“Today was a good day,” I said, and leaned back in my chair, looking up at the night sky.
Jill reached over and took my hand. “Every day with you is a good day, my love.”
We watched the sky in companionable silence. A few minutes later a white streak raced from behind us towards the far horizon.
“Shooting star!” Jill said happily.
“Yup.”
“Do you remember when we floated in the pool watching shooting stars the week we met?”
I gave a small smile to the heavens. “How could I ever forget the night you decided we were going to have a one-week stand?”
I didn’t blame her for asking. My memories of that time could be a little fuzzy, due to my brain injury, but I clearly remembered the night Jill took charge. She’d decided on the direct approach to overcome my reluctance that had been entirely due to my fear of relationships and had seduced me in a swimming pool in Virginia Beach. It had been an extremely hot night, and not because it had been in July.
“Well you were being all… you, and I didn’t want to waste anymore of the time we could have been together.”
“You’re always the wiser of us when it comes to our relationship,” I agreed. “I’m glad you took charge.”
“Speaking of being in charge, stand up.”
“What?” I turned to look at her.
“You heard me. I’m still in charge this weekend, right?”
“Uh… yeah.”
“So, stand up. Go over to the other side of the fire so I can see you better.”
“Alright.”
I pushed my way up out of my chair, my knees cracking just like my dad’s used to, and walked around to the other side of the fire pit.
“You’re so pretty,” Jill sighed.
I flushed and looked down at myself. Before dinner, Jill had graciously allowed me to shower again, as gardening in the morning had been sweaty work. When I’d gotten out of the shower she’d had another of my old body-building outfits laid out for me, this one purple, but she’d also let me have a pair of jeans to wear while cooking her dinner.
“Uh… thanks.” I ran my hand self-consciously over my non-existent abs.
“I mean it. You’re the prettiest woman I know.”
“Then you need to spend more time looking in the mirror, Blue.”
“Take your jeans off, you flatterer.”
“What?”
She rolled her eyes. “Stop pretending you didn’t hear things and take ’em off, Jo. I’m in charge, remember?”
“Oookay, but it isn’t going to be that sexy.”
I had to sit down in one of the chairs across the fire pit from Jill to work the jeans over my prosthetic foot, then tossed them over the back of the chair, and stood back up.
“Mmmm, yummy.”
She reached over to the ground and picked up something. It was her sketchbook. Then she took the phone out of the pocket of her dress, touched the screen a few times and music started playing. I could tell it was our playlist of potential songs for the Blue Birds, ones we hadn’t arranged for ourselves yet. She set her phone on the arm of her chair and looked back at me.
“Okay, now the rest.”
“You want me to do a strip tease?” I asked uncomfortably.
“No, baby. I know that isn’t your jam. The music is just for mood.”
I grunted in relief. Jill had given me a lap dance on more than one occasion, she was the sensual, girly one in our relationship. My idea of dancing was head banging over my guitar to Hole or jumping in the air while soloing to Guns N’ Roses. I appreciated that she wasn’t going to force me too far out of my comfort zone.
I pulled the sports bra over my head and tossed it into the chair, then started pulling down my boy shorts.
“Stop!”
“What?” I said, confused.
“Leave them right there.”
I let go of the fabric and straightened up, the shorts halfway down my thighs.
“Perfect!” She flipped open her sketchbook. “Now, feet just a little wider apart… Yes, now one hand on your hip… perfect.” She started sketching furiously. I grinned.
“You going to draw me like one of your French girls?” I said it every time I’d caught her drawing me, just because I enjoyed the reaction I knew it would bring.
“I’m not Leonardo, I have no problem dating girls over twenty-five, as evidenced by this.” She held up her left hand and clicked her wedding ring with the pencil she held in her right. She took a long look up and down my body.
“This isn’t working. Sit down. No, not in the chair, on the arm.” She flipped to the next page in her sketchbook. “Yes, now cross your leg… no wait go ahead and lose the shorts… no wait…”
I laughed in frustration. When Jill wanted to do some serious artwork, there were always lots of instructions until she got exactly what she wanted. I had a feeling I might be here a while, and I wasn’t really used to being naked outdoors. The last time I’d gotten naked around the fire pit, we’d brought out the baby monitor to make sure our then toddler son didn’t get out of bed and walk out on us. And she’d been naked first that night.
“Take off your shoes.”
“Okay…” It took me a minute to get the cross trainer off my prosthetic, then I took off the other and tossed them in the neighboring chair.
“Now, shorts down, but cross your leg over. No, your left leg. And leave your shorts hanging off the toe.”
I assumed the pose. I was glad I’d sanded and refinished the chairs over the winter and that the wide arm of the chair wasn’t too rough, given the parts of me in contact with it.
I did feel a little uncomfortable though. Jill had sketched, painted and even photographed me hundreds of times over the years. But very few had been overtly sexual. And none of those had so prominently featured my fake foot. There had been a time when I’d first gotten it that I worried it would turn her off, but I’d long since overcome that fear. She’d never shown the slightest squeamishness about it. In fact she’d been more accepting of it than I had at first.
“How’s–”
“Shhh!” Her hand was flying back and forth across the page. Every time she looked up at me to get a reference, I saw the look in her eyes. She was in the zone. She made art almost every day, but the zone was a rarer occurrence. I knew better than to break her concentration now.
So I simply sat and watched her.
She was still as beautiful to me as the day we met. She had prominent laugh lines around her eyes that hadn’t been there then. Whereas I’d gotten a little thicker, Jill had that weird metabolism that kept her skinny as a rake. She’d gone up two sizes after having Eric, but within a year she was back to wearing her old wardrobe. I’d actually liked it when she’d put on a little around her corners, but I’d never told her. I didn’t want to make her self-conscious about being skinny.
The Santino Surfer’s song Turtle Dance came on her phone, and I closed my eyes, letting the vibe transport me. I imagined floating through space, hand in hand with Jill. We’d worked on a version of this song, but it was less of a technical piece, more… feeling. I’d had a hard time getting it down, the lack of rhythmic-ness to it. Not Jill though, she’d nailed her part. She’d come so far as a musician.
I opened my eyes to look at my Blue Girl again. She was seriously into her work now. I could tell because the tip of her tongue was poking out of the corner of her closed lips.