Work of Art (42 page)

I laughed. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“You promise, because
yesterday sort of felt too good to be true.”

I turned to face him, brushing his blond hair off of his forehead. “I love you just as much as I did last night, and I have a feeling that’s going to be something I’ll feel for a long time.”

“I hope you feel that way forever.”

I leaned forward and kissed him. “I think there’s a very good possibility of that.”

He pulled me close and tucked me into his chest, his warmth enveloping me and making me feel safe and comforted. I’d never felt like that with a man before, and it was such an amazing feeling.

“I love you, Harper Connelly,” he said softly.

I kissed his chest. “I love you too, Ryan. So much.”

“Do you have anywhere you need to be?” he asked me.

“Nope, I’m all yours.”

“Mine,” he said, and it made me smile. I liked that he was claiming me.

“Yours.”

“Forever.”

“Forever,” I repeated.

“Can I make you breakfast?”

“Sure, but let’s sleep more first,” I said just wanting to drift back to sleep. It was so cozy in his arms and under his covers that smelled like him.

“And then can we spend the day together?”

I smiled. “I’d like that. As long as you’ll let me go home and change first.”

“I can do that, but can you shower here?”

“I guess.”

He hugged me tighter. “Good, because I have a really amazing shower that I’d really like to explore with you.”

I laughed. “Sounds wonderful.”

* * *

An hour later, we finally got out of bed and made our way into the kitchen where Ryan sat me at the table with a glass of orange juice while he busied himself making coffee, pancakes and bacon. I watched him cook, imagining doing it every day for the rest of forever, and it made me so happy. The only thing that could have made it perfect would have been if our son was with us. He’d have been ten, and I could only imagine what he would look like and how much he would adore his father.

“What are you thinking about?” Ryan asked then, as he set a cup of coffee in front of me and kissed my lips. “
For the record, I will never get tired of doing that.”

“Me neither, so you’d better not
stop.”

“No way.”
He grinned. “You seemed miles away. Where were you?”

I shook my head. “I was thinking about Tyler. I think about him a lot.”

He nodded. “Me too.”

The silence between us was palpable as we were each lost in our own thoughts.

“I was thinking,” Ryan said, as he went back to the stove to tend to the sizzling bacon. “Could we maybe go visit him?”

I looked up in surprise. “You want to?”

He nodded his head a few times but didn’t look at me. “Yes, I’d like to, very much.”

I stood, walked over to him and wrapped my arms around his bare waist. I pressed my lips to his back and rested my head between his shoulder blades. “We can go today.”

“Okay,” Ryan said, and I thought he might have been crying, so I let him have his moment and just kept my arms around him. Lord knows I’d had my share of tears over the years.

Chapter Thirty-Two

Ryan

Harper drove us to the cemetery in North Beach, and all I could think when we pulled in was that my son
had been so close by for the past year, and I never even knew it.

She took my hand as we made our way through the headstones
, over the freshly cut grass, her other hand holding a bouquet of flowers. I glanced at some of the names and dates of the headstones we passed, but none of them were as young as Tyler had been, and my hand involuntarily gripped Harper’s hand tighter. She squeezed it back.

When we were halfway across the cemetery, she stopped just under the shade of a big oak tree, and I looked down to see the headstone that took my breath away. There was his name in block letters and the date he was born, February 11
th
. Then following it was the date he died, April 26
th
. He was just over three years old.

I tried to think back on what I’d been doing on February 11
th
ten years earlier, and I couldn’t remember. I’d been at Yale. Harper had told me he’d been born in the late afternoon, so I’d probably been in class when my son was taking his first breath. And three years later on April 26
th
, I’d been getting ready to graduate. I’d finished my entire degree in the time that Harper had birthed our child, raised him, loved him, held his hand when he was sick, and ultimately buried him, and I never fucking knew about any of it.

I wondered how long I’d get angry every time I thought about what I’d lost, what I’d missed out on, and what I could never get back. I couldn’t imagine the feeling ever leaving me.

Next to me, Harper dropped to her knees in front of the headstone and placed the flowers at the base.

“Hi sweetie, it’s Mommy,” she said softly
, and her words squeezed my heart. “I know it’s been a few weeks since I visited, but there’s been so much happening that I want to tell you about. And I brought someone with me this time. And no, it’s not Grandpa, but he’s doing well and sends his love. He’s working on a new car that I’m sure you would think was just the coolest, and I have no idea what he’s doing to fix it, but he’s happy. I actually brought someone who wanted to meet you so much when you were here, but he never got the chance.”

Harper tugged on my hand, so I dropped to my knees next to her, the tears welling in the backs of my eyes as I listened to her talk to our son.

“Ty,” she continued. “This is your daddy.”

Her voice broke when she said ‘daddy’, and she had to stop for a few seconds to collect
herself. I squeezed her hand, and she took a deep breath.

“A few weeks ago,” she said, her voice sounding so much stronger. “He walked into the parlor and surprised me. I hadn’t seen him in eleven years. Can you believe it? And then one
night I told him all about you and how special you were and how much I loved you.” She started crying then. “And I want you to know that I’m not going to be alone anymore, because he loves me so much, and I love him.”

She started to lose it, so I pulled her into my arms where she started sobbing, and it was all I could do to just try and comfort her as best I could.

