Blossoms of The Heart

by Khardine Gray

This summer though, things were different. Things were different because I knew that there was every chance that next summer life would be different.

  She was starting college. I was so proud of her. She got into Yale.

  And, me I was going to be a Marine. I was being shipped out to Iraq in a few weeks. It was exciting and I looked forward to it but what I didn’t look forward to was the fact that time was passing.

  Suddenly we’d all gotten older and to what my dad referred to as that mental pause in life that made you stop and think. And, maybe… maybe do things you were scared to because you may not get the chance to do them again.

  All summer I’d watched Phoebe. I got her a present this year, a special one for a special birthday.

  I just waited around all day and hadn’t given it to her yet.

  And here I was again waiting outside the summer house where she and her family stayed.

  I hid behind the cherry blossom tree outside her window like a peeping Tom.

  Akito was doing some sort of movie night so everyone was supposed to be heading to the main house.

  Phoebe and her mom were inside the summer house. They’d been here for over an hour.

  I’d heard Phoebe complain about having stomach cramps when we were at dinner, so her mom brought her back here. I followed conspicuously behind.

  Waiting. For all I knew her mom could have decided to stay with her. I was hoping though that she’d leave her behind.

  I wanted to talk to Phoebe in private. Definitely not with her mom around. That woman hated me. I didn’t know how a guy as cool as Phoebe’s dad had ended up with a snobby nosed bitch like Patrice Walker.

  I didn’t go around calling people’s mother’s bitches. Thought it was completely disrespectful but that woman was absolutely one.

  Like the fucking alien queen, except she was worse.

  She’d had it in from me from day one. Always, she looked down on me. Down her fucking nose like I was shit she’d stepped in.

  Maybe to her I was and it bothered me a lot, but tonight I needed to push that aside. Tonight was important. It was important that I saw Phoebe.

  I watched on and thanked God a few minutes later when I saw the door open and she came out locking the door behind her.

  Phoebe wasn’t with her.

  Good.

  I waited until Patrice walked down the pavement and disappeared down the garden path before I made my move. The door would be locked so I used the window in the sitting room and just hopped inside.

  The scent of roses filled me. That and something else that was sweet. Like candy.

  I made my way up the stairs to Phoebe’s room where I found her crying.

  I wasn’t sure if the stomach cramps were an excuse or if she really was in pain so I rushed up to her.

  “Phoebe are you okay?”

  She got up so quickly she nearly bumped into me as I lowered to her.

  “You’re here.” She looked at me in disbelief.

  “I am.” I nodded and held her gaze as she searched my face. “Stomach cramps?”

  Her cheeks flushed. “No, I’m okay.”

  “Yeah, so why are you bawling your eyes out on your birthday?”

  She looked away from me and another tear ran down her cheek.

  “Phoebe.” I prodded.

  “I can’t do it.”

  “What’s that?” It was unfair to make her suffer when I knew what it was she couldn’t do. She’d wanted to tell me something now for the last two years and never did.

  “Nothing.” She replied in a meek voice.

  I stood up. Her eyes followed my every move.

  “Phoebe Alyssa Walker, you’re eighteen years old. You’re a woman now. Am I supposed to wait until I’m an old man before you tell me this thing you’ve wanted to tell me for the last two years now?” I should tell her. Tell her how I felt. The way I said that though I hoped it was enough of a hint that I was trying to make it easier for her.

  She sucked in a breath and held on to it.

  God, I knew more than anyone that all manner of things happened when you went to college. I just graduated and it was like I’d lived a whole lifetime. The summers in between were the only thing that resembled some normalcy for me. I wasn’t a saint, but maybe I’d grown up a little over the last year.

  What I did know though was this innocent being who had feelings for me would change.

  She would grow up and have her pick of men who would chase her, and she might not even remember me when next summer came along. I doubted that I would have been able to just book leave just like that in the Marines. Dad was sometimes away for months.

  I stretched out my hand to her and she took it and stood too. Her hands shook then trembled when I brought it up to my lips to kiss it. Her skin was so soft and smelled just like that candy scent I smelled downstairs.

  “You get one more question as it’s your birthday. One question and a wish.”

  She smiled even though tears still ran down her cheek. “Really? You would give me another question and a wish?”

  It was rare. We always played twenty questions and somehow I’d manage to fool her and get her to use up her twenty questions in just a few turns.

  “It’s a special birthday. I also have a gift for you.” I had a fucking good gift for her. It was actually better than what I gave my mom for her birthday earlier in the year.

  “You have a gift?” she gasped.

  “Yes princess.”

  “I’ll treasure it forever.” She beamed.

  Somehow I didn’t doubt that.

  “You better. You might forget who I am by next year.”

  She shook her head and that gorgeous mass of hair I’d always wanted to run my hands through brushed against her shoulders. It had just grown past the length where her mother would usually insist on her cutting it.

  “Never. That’s ridiculous. I can’t.”

  “Okay. Question, then wish, then present .” I smiled. “Make it count Princess Phoebe. Who knows when we’ll play this game again.”

  She looked down to where or hands joined, nervously. When she looked back to me she seemed more scared than when I got here.

