Pickleballers

Chapter Twenty-Two

Twenty-Two

Meg blinked to assure herself she wasn’t hallucinating. As her eyes adjusted to the light, she squinted, trying to make sense of the view. Where there had been a dark mass of forest, there was light. Bracelet upon bracelet of fairy lights twined around the boughs of an enormous big-leaf maple, a tree so massive that eight trunks emerged from one colossal stump.

And as she pieced together what she was looking at, Meg shook her head in wonder.

Supported by eight sturdy fingers, a bungalow tree house sat cradled in the palm of the tree. In front of the rustic door, a cozy porch jutted out, complete with a table and chairs hewn from downed forest wood. Meg’s heart thudded at her rib cage—it was perfect: Function plus beauty. Art. The final touch was the colorful hammock beside the camp, swaying in the light breeze.

“Solar lights,” Ethan said, holding up the switch, as if that was the cause of Meg’s astonishment.

Meg found her voice. “What is this place?”

“My cabin. Well, my family’s cabin. We’re just outside the national park, so we usually get a lot of action here as a rental. But it’s not rented tonight.” He shrugged. “So I had planned to stay here a night or two and give myself some space to think.” He gestured to the plank steps. “Go ahead.”

She climbed up, and when her view leveled with the bungalow’s interior, her eyes widened. Inside, there was room for only a bed. It sprawled out like a reclining prince, replete with a deep mattress and topped with a multicolored quilt. A parade of pillows marched along the wooden headboard. Her fingers unthinkingly touched the corner of the soft sheet. The bed was just the right size, cozy and perfect for two. “Wow,” she breathed. “Just for future reference, I think ‘roughing it’ undersells it.”

He said, “It’s a nice night. I can take the hammock. Give you your space.”

She did not need her space. In fact, she wanted to be as close as two humans could get. But instead of suggesting the mountain cabin snog-fest she craved, she heard herself say, “It’s your cabin. You shouldn’t have to sleep outside. I can sleep in the hammock if you—”

“You take the bed,” he insisted. “You can’t tell me that after all we’ve been through today, you’re not wiped.” He gave a nod to indicate that his decision was firm.

But his eyes spoke otherwise, and instead of leaving, he stood in the doorway. The sound of the nighttime toads and the rustle of wind in the leaves snuck between the wooden cabin walls. Neither of them spoke, but his glance caught her hips and traced her contours until he reached her face. Then he sighed and rapped softly on the doorpost with his knuckles. “G’night, Meg.”

Meg flopped back on the bed and stared at the rafters. “Grr,” she groaned, tapping her brow with her fists. “Grr.”

Meg retrieved her cell phone from her bag. With little faith, she pressed it on, and, miracle of miracles, the screen came to life.

She bolted upright and texted Rooster. I’m safe. How’s the hand?

In response, her phone rang. Rooster’s voice sounded distant, tired. “Where are you? Are you all right? We were so worried…” He paused. “It’s Meg,” Rooster’s muffled voice translated to Annie.

“I’m fine. I’m fine.”

“Thank heaven and the saints. Can’t tell you how glad we are to hear you’re okay. The hand’s okay. I’ll have to cancel my harp concert at Carnegie Hall, but it’ll heal. Where are you? Is Ethan with you? Are you already down the mountain?”

“No. Listen. It’s a long story, but Ethan’s here with me and we’re both fine. I’m safe. I’ll be down in the morning, and I can tell you all about it.”

“Okay.” He hesitated, his Papa Bear radar perking up. “If you’re sure. You know how to reach me if you change your mind. Annie and I found motel rooms for the night in Port Angeles. Text us when you’re down and we’ll pick you up.”

Meg sighed as she packed her phone away. Here she was in a lovely, romantic cabin. The man she craved was only fifty feet away, but he may as well have been in Alaska. She pulled off her hiking clothes, including her campfire-scented fleece. Investigating the contents of her pack, she was pleased to find an unworn, lightweight thermal shirt, which she tugged on before snuggling beneath the cozy comforter.

