Love is a Beach: a romantic comedy

by Lilliana Anderson

  “Nervous and worried,” I mutter. “Yeah, that pretty much sums me up. I’m constantly in a tizz about what everyone around me thinks or feels. But no one’s really thinking about me, are they? Not even me, it seems.” With a shrug, I flip over the card. It’s a robed woman sitting on a throne with a crescent moon at her feet.

  “The High Priestess.” Betsy says this with a reverent breath and shining eyes.

  “That’s good?” Admittedly, I’m getting a little excited here. I’ve always thought this was such mumbo-jumbo, but the fact that the first two cards were exactly right gives me hope that this future card is right too. And there’s nothing wrong with hope, surely.

  “It is. And it’s one of my favourites. It’s all about feminine influence and wisdom and suggests that you have excellent intuition. If you’ll let your head trust the wisdom of your heart for a change, you’ll find yourself on a much better path than before.”

  “That’s easy to say. But when my heart and my head are both hurting, I’m not sure I can trust where any of these instincts are coming from.”

  Reaching across the table, she pats her hand on top of mine. “You already know what your heart wants, Darcy. Your head is telling you to be cautious. In this future position, the High Priestess suggests that you’re on a course to receive great rewards, which I believe you will. But, as with all paths that lead to success or happiness, there will be attempts to steer you off course, or push you back where you started. You need to reject those attempts, put yourself first for a change, and stay the course. Only then will you find your ultimate happiness.”

  “Even if my happiness results in my child’s unhappiness?” I pull my hand from hers and place both in my lap. “I don’t know if that’s something I can do.”

  Pressing her lips together, Betsy collects the cards, shuffles them again and places the deck in front of me. “Cut it,” she says.

  I do. Then she selects the card on top and places it in front of me. “The Lovers,” she says, and I actually roll my eyes.

  “Did you go through this and only put cards in there that tell me I should give this thing with Leo a shot?”

  “Is that your interpretation of things?” she asks, lifting her brow. “The Lovers actually means that you have a decision to make: a fork in your road. One leads to happiness, and one…does not. Take from that what you will, but the cards don’t lie.”

  “They don’t know everything either.”

  She shrugs. “And yet they keep saying the same thing: your happiness lies with understanding how incredible you are, Darcy. How beautiful you are on the inside and out. You are incredibly loveable. While a man won’t make you happy, having a man who sees the real you and loves what he sees will make all the difference. We all want and need love, Darcy, but happiness includes feeling buoyed by someone who values you, walks beside you and loves you unconditionally.”

  “And you believe that man is Leo?”

  “Yes. Your nana and I have always believed it’s Leo.”

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  LEO

  “So, you’re telling the neighbour’s kids that I’m a shitty person now?” I ask Niall as I sit beside him on the couch. He’s watching some movie on Stan, staying out of his room for a change. I take it as an opportunity to talk, placing a tub of Ben & Jerrys in front of him to get his attention. No matter his mood, the kid can’t say no to The Tonight Dough.

  He picks it up and tears through the plastic, his spoon in there before he answers. “We were talking. The topic came up. Didn’t say anything that wasn’t true.”

  “I think your version of the truth and mine are two very different things.”

  He shrugs. “I just call it like I see it.”

  “And how do you see it?”

  “You fucked up your own family, and now you’re moving in on theirs.”

  I sigh and wipe a hand over my face in exasperation before grabbing the TV remote and hitting pause. “I don’t want a substitute family, Niall. What I want is to fix my relationship with the one I have. But I don’t think you want to give me the chance.”

  “Well, forcing me to be somewhere I don’t wanna be isn’t helping your case, Leo. I had plans these holidays.”

  I don’t really know what to say to that. “I wanted to spend time with you before you go off to uni and can’t find time to come out here anymore.”

  “You mean before you can’t exercise your parental rights and force me here?”

  “Force.” I drop my eyes to the palm of my hand and run my thumbnail over a callous there. “Is it really that awful spending time with me?”

  “I don’t know, man. I’m not the one who abandoned his family when they got in the way of his big football career.”

  “You think I left because of my career? A simple Google search would tell you that wasn’t the case.”

  “It told me how mentally abusive you were to Mum. How you made her live like a pauper and wouldn’t let her have a career.”

  “None of that is true. I gave her everything she needed and more. I’ve continued to give her more. All I’ve ever wanted, Niall, is more time with you.”

  “Then maybe you shouldn’t have left. Maybe you should’ve gotten a different job.”

  “Yeah. Maybe I should have.” I bounce my shoulders and shake my head. I can’t say that I’ve never thought about that option. It would have been a hell of a lot easier on my relationship with my son. But what kind of a lesson would I teach him, staying in a loveless marriage with a person I can’t stand? I fucking hate these hopeless situations where you lose no matter what.

  Sitting back, I run my hands through my hair and let out my breath. “Listen, we only have a couple more weeks before these holidays are over and school is back. How about we call a truce, spend some time doing fun shit together, and see if maybe we can get along?”

  He shoves a spoon of ice cream in his mouth and talks around it. “Can we go skydiving?”

