Page 32 of Your Two Lips
“It wasn’t only because my brother asked me to do it. There was a crash during practice a few months before. I was in the hull, grinding, you know, the winches on the big sails, and the boat was up out of the water, flying on the foils, those fins on the bottom. Sailing foils were new, and we were all still learning how to manage them. A gust during a turning maneuver picked us up and slammed us down on the side. My side. Five of us were held under.”
“What’d you do?” I knew something about crashes and fear.
“I stayed calm, relied on my training. My safety belt jammed, though, and the panic threatened from the periphery. In that moment, while I reached for the emergency knife to cut the belt, all I saw was ReeAnn’s face. I had thought about her occasionally during the years since high school, and then there she was.”
He looked off into the distance. “It was the graduation bonfire right before I left for San Diego. She was standing in front of me, close to the flames. So beautiful, with light in her big eyes and her dark skin glowing gold in the firelight. I wanted to touch her, feel that skin I had spent the better part of my senior year staring at. It was mesmerizing how it shimmered. Still is.”
He shook his head. “I’ve asked her to dinner, to lunch, here in town, out of town, on the moon. She said anything more than friends was too complicated. I don’t want to be friends.”
“What do you want?”
A glint lit in his eye.
“Besides that, I mean.”
“I want to take her sailing. Just the two of us.” He leaned back and stretched his arms wide along the side railing. “I want to see her sitting up there on the bow, sun shining with nothing but sea and sky beyond her. I want to see that look on her face again, the one from the bonfire. In the water that day, it was her face rising to the light that I followed up to the surface. I know we sailors are superstitious, but that was a sign.”
“Well, at least you’re sure about what you want.”
“How’s it going with Emily?”
“It’s like you and ReeAnn in high school. If I let myself go there, she could do damage.”
“I get that. ReeAnn could still level me. But living a life without her would level me, too. Not today, not tomorrow, but in small bits every day. I don’t want to be forty and wake up next to a nice woman and realize I loved another the entire time. So, I’ll keep trying. Don’t you think it could be worth it to try with Emily?”
“You said you loved ReeAnn. You know that, right?”
“Yeah, keep it to yourself for now and stop avoiding the question.”
I leaned forward, meeting Jake’s eyes. “I can’t figure her out. She’s rich. Drives a BMW and her bike is hardcore.”
“So’s yours.”
“Now, yes, but not when I was a year in. I was riding a Walmart Huffy in those days.” I chuckled.
“Yeah, you inflicted some pain on that poor bike.”
“She doesn’t act like the rich women I’ve known. She can get muddy on the trail and calmly wipe it off before heading out for a beer. I have never actually seen her fix her hair. She barely touches it. She never checks the mirror above your bar.”
“She knows her bourbons.” Jake pointed at me, not helping.
“Which she enjoys with her whole body. She laughs easily. Trolls Groupon for good deals and doesn’t act like money’s a given. She smells like lemons and flowers, even covered in mud.”
“She sounds great to me.”
Yeah, she sounded great to me too.
“Look. I really do get it. ReeAnn’s all class too, and there are obstacles. But I see it in her eyes. There’s something there, and she is absolutely worth the risk. Even if it’s only for a little while, it’s worth it cause then I’ll go on with my life knowing I tried.”
Was Emily worth the risk? Even if I could only have her for a little while? DidIwant to wake up when I’m forty, alone, or married to some woman that wasn’t her knowing I never really tried? I was putting my career on the line with the farm and the resort. Taking a chance with Emily was putting my heart on the line too.
21
EMILY
We hadto be at the marina by five o’clock for the boat race, so as planned, Finn picked up ReeAnn and me at the spa after Jake left the bar in his brother’s capable hands.
The guys dropped us off and headed into the parking lot. A distant gangway led to a section of yachts and larger sailboats, one of which we’d be crewing on tonight. Had I lost my ever-lovin’ mind? Jake had assured me he would not let it end badly for me. “You’ll be fine. Everyone does it,” he said. Oh, well, if everyone did it, I had nothing to worry about. That always worked out. Ha.