  “Jesus, Phoebe. Let me make it easier for you.” I wanted to hear her say it. I didn’t know why but I did. “I know. Now your question is what.”

  She pulled in a breath and kept her blue gaze on me. “What, do you know?”

  Now the scary, fear, trembling emotions were diverted to me. “I know how you feel Phoebe. I know how you feel about me.”

  Her cheeks colored fiercely but at least she didn’t have that frightened look anymore.

  “You do?”

  I gave her a look of askance. Her feelings were probably obvious to everyone who wasn’t her.

  “I do.”

  “I…”

  “Phoebe I feel the same about you.”

  She gave me a look of disbelief. “Me?”

  That right there. That was why I liked her. She looked at me like I was the best thing that ever happened to her.

  I wasn’t stupid enough to allow such a look to go unnoticed, or to not appreciate it.

  “You. What’s you’re wish princess?”

  A little smile tugged at the curve of her gorgeous mouth. “My first kiss.”

  I would be lying if I said I wasn’t shocked. I wanted to kiss her so I set her up with the wish. But I would never have guessed that she’d be asking me for her first kiss.

  Fuck.

  “You’re first kiss?”

  “You, I want it to be with you.”

  I moved in before she could say another word. My lips to hers. Her soft, soft, virgin lips.

  I kissed her slow at first showing her how to kiss me, then I thrust my tongue into her hot wet mouth to explore her. She pressed her dainty hands to my chest and the simple touch made me lose it. I took hold of her waist and pulled her towards me. We both fell down onto her bed together where I continued to kiss her.

  It got intense a
nd hotter and we both lost ourselves in the kiss. I hadn’t intended on doing anything further than the kiss but suddenly my T-shirt came off and so did her blouse. I took a second to admire her gorgeous breasts in her little bra.

  I must have lost my mind because I should have heard the footsteps coming. There was always a loud creak on the stairs.

  It was too late by the time the door swung open and I heard something smash against the floor.

  Phoebe and I jumped apart.

  I looked up in horror to find Patrice standing over by the door, face, ghost pale.

  “What the hell are you doing in here with my daughter!” she screamed.

  “Mom, it’s my fault.”

  I grabbed my shirt and shrugged into it quickly.

  “Did he touch you?” She rushed over to Phoebe and took hold of her arm.

  “Let go of me.” Phoebe cried.

  “I’m being serious, did he touch you?” she demanded.

  “I didn’t touch her.” I balked. Fucking woman was looking at me as if I had some kind of disease.

  She whirled around to face me, and poor Phoebe started crying. I wasn’t the guy to have a soft spot but my heart broke when I looked at her and saw the sadness in her eyes.

  “You.” Patrice pointed at me. “You are scum. She’s eighteen. How dare you think you can come in here and touch her. My daughter won’t be with someone like you. A tattooed freak with no ambition, and purpose in life. Worthless and no good. How dare you touch her?”

  “Mom stop it.” Phoebe cried.

  “You’re blinded by love child.”

  Patrice launched into a tirade of insults but I kept my eyes on Phoebe.

  Blinded by love. Was she?

  I loved her too.

  This was probably going to be good bye. I didn’t think I would see her again after this, and if I did things wouldn’t be the same.

  “Tai.” Phoebe called for me as I walked out the door.

  “You stay away from my daughter. You hear me! Stay away.”

  Patrice must have said the same thing ten times. But all I could hear was Phoebe calling for me.

  Her present was still in my back pocket.

  Chapter 20

  Tai

  Present day…

  Akito told me she was down by the beach. Gone out for a night swim.

  I knew where to find her.

  No way was Phoebe going to be swimming in the actual sea at this time.

  There was still a hint of light in the sky from the longer days but it was dark enough so that you wouldn’t want to venture into the sea.

  There was a little cave we used to play in as kids. There were two ways to get there. down the path that branched off from one of the gardens. Or by walking down along the beach. She would have walked along the beach.

  The water ran into the cave in a little pool and the cave itself curved into an arch. Perfect for the seclusion.

  Akito had placed solar lights inside so we could come down here at night. he’d also grown lilies on the side.

  As I walked in I smiled when I saw a set of clothes resting on of the large boulders. A little skirt and a t-shirt.

  By the edge where I could have walked in there was a little collection of shells.

  I waited for a few seconds and up Phoebe came piercing through the surface. Hair slicked back skin glimmering in the amber lights.

  Surprise tickled her face when she saw me, but I also saw a little smile which disappeared just as quickly as it appeared.

  “What are you doing swimming out here by yourself at this time.” I scolded rolling the sleeves up on my T-shirt. Her eyes went to my forearms as I crouched and she scanned over the Japanese characters for love.

  “Pretending to be a mermaid.” She smiled sweetly and opened her palms to show me some little stones she found.

  “Pretty.”

  “What are you doing here at this hour?” her smile widened.

  “Looking for you.”

  “If its’ to talk about complication, asses or fucking I’m not interested. I’m going to be a mermaid for the next hour. You can come back then or I’ll just see you tomorrow at the cave. But I still don’t want to talk about asses or fucking.”

