storr; it felt like we’d been marooned on our own little island for weeks.
Mal held me cocooned against his chest, his soft breaths stirring the hairs at my temple, Boy and Dudley snoring at our feet, and I thought:this is it. That unattainable feeling I’d been chasing for half of my life. I could have lived in that moment for a thousand years and never tired of it.
I kept my breathing slow and even so as not to disturb him, but all too soon he began to stir, his lips going straight to the crown of my head and kissing reverently. It might have been my imagination, but I thought he held me a little bit tighter too.
After long moments of silence, I tipped my head back for his lips, ready to sink into his kiss, when he pulled back to ask,“Tea?”
“Five more minutes,” I whispered.
