(Looking at her is like waking up.)He pauses and then takes a deep breath. Here we go. The memories about Jacob remain so close to your surface and yet nothing about Cole. Still. This summer it will be going on seven years, Bridget.
I know. I say it softly as if that excuses my behavior.
I would like to make a...separate proposal, if you will. I'd like to commission you to write some of the better memories down for me so I can make it into a book with some of his works.
Is seven years the magic amount of time within which one passes from villain back to hero? I stare at him in sudden total chagrin. Scorn is not permitted.
He looks up sharply. No, I simply want some good memories to help offset everything I know.
Paint him in the prettiest light possible?
No, Bridget. Make a record of the times that things were good. The times your love grew instead of the times it was tested.
I don't know.
There's a ridiculous advance involved.
Money doesn't buy me, Caleb.
I'll do it piecemeal then. He winks and goes back to scrubbing food off the plates in the sink. He spoils me sometimes. He cannot cook and yet today he invites me down to the boat for scotch and bruschetta and we had a little sunshiny picnic, our legs dangling over the side of the wharf. I took off my shoes and then he did too and for all of fifteen seconds we were children again. Well, I was. When I first met Caleb he was sixteen, not a child anymore but barely a man. And now he's on the verge of fifty and just figured out how to chop up a few tomatoes to put on toast, sprinkled with a little bit of basil and a whole lot of absolution.
I drank my scotch in one gulp and waited while it burned the whole way down. At least I was not cold anymore. He frowned and we finished our lunch in silence and then we walked up the path together, I in my bare feet, kicking up dust every time I slid backwards, Caleb's patience tested as he repeatedly put out his arm to stop me from passing him on my way back down.
I offered to help clean up and then I'm out of here.
This amount of money and a guarantee to spend a certain amount of hours doing what you love best will serve to undermine us both, Princess, he winks at me and I pretend I don't see it. The water gushing out of the tap is loud and I unconsciously reach up and turn down my hearing aids until they're almost off. I've promised to wear them until it gets easier.
I don't know why I lie.
If I have memories I'll write about them on my own time, without a deadline.
Okay, Bridget. I give. You're going to keep refusing all offers of help no matter how well I disguise them, I'll just go back to a cash allowance on a regular basis or direct deposit or something.
For what? I don't do anything for you. Presently.
That changes on a dime. Literally. He smiles to himself. I shrug. He is leaving me speechless often these days.
And yes, Bridget, seven years seems like the perfect amount of time for one to turn back into a hero. Especially when it's multiplied by four.