Today we were floating down the river on tubes with Doug, Brian, and Liz.
We packed a cooler with drinks, put on a tiny Bluetooth radio, tied our tubes together, and went drifting.
Brian, Liz, and Doug had broken off and were behind us, upriver a few yards. Daniel and I were alone, holding hands.
“It’s so beautiful here,” I said, tipping my head back to look at the branches arching over the river.
“You should see it in the autumn. All the beauty falling down around you.”
“I’ve never done anything like this,” I said quietly. “It’s so relaxing.”
“Never been to a drive-in, never floated down a river,” he said, smiling. “What kind of stuff did you do as a kid?”
I shrugged. “We summered in New England usually.”
He laughed. “Why does this not surprise me?”
I smiled. “Hey, don’t make fun of me.”
“Did you have a governess?”
I flicked water on him. “It was an au pair, actually, and it sounds fancier than it is.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Hey, I don’t hold your childhood against you,” I teased.
“Maybe you should try it. You like holding things against me.”
He leaned over, slipped fingers into the back of my hair and kissed me, and the whole world disappeared around us. It was always like this, the complete and total submersion into Daniel. It got me every time.
Doug made a sharp whistling noise from behind us. “Hey! Keep it clean!”
We laughed and sat back into our tubes.
I looked at Daniel. He was so handsome. He had on dark blue swim trunks and sunglasses, his tattooed forearms popping against the black tube. His body was defined and toned, his hair wet and slicked back.
He got hit on a lot. A lot.
I saw girls look at him all the time. Even when he was checking in guests, he’d get smiles that I knew were more than just smiles.
I wondered how fast he’d move on once I was gone. A few weeks? A month?
It was like he was reading my mind.
“So the hospital vote is tomorrow, right?” he asked.
I nodded. “Yeah. At six.”
“And then what happens?”
I raised my foot out of the water and let droplets drip into the river off my toes. “And then if I get it, I’ll start my new job a few days after that.”
He went quiet for a moment. “You said eighty hours a week, right?”
“Maybe more.”
Even with his sunglasses on, I could still see the light fading from his eyes. Or maybe it was the light fading from mine.
We were nearing the end.
There were two ways we could do it. Break things off cleanly and just stop talking—or let it die a slow and painful death.
We’d put it on life support, try to keep things going, and it would delay the inevitable. His texts would go unanswered because I’d be too busy to reply. I’d make plans to go see him once or twice a month and then end up canceling when I got called in. We’d try to talk, but I’d be too tired. I’d get invited to holidays and celebrations with parents who wouldn’t have him, so he couldn’t come.
Then maybe he’d meet another woman. And he’d tell me this. And then it would be over.
Eventually everything good we had would be strained and faded. And I would have wasted yet more of his time. So I was planning on a quick, clean break. After all, those were the ones that healed fastest, right?
I gazed out over the river. Dragonflies darted around. I could smell freshly cut grass and some kind of flower. Cicadas were buzzing. The leaves on the maples were dark green, and the days were long and warm and bright. I wondered what this place looked like in the fall and winter.
I wondered what Daniel looked like in those seasons too. But I wouldn’t be here to find out.
I’d been listening to Lola’s eleventh and last album on repeat, the one she made before she got sober and started producing. She must have been going through something similar when she wrote it because it was all about lost love. Songs about being torn apart and heartbroken. She had a bonus track at the end. A cover of “Love Song” by The Cure. This crooning, sad, slow rendition that made my heart feel like it was crying.
You could feel Lola through her music, like her emotions streamed out of her voice. She was so raw and vulnerable, and I knew, even without meeting her, how remarkable she was. I knew why Derek fell in love with her.
“Why didn’t you ever marry him?” Daniel asked out of nowhere, breaking into my thoughts.
“Huh?” I looked over at him. He was peering at me from his tube.