Page 66 of Lucas & Melissa Falling in Love
She nods. “All we need is time. Or rather all I need is time. I can work anything out with some time and preparation,” she says.
I laugh.
“You know I am madly in love with you.” I hadn’t planned to say it, gave it no forethought, but the sentiment escaped as if it had been trapped too long and needed to fly free.
“I know you’re madly in lust with me for sure,” she says thoughtfully, seemingly unaffected emotionally. “Maybe you’re falling in love, but it’s too soon, Lucas. We’ve had so little time to get to know each other—no, tobewith each other.”
“I know it’s soon, but I know you,” I say. And I do. Maybe better than she knows herself and that’s the problem. I pull her close, under the covers. “I understand your struggle. even though it seems now like I’ve forgotten how to be patient and understanding. I promise I’ll do better. It’s just—” I pause, feeling like we’re at that same crossroads we were at that morning only a couple of weeks ago when she told me our affair was over, when she told me that I was no more than a temporary distraction. I know it’s not the same now.
“What is it? Tell me,” she says. But I don’t talk. After several beats, she fills the void.
“Your father’s health emergency couldn’t be helped,” she says. “But it’s forced us to make decisions that it’s not time to make. We have so much to do, to learn, a process to go through. Maybe we aren’t ready to—”
“I’m ready,” I whisper, once again ahead of her in our relationship and feeling the emotional panic rising, not wanting to lose this chance, not wanting to ride this roller coaster for fear of my own heart having an attack from the stress.
She stares at me, shuttering the view to what she’s feeling, closing in, protecting herself from vulnerability, letting her fears get to her. I tell myself it’s to be expected. I’ve uprooted her without notice and dragged her to the other side of the Atlantic, introduced her to my family, introduced her to a side of me she had no idea existed.
“Of course you’re overwhelmed.” I take a deep breath. “You need time to assimilate who I am and how that affects us. The idea of us you had is now obsolete.”
“You have a way with words,” she quips, raising one side of her mouth in a half smile. “But I’m not overwhelmed. I’m never overwhelmed. I can handle anything and everything—in its time and in the order of importance. It’s like life triage. I handled the failure of my business without going bankrupt, without getting overwhelmed, didn’t I? Now that the immediate crisis of your father’s heart attack has passed, I’m focusing on my current obligations . . . and my bank account. Or more precisely, lack thereof.”
“Let’s think past that,” I say. “We need to.”
She shakes her head and says, “First things first.” She’s orderly in the extreme and I’m afraid she’s not going to be budged.
“Fine. I can help you through your immediate needs.”
She looks at me with skepticism and finally a suppressed smile wins out.
“You’re going to be relentless about this, aren’t you?” Her face softens then and she leans into me. “Aboutus?”
I nod and nuzzle her earlobe.
“I think it’s a good thing that you are. A good thing that at least one of us is focused onusat all times. I heard once that’s the secret to a long . . . relationship.”
I know she was going to say longmarriage, but I keep the pleasant flip in my gut to myself. She’s not ready to talk about that and I promise myself, swear on my family’s crest, that I will not be the first to bring it up. It goes against everything in me to wait for her, to let her take the lead on this, but I know it’s the right thing to do with Melissa.
She’s so skittish I feel like I’m on thin ice, ready for our affair to sink to the bottom of her priorities—again. I’m not sure if she’s still trying to prove something to her phantom father or whether it’s just who she is. Relentlessly independent. Prideful. Ambitious.
An hour later, holding Melissa in my arms as she purrs lightly in her sleep, like a kitten, I give up the idea that I can sleep tonight. Retreating from her, I leave the bed, lean over once to kiss the corner of her mouth, then throw on a robe. I need to do some serious thinking, some work, the kind of planning Melissa thrives on.
I need to put my mind to work and solve this problem properly. It’s not only a problem of the heart, I realize, maybe not a problem of the heart at all. It’s more of a logistics problem, maybe with some scars and lingering doubts from our pasts, both Melissa’s and mine. Maybe we’ve both been guilty of having something to prove. But now it’s time to work out the logic with cool reason. I know I can appeal to Melissa with this approach.
I’m convinced she only needs some time and that I can find a way to make time for her.
My father’s study is the only place I think to go to work. He won’t be there tonight. He won’t be there at night for a long while. The thought tugs at me, at the nostalgia of those nights when I was young and he was always there, in his study. The realization hits me that I thought he would always be there, that I’ve taken him for granted. Too much. I can’t afford to do that any longer.
But I can’t afford to let Melissa go, to let what we have go. The need I have for her is a real live thing that I can’t ignore. So, as I go down the stairs and through the dark hall to my father’s office, I’m determined to work through a plan. I’ll need to look at some of his files, some of the business financials and production schedules, and his calendars.
By the time I push through the heavy wood door of his office into the high-ceilinged room, I’m geared up, my mind revving with questions that need answering and a direction to go in, a path to follow once I have the facts and know the obstacles.
That’s how I spend the night, sitting at my father’s desk in front of his computer, reconfiguring the workings of Fierro Motor Company, at least in theory. When dawn shows through the tall arched window, I shut down the computer. A slight smile curves my mouth as I return upstairs to my bed, to Melissa.