  “If that’s what you want, sure. I’ll take you skydiving.”

  He thinks for a moment, eating, thinking, then nodding his head. “OK.” He holds out his hand. “We’ll call a truce.”

  I take his hand and we shake on it.

  “Do you think you could try not to stir things up next door? Despite whatever reputation you think I may have, I like Darcy a lot.”

  “iPhone XR a lot?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Do you like her enough to get me an iPhone XR?”

  “To keep you quiet?” Just when I thought we were getting somewhere.

  He shrugs. “You want something. I want something. It’s a win-win.”

  “Jesus Christ.” The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. It’s like he’s channelling Tash. “I’m not bribing you, Niall. I’m asking you to do the right thing and not spread rumours. The rest is up to you.”

  “And I’m asking for a new phone.”

  I ease out my breath to stay calm. No one said this was going to be easy, and exploding at him when we just called a truce isn’t going to help. “What happened to your other phone?”

  “I lost it.”

  “When?”

  “I don’t know. Sometime this week.” He shrugs like it’s nothing.

  “And you’re only telling me this now?”

  “I was going to tell you earlier but you were too busy playing daddy to someone else’s kid.”

  I choose not to let that barb get to me. “OK. I’ll take you to get a new phone.”

  His brow quirks upward. “An iPhone XR?”

  “A 7 Plus. That’s the best I’m willing to do for you.”

  “Not even an 8?”

  We spend a few minutes haggling over which phone he wants. He talks me into an 8 Plus, and I trade him for visiting at least once a month and spending one week of the Easter holidays with me. It still feels a hell of a lot like bribery, but I’m trying to look at it as compromise.

  “Don’t make me regret this truce thing,” he says after a while, giving me
a sidelong glance.

  I laugh a little. We sit in silence, watching some martial arts film while I take what time with him I can get, happy for the absence of slammed doors and the loneliness that comes with sharing space with someone who won’t talk to you.

  “MORNING.” I sit on the bench next to the privacy screen when I see Darcy’s silhouette through the thatching, pulling my runners on my feet. “Not like you to be out here this early.”

  “I feel like I’ve been out here for hours. What time is it?”

  “A little after six.”

  “The sun is coming up,” she says, taking a seat on the bench on her side. We’re sitting back to back. When I look over my shoulder I can see pieces of her through the diamond shapes in the thatching. Her eye, her mouth… glimpses of beauty.

  “Something on your mind?”

  “I’m sure you heard the yelling yesterday.”

  “I did. Change isn’t easy on kids.”

  “Unless you’re Archer.”

  “Yes, well, he’s a fifty-year-old man in an eight-year-old body.”

  She chuckles. “A regular Benjamin Button.”

  “He’s good fun though.”

  “He made you a thank-you card for the bunks. He thinks they’re really cool.”

  “I’m glad. I’ll put it with the John Cena figurine he gave me.”

  “He gave that to you? I thought he still had it.”

  “That’s a different one,” I say. “Long story.”

  “It’s always a long story where Archer’s concerned. What are you doing up this early?”

  “Going for a run.”

  “Can your knee handle that?”

  “It’s a very slow jog, so yeah. I’m staying off the sand though.”

  “If you turn it into a walk, can I come with you?”

  I take a moment to study her eyes, they seem wide and conflicted, like there’s something she isn’t telling me.

  “Sure. That won’t get you into trouble though?”

  “My kids don’t get up until eight. We’ve got some time.”

  “A walk it is then.”

  By the time she grabs her shoes, I’m on the footpath outside her gate. She’s wearing a black pair of baggy pants that cuff at her ankles. Harem pants I think they’re called—don’t ask me how I know that. She has a pale yellow tank top on that hangs loose to her hips. Her blonde hair is pulled into a messy bun, and her sunburn isn’t as angry-looking today.

  “Don’t mind the face,” she says with a half-smile. “I haven’t had the chance to cover it.”

  “I could never mind your face,” I say in return, wondering for a second if that came out as a good thing to say or a bad thing. “I meant that I like your face no matter what.”

  She laughs. “Well, thank you. I like your face too.”

  We walk in quiet companionship until we reach the track that runs along the edge of the beach. There are a few people out running in the early morning light, but mostly, it’s just us and the birds.

  “We should do this more often,” I say after a while, catching her hand in mine and feeling my chest stutter with relief when she responds by entwining her fingers with mine.

  She takes a deep breath. “I think Nana and Betsy did some sort of spell on us,” she blurts out, and that’s the last thing I expected her to say, so I laugh in disbelief.

  “What?”

  “They did this chanting spell thing on New Year’s Day. They said it was to help cut emotional ties with Kevin and open my heart to new beginnings.”

  “OK?” I’m all for a little crazy, but crediting this thing between us to a spell is a little beyond my level of acceptance. “Do you believe in, uh, witchcraft?” I choose my words carefully.

  “What? No. That would be nuts.” Thank God we’re on the same page here. “But I think they do. And they keep letting it slip a few times that they’ve always thought you and I would be good together, like they’re patting themselves on the back or something.”

