Chapter Twenty-Three
Tamsin
Daniel’s already gone by the time I get to the hall. I run to the exit and push through the door, and I don’t see him right away. I panic, but then I catch sight of him across the quad, walking toward the library.
And now, suddenly, my frantic urgency disappears. I follow, but not fast enough to catch him.
A hundred different things are jumbled together in my mind. An image of Daniel at twelve years old, thinking he has to be the man of the family. An image of him in his neighbor’s apartment being handed a beer.
I want to kill that piece of shit child molester. I want to destroy him. Tears well up in my eyes, and I wish for something else even more. I wish I could go back in time and protect the boy Daniel once was.
But that’s not the only thing I’m thinking about.
I’m thinking about Daniel taking me to a vegan restaurant because he thought I’d like it. I’m thinking about him giving me his shirt to wear in the rain. I’m thinking about him texting me that quote from The Tempest.
I’m thinking about the way he went down on me with total abandon and looked at me like I was the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen.
And I’m thinking about the look in his eyes when he said he loved me, and the way it felt to say it back to him.
We’re at the library now, and Daniel goes around to the back of the building. I’m moving faster now, catching up to him, and I’m close behind when he goes into a garden I’ve never noticed before. When he sits down on a bench under a maple tree, he sees me for the first time.
“Tamsin,” he says, staring.
I feel eager and scared and shy all at once. I feel a thousand other things I can’t even define.
But what I feel most of all is love.
“Daniel—”
“I’m glad you’re here,” he says, getting to his feet. “I wanted to tell you that Trace is gone. We kicked him out of the house. I wanted to tell you how sorry I am that he said all that shit to you. I wanted to tell you how much I—”
“Daniel,” I say again, and he stops.
Now that I’ve gotten him to listen to me, I don’t know what to say.
“Please don’t,” Daniel says suddenly.
I stare at him. “Don’t what?”
“Don’t tell me how sorry you are that I was molested.”
And then, just like that, I’m crying.
“But I am sorry. Oh God, Daniel, I’m so sorry that happened to you.”
He sinks down on the bench. His shoulders are slumped. I sit down beside him, wiping the tears from my face with the back of my hand.
“I don’t want you to feel sorry for me.”
“I don’t.”
“You just said you do.”
“No. I said I’m sorry that happened to you. But I don’t feel sorry for you. I don’t pity you. You’re my hero, Daniel.”
The sun’s down and it’s almost nighttime. We’re sitting in the gray shadows of dusk. But the lights are on in the library and the windows are right above us, and that’s enough light for me to see that Daniel is shaken.
“You shouldn’t say that.”
“What?”
“You shouldn’t call me your hero. Not after what I put you through at my house.”
“You fixed it,” I say. “That’s what heroes do.”
“But—”
“Daniel,” I interrupt him, putting a hand on his shoulder.
He turns to face me, covering my hand with his, and a wave of heat and sweetness goes through me. And now, finally, I know what to say.
“I love you.”
I feel a tremor run through him.
“I love you, too.”
For a long moment we just stare at each other, and I could sit here like this for the rest of my life.
Then Daniel lifts my hand to his mouth and kisses it.
“Tamsin?”
“Yes?”
“Will you be my girlfriend?”
My heart soars.
“Yes.”
“We’re still really different people.”
“I know.”
“I believe in God and you don’t.”
“I know.”
“I’m pro-life and you’re not.”
“I know.”
He takes a breath.
“That one’s a big deal. I mean, we’ll do everything we can not to get pregnant. But there’s a chance it could happen.”
“I know. Women are used to thinking about that possibility, on account of us having uteruses.”
He smiles a little. “So what would we do if that happened?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t?”
I shake my head. “I have no idea. No clue. And I don’t think there’s any way for us to know in advance.” An echo of an old discussion comes back to me. “It’s kind of a Schrödinger’s Cat scenario. Right now, all the possible outcomes exist at the same time. We can’t know what’s in the box until we get there.”
Daniel is staring at me like I’ve grown a second head.
“What?” I ask after a moment.
“You said Schrödinger’s Cat.”
I nod. “It’s a quantum mechanics thing.”
“I know that, Tamsin. I read science books for fun.” He’s still holding my hand, and now his thumb strokes the back of my wrist. “Name dropping Schrödinger’s Cat is like handing me a brandy on a snowy night and saying ‘Baby, it’s cold outside.’”
I start to smile. “It is, huh?”
“Yeah.”
I lean a little closer. “Hey, Daniel?”
“What?”
“Kiss me.”
His lips touch mine like butterfly wings. But before long his hands are under my shirt and his palms are on my breasts and his tongue is doing wicked, wonderful things.
I don’t know how long the kiss goes on, but it’s not long enough. I feel deliciously mussed afterward, and as we sit there with our arms around each other, I realize I’m smiling like a fool.
A fool in love.
“Hey, Daniel?”
“Yeah?”
“Can I tell you something sweet?”
“Yeah.”
“You make me want to believe in God.”
His arm tightens around my shoulders.
“Hey, Tamsin?”
“Yes?”
“I don’t want to change you. On the other hand—”
“Yes?”
“I could spend my life arguing with you and die a happy man.”
The melting feeling behind my breastbone is back.
“Deal.”
* * *
Daniel and I aren’t like Rikki and Sam. You meet the two of them and think, man, these two people belong together.
It’s the same with Will and Claire. Everyone had them tagged as a couple before they finally figured things out.
Daniel and I don’t fit like that. We’re not a perfect match.
People said that about my grandparents. My grandfather passed away ten years ago, but my grandmother still talks about how they met and what their married life was like. He was this super-smart, hyper-intellectual English professor, and she was a seamstress who didn’t even finish high school. No one thought they should get married, but they did—and they had forty happy years together.
What I said to Daniel is true. There’s no way to predict the future. But as I’m sitting here with my head on his shoulder, a picture comes into my mind.
It’s me, talking to my grandchildren.
They told us it would never last, I say. And yet here we are, celebrating our fiftieth wedding anniversary.
And this moment, I’ll tell them, is when our happily-ever-after began.