She should sleep. She should be exhausted. But instead, she lay there, engaged in a rafter-staring contest. Her thoughts ping-ponged between steamy—the hot man lying in the hammock outside—and depressing—Rooster’s mangled hand. She tossed onto her side. She flopped onto her belly. She groaned into her pillow.

The steamy thoughts won out.

“Enough already.” She kicked aside the comforter and slid her bare feet into her hiking boots. Clunking across the wood floor, she groped her way to the door, pushed it open, and stood on the landing. Her eyes adjusted. Overhead, the night sky glittered with a creamy wash of starlight, but the creature sounds of sunset had ceased. The mountaintop was silent save for the hushed crinkling of leaves pushed by the wind. Below, she made out the wonky slope of the plank stairs. Steps away, there was the hammock. Just a short walk across the earth, and she would be there. She could stand on the landing till her feet grew roots. Or she could stride across that dark expanse and take control.

Screw it , she thought, her feet carrying her down the stairs. Meg Bloomberg was tired of waiting for someone else to make her life happen. In her eagerness, her fingers missed the handrail, and she tripped down the lopsided steps. “Ow,” she said quietly to the dirt at the bottom. Righting herself, she tromped over the roots, circumvented a stump, and skittered over the pebbly ground until she found herself standing behind the head of the hammock.

She froze there, heart pulsing in her ears, wondering if she should turn and go back. This was silly. Maybe it was too soon after getting their wires uncrossed. He could have made a move in the cabin. But that whole “give you your space” thing could have meant he simply wasn’t sure if he wanted the high-maintenance job of being the postdivorce rebound dude. On the other hand, maybe he was lying awake thinking about Meg. He had said he really liked her. Quietly, very quietly, she decided to check in on him.

“Are you asleep?” she asked, her words thinner than a whisper.

“Are you kidding? I thought you were a bear.”

Smiling, she came around. He lay on his back, eyes wide. She saw he was smiling, too. Ethan patted the space beside him.

Meg kicked off her boots and slid into the hammock. Side by side, they lay together, their hands clasped over their chests like twin statues. They stared up at the spreading boughs, at the canopy of leaves that trembled like lips on the verge of speech. Neither of them said a word. Meg was acutely aware of each spot where his body met hers; their calves pressed together, thighs touching, his hip resting on hers. The midnight scent of his skin dizzied her with desire, but she would not break the spell, because lying perfectly still beside him was arousing her in a way that made every molecule of her blood press against the surface of her skin. If he touched her, if he even moved an inch, she imagined she would combust.

He turned his head and spoke low near her ear. “I’m glad you’re here.” The hammock swayed in the soft breeze. He breathed against her temple, stirring her hair, and she closed her eyes to absorb the intensity of his nearness.

“I still feel bad about pushing you away like that,” he said. “That whole thing. That had nothing to do with you but with—” He stopped, and Meg got the sense he was choosing his words with care. “…It was all stuff I’ve been carrying around for years.”

He closed his eyes. She watched him, waiting for him to go on. The wind pressed strands of his hair against her cheek. The silence went on for so long she wondered if he had fallen asleep. Then he opened his eyes and spoke in a voice barely above a whisper. “You know how I told you my dad was out of the picture?”

Ethan continued. “Growing up, it was just me and my mom. My bio dad, I barely remember him, but apparently, he was a pretty convincing bullshit artist.” He stared at the branches and shook his head, still affected by the memory. Meg listened, not daring to budge. “When I was three, my ma found a ring in his wallet. He had this whole other family. And he chose them over us.”

Meg absorbed his words. “That sucks.”

He chuckled bitterly. “It does suck. So I guess you could say I have trust issues. Doesn’t excuse my behavior; just history.”

She felt it then, the sensation of opening. Of one person making their heart vulnerable to another and accepting the invitation to do the same. “I bet that was hard. On both of you.” Listening to the rise and fall of his breath, she watched the leaves shimmer in the dim moonlight. “I have a giant hair ball of trust issues of my own, obviously. Though mine are more recently acquired,” she said, trying to make light of it.

