Please comment. This chapter has more character development. I'd appreciate any constructive feedback that will help me improve my storytelling skills. Thank you!
It'd been three weeks and they still didn't have the answer to that question.
Henry had just been responding to Mara's pull. She'd initiated this whole thing, stirring up the courage to ask before he'd gathered the nerve himself. He wasn't complaining about that. They seemed to want the same thing. But that was the problem. What was that, exactly? She dodged the question whenever he asked, but he couldn't resist asking. It was this little cut that he couldn't stop itching, despite the fact that it only made the wound worse.
The only reference point he had for this sensation was their first night together. The panic and intensity turned into a euphoria he hadn't experienced before. So did the fear that came with thinking that it could end. When he pinned her under him and made her come on him...It was this power, this strength that she'd given him that constantly hummed throughout his being; an energy he'd absorbed into himself, but hadn't figured out how to use. Really, 'girlfriend' was just a jumping off point to what he wanted her to be-his fiancée, his wife, mother of his children. But Mara held out.
She was avoiding telling their parents. Once they did, they wouldn't have the same privacy. Plus, they'd have to answer the question about how they'd carry on their relationship. The words 'long distance' would probably cause people to look at them with a shit ton of sympathy-like they were doomed to fail. That negativity would not be received kindly, on Mara's part. Meanwhile, she and Henry spent more and more time butting heads.
Then there was the wedding. Mara's dad went on a cruise with his girlfriend and they'd come home engaged. The house buzzed with the excitement of wedding planning-flowers, dress boutiques, cake, location. Terrance and Dionne were hashing out the last subject as Mara came down the stairs.
The love birds sat leaning against one another on the area rug as they looked at the laptop sitting between them. Mara couldn't help but laugh at the image before her. Her father ran a hand over his short, peppered black hair. A 6'2'', forty-three year old man with an athletic build from going to the gym, hiking, and the like; he could be intimidating when he wanted to be, even when just sitting. Dionne's chocolate brown skin was striking against shoulder length night black hair. It gently framed her heart-shaped face. A 5'2" thirty-eight year old, fairly active herself, each movement of her lithe frame displayed the shadow of muscle underneath.
Despite their size difference, Dionne was a forced to be reckoned with and Terrance was putty in her hands.
"We should get married in a church," Terrance insisted.
"Where is this coming from, Terry? You're not even religious."
Mara continued on into the kitchen, eavesdropping on their conversation.
"It's important. I want to stand on holy ground and make our union official before God."
For a moment there was no reply.
It was true, they weren't religious. But her father's sense of tradition reared its head every once in awhile-like opening the door for women and keeping his worries to himself. Apparently, this list also included getting married in a church.
"That's romantic," Dionne confessed.
Her father's phone rang.
"Hello?" The person on the line said something. "No. The stagers need to be there on Monday. I start showing the house on Wednesday."
He excused himself from the room, saying he needed to go to the office and straighten some things out. As soon as Terrance left, Mara skipped into the room, plopping down next to Dionne. The two had grown comfortable over the last six years. Their relationship was more friendly than parent-child oriented. So Mara had no apprehension about asking Dionne to tell her the story of how her father proposed. For the umpteenth time, Dionne happily recanted the story to Mara.
"So we were sitting on the deck, sunbathing." Dionne giggled. She leaned back, stretching luxuriously. The sun beamed down, hot enough to make her skin prickle. She could smell the ocean salt. "He wasn't even complaining. You know he hates to sit for too long, but I wasn't even thinking about it. I mean,
your
father tanning. Can you imagine?"
"I don't want to!" Mara shook the image from her mind. "Why can't we skip this part when you tell it?"
"But that body-"
Mara covered her ears, humming over Dionne's words.
Dionne rolled her brown eyes and sat up. "Well, anyway. We're sunbathing and your father wasn't complaining. I was suspicious, but, you know, whatever. That's what cruises are for-relaxing. So, I'm lying there...and I hear this music. And it's the song. And I open my eyes and look at your father and he's grinning like the devil. Then the band comes up the stairs from the lower deck and they start singing 'Wise men say only fools rush in..."
Dionne clapped her hands to her face, smiling uncontrollably. That song was his favorite. He loved singing it to Dionne. It was their song.
"They came up the deck and fanned around us and your father went down on one knee. My heart was just racing." Dionne sighed and looked at her ring.
"And you knew you'd say yes?"
"Of course."
Mara was always interested in their talks about romance. Dionne weighed many of her decisions with her heart as her guide. She once told Mara, 'If you're going to be in love, you can't walk the line with a net under you. There is no net. You just have to believe it was all worth it. Even if you fall on your ass'. Mara hadn't thought about that again, until now. Dionne wasn't a flighty, senseless person. She was just open and willing to value the things that made her happy. In Mara's opinion, Terrance was privileged enough to be one of those things. She was glad they'd found one another. But Mara didn't see romance that way at all.
She'd thought,
Why wouldn't I have a net? I'm not walking a tightrope with no net.
Now look at her. All of that baloney that Dionne spoke about was actually starting to make sense.
"Thinking of a certain someone?" Dionne asked.
Mara didn't even ask how Dionne knew. "What do you mean?"
Dionne ignored the terrible attempt at deceit. "Do you think you'll make it this far?"
Mara shrugged. Dionne smiled at the Terrance-like mannerism. "Don't know. We're still pretty new."
"But you've thought about it?"
Mara shrugged again. "We have to get through college first. We still don't know what to do."
Dionne rubbed Mara's back, comforting her. "I can't tell you what to do, chick, but if you want it to work you have to fight for it."
And fight they did.
~ ~ ~
"I don't know what your problem is," Henry hissed. He was as tired of saying it as Mara was of hearing it.
But I still don't have an answer. Do I?
"Can we not do this right now?" Mara grumbled, rummaging around her room, looking for her bright orange sweater. It would go perfectly with her white floral printed sundress.
"No!" Henry answered.
Mara snorted at the ambiguity of his response. She tried to cover it, focusing in finding that stupid sweater.
He thrust his finger in her face, forcing her to acknowledge him. "You know what I meant."
"I have work in thirty," she barked, impatient.
Her friend Hannah had done some print work with some photographer and it turned out that the magazine he worked for was looking for a writer to replace a woman who'd moved on to other opportunities. Mara sent in some samples along with the usual paperwork. Already a couple weeks into the job, she was really enjoying it. Usually, she was excited about going to work, but this argument was piling on anxiety she didn't need.
"I'm already fifteen minutes late. Next excuse."
Mara didn't want to tell Henry that she was afraid that he'd find someone else. Ever since their first night together, the thought cast a shadow over their summer bliss. To top it off, guilt weighed on her for even considering that she couldn't trust him. Saying that to him would hurt him way more than her attempts to avoid his questions.
"Things happen! What is going to happen with school? Where are we going to find the time-or money-to see each other? I'm going to be meeting new people. You are too." She let out a heavy sigh. "I don't want to be the girl sitting alone in a dorm on a Friday night, hoping you'll remember our, like, Skype date or whatever."