  “You think they got their little coven of witches together, cast a spell to make sure we found each other, and it worked?” I study her eyes a little closer, wondering if she’s been smoking her grandmother’s wacky-tobacky.

  “God, it sounds so ludicrous when you put it like that. I don’t think that, but it is weirding me out how quickly I’ve come…” She stops talking and presses her lips together, keeping her thought to herself.

  “You mean how quickly we’ve come to care for each other?”

  We stop walking and she nods, turning to face me. “Is that jumping too far? I mean, we’ve had, um—”

  “Sex,” I offer because I’ve grown used to her stumbling over her words and withdrawing a little every time our conversation focuses on anything intimate.

  “Yes. And, well, we’ve you know…”

  “Kissed, hugged, danced, held hands, slept against each other, and every time we touch it feels amazing?” I hold up our entwined hands as evidence, pressing a light kiss to her knuckles. Her eyes flutter closed.

  “Yes,” she whispers, and I can’t help myself. Lifting her chin with the index finger of my free hand, I press my lips to hers, sucking lightly, tasting the sweetness of her minty toothpaste and waking my body up in a way that only a kiss with a beautiful woman can.

  “Do you really think a spell created this, Darcy?”

  She keeps her face tilted up to mine and her eyes closed. “I’m struggling to care even if it did.”

  With a laugh, I brush my fingers along her cheek, being careful so I don’t abrade her tender skin. “I don’t think it was a spell. If those kinds of things existed, I don’t think we’d have a choice in the matter. And we certainly wouldn’t be capable of showing restraint for the sake of the children.”

  “I think you’re right. But do you want to know something strange?”

  “You know I do.”

  “Betsy read my tarot cards last night, and it was so eerily accurate I couldn’t sleep.”

  “What did they say?” My interest is definitely piqued here. Spells are bullshit as far as I’m concerned, but tarot is a different beast.

  “She got me to choose three cards. One each for past, present and future. Basically, they all said that I’m going through a huge change. That life as I knew it is over and I have a choice to make. One choice will lead to my happiness, and the other to, well, not my happiness.”

  “And you saw that as making a decision about you and me?”

  “Yeah. Well, wouldn’t you? I mean, if you believed in that stuff?”

  I gesture towards the park bench and we both sit, our bodies facing the power of the ocean, our knees pointed to each other, my arm draped behind her. It feels natural. Good. Real.

  “You know my mother passed a while back. A long battle with lung cancer. It was partially why I chose to quit playing. To take care of her.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  I give her shoulder a squeeze. “She was almost eighty when she died, which is why I think I get along so well with Esme. She reminds me of her.”

  “She does?”

  I nod. “We were very close. It was just her and me growing up, and she was…everything a mother should be. Patient, understanding, clever and funny. She always lived life outside the box. Never one for convention.”

  “I can definitely understand why you like Nana then.” She smiles.

  “Yes. Well, my mum also loved tarot and runes and horoscopes, stuff like that. She said it wasn’t magic, just a way to read the energy of the universe to help us make decisions. She even threw runes the day I had to choose which rugby club to play professionally for.”

  “Did you do what the runes told you?” She looks up into my eyes and I can’t help but lift my free hand to brush a few unruly strands of hair behind her ear. It feels so natural, this desire to take care of her.

  “I did. See, the thing about runes and tarot and whatnot, is that there aren’t any definitive answers. Each stone, or card, is open to interpretation
and there are positive and negative connotations for each. The symbols appear, and they make these vague suggestions, but it’s you who gives them meaning.”

  “Are you saying the cards could have meant anything?”

  “I’m saying they mean different things to different people. Everyone has some kind decision to make in any given moment, and what the cards do is bring your focus to that particular decision. Think of it like a therapy session.”

  “A therapy session?” Now she’s looking at me like I’m the crazy one.

  I laugh. “Just hear me out, OK? Say you find a counsellor and tell them you need help because you’ve just gone through a marriage breakdown, and now you’re faced with choosing between what you think is right for your kids and what you think is right for yourself.”

  “That’s exactly what I would say to a counsellor.”

  “And it’s the question you were asking when Betsy read your cards too, wasn’t it?”

  She tilts her lips down a little and nods once.

  “When the cards were flipped, what they did was guide you to the answers you already had inside you—same as a therapist.”

  “You think people should consult tarot instead of seeking therapy?” She narrows her eyes.

  I laugh and cover my eyes with my hand. “That’s not what I’m saying at all.”

  “I know that.” She pulls my hand back down and presses a kiss right in the centre of my palm. I want to close my hands and hold on to the sensation of the soft touch of her lips as long as I can. “I just don’t know what my answers are.”

  I stretch out my legs and cross my feet at the ankles. “Well, lucky no one’s forcing you to make a decision right now then, huh? We’ve got bunches of time.”

  She rests her head on my shoulder with a sigh. “No one really knows how much time they have, Leo. This past year, thinking Kevin might die at any moment taught me that.”

  “What are you saying?” God, I hope she’s saying what I think she’s saying.

  “I’m saying that I want this: you and me.”

  “What about the kids? I thought you wanted to wait.”