He said nothing, but she could feel the movement of the hammock as he nodded and gave her the space to continue.

“Sometimes,” she said, “I feel like I wasted this whole period of my life. I thought my marriage was this partnership. Everybody has to make compromises, right? He spent years in dental school, and I gave up painting so I could support him. So, for two years while he got his dental practice off the ground, I beaded and felted cat collars. Don’t laugh.”

“Wasn’t going to.”

“Anyhow. As you know. He left. And I’m still not sure what the full story was.” She shrugged, although it still did not feel like a shrugging matter. “The whole time we were together, secretly I kept blaming him for making me give up painting. But he never did that. I did that.” Shame welled in her chest at having put herself aside for another person. It was one thing to be supportive and open, but quite another to give up on oneself.

He lifted his hand between them, and she linked her fingers through. “You don’t make it into your thirties without dragging a few anchors in your wake,” he said softly.

She nodded, his words hitting home. She understood what it felt like to carry around an anchor. Understood that trust was fragile and breakable, only because gaining it was such hard work.

But with Ethan? She felt a lifting of the burden. A possibility.

“But I know what you mean,” he said. “Sometimes in my business, the people I work with say they want to be environmentally friendly, but they don’t actually want to change the way they operate. Everyone wants an easy fix, but sometimes you have to, well, take out the courts, so to speak. Raze the field. Do a controlled burn so that new growth can appear.”

The mention of the doomed courts pinched at her, but maybe Ethan had a point. There was no easy fix for blunders made in the past, and the closest anyone could come to redemption was to move forward with good intent.

The stars winked between the boughs, and the leaves reacted to the wind. She guessed then that commitment didn’t come easily to him, that he stepped lightly into relationships for fear that they were delicate, untrustworthy things. That he waited to see if they took root and blossomed. And she was—or always had been—the opposite. Meg fell into trusting too willingly. She could free-fall, eyes closed, and she believed trust would catch her. Perhaps they both were going to have to change the way they operated.

As if coming to the same conclusion, Ethan tipped his body so that it faced hers. The hammock shifted, and she let the movement roll her, cocoon them. Their faces were so close. The strain of the past couple of days had left her body thirsting with the desire to reconnect. And from the way the points of their bodies touched in all the soft and hard places, she knew he felt the same.

Their chests rose and fell against each other, her eyelashes fluttering at the touch of his warm, sweet breath. Brimming with delicious wanting, she gave just the smallest tilt of her head. He pressed toward her, his lips first, and his hands following. His fingers skimmed the hem of her shirt and, lightly, he traced the skin up her rib cage. Her thumbs caressed the hollow of his hip bone and threaded along his boxers. Her greedy fingers pressed down his abdomen.

“Mm,” he groaned, licking a line with the point of his tongue from her collarbone to her ear. He combed his fingers up her scalp, lifting her hair against the grain.

Both hands in her hair, he stopped. Ethan pulled her face away and regarded her.

“What?” her lips whispered. “What is it?”

“You,” he said. He lifted her hand to his lips. Gently, he kissed the pale line below her knuckle. “What a fool he was to let you go.”

The words touched her core. She could feel the pull between them, a tension so sweet it was nearly unbearable. When she could deny the magnet’s tug no longer, their lips came together—at once relieving and inflaming that lovely ache. This was not the lusty need of their seat belt kiss, nor the giddy infatuation from the hotel porch, nor the public smooch on the practice court. This time, the press of his lips felt like a completion, the final note in the symphony.

And then Ethan’s mouth was in her hair, and she stretched her face to the sky, exposing the innocent, moon-kissed skin of her neck. He lifted her shirt, and his lips grazed a trail down her body. Weightless, she slipped through the hammock to the center of the earth. She kept free-falling, falling and falling and falling without a net in sight.