  “Jesus Christ Phoebe.”

  “What?” she grimaced resting her arms on the rock while she fluttered her legs behind her.

  “Ass fucking. That’s what I heard.”

  Her cheeks colored and we both burst out laughing.

  “I meant two separate things.” She chided.

  “I heard it as one thing. Literally.”

  “But it was separated by the word, or. Ass’s or fucking.”

  “Phoebe just stop please.”

  “It’s your fault I talk like this. No one talks like this except you, I’m just speaking your language. It’s my thing right? Languages.”

  I shook my head at her enjoying this.

  “It’s your thing.” I gazed down at her, at the beautiful creature she was. “Can you take a break from being a mermaid for a few minutes. I swear I won’t take you away from the water for too long.”

  She pressed her lips together, thought for a moment and then pushed away from the rock and swam over to the shallow.

  My lungs tightened again from the sight of her getting out of the water.

  There was no way I could have looked at her in any other way than I was right now.

  The turquoise bikini strings I’d seen on her arms while she was in the water were attached to a metallic blue looking blue bikini that left nothing to my imagination when it came to wondering what her tits looked like.

  It covered enough, covering her nipples but I could see a slight hint of her areola.

  Then as if that wasn’t bad enough my eyes dropped to the flat of her stomach to the belly button bar in her navel. That hosted two turquoise stones.

  On her left hip was a little hummingbird in the same colors. That was her color from way back when. Shades of blue with everything in between. Just like her eyes.

  She didn’t need to pretend to be a mermaid. She was exactly that. A beautiful siren, capturing me with her call. Captivating me with her beauty.

  There was no one else like this woman for me because hell, only she had ever had this effect on me.

  We can love a lot of people in our lives, but this…what I felt was something I couldn’t quite describe.

  Like a drug it entered every cell of my body and I wanted more. I wanted more.

  I wanted her.

  My eyes trailed down the rest of her body, running down her smooth legs and the row of laurel leaves tattooed around her feet.

  Jesus, sexy was just the beginning of her.

  My mouth went dry and I knew I should move or say something but all I could do was stare.

  She walked over to the wall and rested against it, pressing her palms flat on either side of her.

  “Are you going to stand there and just watch me?”

  “Can do, I don’t exactly mind.”

  “But you wanted to talk.”

  Talking was the furthest thing on my mind. Not with her hard nipples practically fighting to escape the meagre fabric that held them in place.

  She saw me looking at her breasts and I never looked away. That wasn’t me. I was the kind of guy whereby you didn’t have to think or wonder if I was

  starring at your ass or tits, you’d know.

  “You’re beautiful.” I stated on the edge of a labored breath feeling my cock stir and trying my hardest to control my emotions.

  “You know this flirting is unnatural if it’s not real.” Pain flickered in her eyes and I wondered how anyone could think to hurt her.

  What man in his right mind cheated on someone like her. A woman who was everything. I wanted to kill her ex, and I didn’t even know him.

  I was so protective over her when we were younger, and I thought I was still being protective by staying away from her.

  I walked up to her, towering her magnificence wit
h my height and reached out to touch the ends of her hair.

  This was it. The line I would cross as I made my decision.

  Nothing really had happened so far with us in the time that she’d been here, only internal turmoil. I didn’t want that anymore.

  I wanted to see what we could have had, just like Mitsuke had said.

  I might have been a whole five years older but Mitsuke was wise beyond her years. Definitely a woman who had her head screwed on.

  More importantly she knew me. Sometimes more than I knew me.

  She knew that the answer to all of this was it killed me to not know what would have happened if I’d gotten a chance with Phoebe.

  “It’s real.” There, line crossed. Intention stated.

  She gazed up at me in silence, taking me in. I thought it was the perfect time to reach into my pocket and give her the present I should have given her eleven years ago.

  I released the coil of hair that I’d had looped around my thumb and held out the little navy pouch to her.

  “What’s this?” She took it and smiled.

  “Your birthday present.”

  “My birthday’s not till August.” Her smile widened. “Is this you giving me an early present so you don’t forget on the day?”

  That wasn’t a date I was likely to forget, given what it signified eleven years ago. “The twentieth of August, princess.”

  Her lips parted, and her brows raised. “You remember?”

  “I never forgot.” I didn’t usually remember stuff like that but for her I did because her birthday for her was like a national holiday. “That’s a very late present. Eleven years late.”

  She held my gaze as her lips parted. Realization dawned on her face. She knew the only present I could mean was the one I never got to give her.

  Her eyes glistened with tears and her grip tightened on the pouch. She blinked several times then looked down at the pouch and opened it.

  Phoebe sucked in a sharp breath when she reached in and pulled out a silver chain with a white shiny pearl attached to it.

  She gasped. “It’s a pearl, like an actual pearl.”

  “Yeah. Found it off the coast of Fiji, the spring of that year and I thought it’d make a good eighteenth birthday present for you.”

  Before I could even finish she’d thrown her arms around me. “I love it. Thanks so much.” She said against my chest. Then when we pulled apart we just kissed on instinct like that was normal. As if it was habit.