“Hey Tyler,” I said after a few minutes of listening to Harper’s soft sobs. She couldn’t talk, so I’d do it for her, and just saying Tyler’s name out loud made me feel better. “I’m Ryan, I mean, I’m your daddy, and I just wanted you to know that I love you.”

I felt Harper pull away
and look up in surprise.

I looked down at her and asked, “Is this okay?”

She nodded, fresh tears shining in her eyes. “Yes. Do you want some time alone?”

I shook my head and held onto her, needing her there with me as I did one of the hardest things I’d done in my life.

“I wish we could have spent time together when you were here, but your mommy told me so many wonderful stories about how you used to paint with her, and you gave really good hugs, and you were such a good little boy. I know she did a good job being the best mommy for you, and I’m sorry I never visited you, but I didn’t know about you, and if I had, I would have been right there with you when you were growing up and when you were sick and when you were scared. I would have been right there with you.”

Harper pressed her lips to my collarbone, and whispered, “Thank you.”

I settled down onto the ground and pulled Harper between my knees, so her back was resting against my chest. I had a lot of things to tell my son, so I wanted to get comfortable.

“So, here are some things you should know about me. I’m twenty-nine, and I met your mom when we were just sixteen. I thought she was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen, and I still think that.” Harper looked back at me and smiled, so I kissed her. “Sorry if the kissing bugs you, but she just told me
yesterday that she loves, me so I’m kind of floating on air right now. Anyway, I’m a huge Red Sox fan, and that’s something I would have passed on to you, because the Red Sox are awesome. I’m originally from Boston, but I don’t have one of those funny accents. I love chicken wings and Dr. Pepper and Doritos, but only the original nacho cheese flavor.”

“Your daddy likes the same things you used to like,” Harper joked, and I squeezed her tighter.

“And your mommy is the most special woman on the planet, and you should be so proud that you knew her. I know I’m so much better off because of her. I know she probably never told you about me, but I’ll tell you the story of how we met and how I fell in love with her, because it’s a really good story.”

I started talking, holding Harper against me, as I shared the story of the first time I’d laid eyes on her. I’d never actually told her that I’d been crushing on her for a year before I asked her out, because she intimidated the crap out of me, and I’d been so shocked when she’d said yes. But I told Tyler about how I’d watched her from afar
for weeks, wondering what she was thinking as she drew in her sketchpad at lunch. I almost approached her several times, but I kept chickening out, and then I finally got up the nerve to talk to her and she almost rejected me. But then she’d let me in, and she’d never let me go.

“How come you never told me that story?” she asked.

I squeezed her tighter. “Because I was a proud sixteen year-old kid, and I was embarrassed that I’d been stalking you for so long. I didn’t need you to think I was crazy.”

She laughed. “You weren’t stalking me, and I wouldn’t have thought you were crazy. I would have thought you were adorable.”

“No, you would have thought I was nuts. You weren’t so forgiving back then.”

She laughed again. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

I kissed her neck. “It’s why I told you I loved you after two weeks. You didn’t know it, but I’d fallen in love with you long before.”

She turned to look at me. “But you never talked to me. We did that history project together, and you didn’t say two words to me for the next year.”

I laughed. “Yeah, I know. I told you, you were intimidating. You were smart and beautiful and sweet, and I got tongue-tied anytime I even thought about talking to you, so I just avoided you.”

“What gave you the courage to finally ask me out?”

“Oh, I really don’t want to tell you this,” I groaned, remembering that day all too well.

“Well, now you’d better tell me,” she threatened.

I sighed. “None of my friends knew how I felt, and they were assholes, so they bet me I wouldn’t go over and ask you out. They told me to do it, and then not pick you up for our date.”

She gasped out loud. “I knew it. I knew they put you up to it.”

“Yeah, they did, but what they didn’t know is that I had no intentions of ditching you. I was so thrilled that you said yes, that there was no way in hell I wasn’t taking you out and kissing you at the end of the date.”

“That was a great kiss,” she mused.

“Yeah, I know. Kissing has always been a gift of mine.”

She smacked my shin with her hand. “Don’t be a jerk.”

“Hey, you like my kisses, and now you can have them whenever you want.”

She settled back against my chest again. “Y
eah, that is pretty good. I think I’ll keep you around.”

“You couldn’t get rid of me if you tried.”

“I wouldn’t dare.”

At that, Harper and I
sat in each other’s arms and listened to the birds chirping nearby and the sounds of the city all around us, reminding us that we weren’t as isolated as we thought we were.

Sometime later,
she let out a big sigh and turned to me. “You ready to go?”

I nodded. “Yeah, I’m ready.”

“Ty, we’re going to head out, but we’ll be back,” she said then.

“It was good talking to you, buddy. I’ll take good care of your mom, okay?” I turned to Harper. “It should feel weird that I’m talking to thin air, but it’s really not.”

She took my hand as we started to walk out of the cemetery. “I like to think that he’s up in heaven listening. It makes the whole talking to someone who’s not here not so odd.”

We climbed into her Shelby
to drive back across the city.

“So what do we do now?” she asked me expectantly, looking over as she expertly navigated the hills I was still getting used to after almost a year.

“What do you mean?”

“Ryan, we’re together. This is huge. What do we do?”

I grinned at her enthusiasm. “We live our lives, together, like we should have been doing for the past decade.”

She grinned. “I like that idea.”