Plight(5)

"I still do," I blurted, stepping next to Danielle and pulling her to my side. "In fact, we are already engaged."





What. The. Actual. Fuck?




       
         
       
        
The air from within my lungs wooshed from my body like a balloon with a puncture that had been let loose around the room. I tried to open my mouth, to object, to speak  …  to just bloody take in another breath, but I couldn't. I couldn't do anything but register Elliot's warm, hard, body somewhat adhered to my tiny frame.

My God he smelled good; clean and earthy, a bit like the garden but in a yummy kind of way. And my god he looked good, too, just like his profile picture, but in an extra yummy kind of way.

I couldn't help but stare at him for a moment, adrift in sea-blue eyes and hair as black as ink that was somehow both neat and dishevelled. And for a second I wondered how it came to be that way, my fingers twitching and desperate to sweep it from his face so that I could study the chiselled contours of his jaw and the softness of his lips.

"You're what?"

I turned my head in the direction of Elliot's mother, Helen, who'd screeched her surprise as she halted only metres away from us, two paint tins dangling from her hands.

My eyes bounced from her stunned face, to my mother's equally stunned face, to Elliot's God-knows-what-expression face, and back to Helen's, whose mouth and eyes were slowly morphing into an incredulous smile.

"REALLY?" she shouted, lowering the tins to the ground. "You're both getting married? To each other? Oh my goodness, there is a God, and he's finally listened to my prayers." She ran toward Elliot and me and threw her arms around us, squeezing so tight that I was sure I was only seconds away from passing out. "How has this happened? I didn't even know you were both still in touch let alone dating."

"We  …  we aren-" I stuttered but then choked on my words when she burst into tears.

Big.

Ugly.

Tears

 …  of absolute joy.

"I just can't believe it," she sobbed. "My Elliot marrying his Danielle." Helen released her grip and placed both her hands on either side of Elliot's face. "I'm just so  …  so happy for you both." She turned to my mother and gestured that she, too, join the lovefest. "Jeanette, are you hearing this? It's our dream come true!"

Mum's jaw was slack. Open. Almost detached from her face. Wisps of her greying, brunette, shoulder-length hair had fallen free of her ponytail and were covering widened eyes.

She blew them out of her line of sight with a puff. "I'm hearing it. I'm just  …  confused." Mum stepped closer and mimicked Helen's hold of Elliot's face by doing the same to me, her sceptical eyes, piercing and accusatory. "Danielle? Why didn't you tell me?" Because it's not freakin' true. 

I wanted to cry, to punch Elliot, to grab the shovel leaning against the wheelbarrow and dig myself a grave. I wanted to die.

"I  …  I didn't because it's not-"

"Because it's still new for us," Elliot interrupted, slicing my confession like a guillotine. He pulled me to his side again, but this time his grip was harder, stiff  …  seemingly panicked. "We're still testing the waters of our relationship and wanted to wait before letting our families know our intentions." Our intentions? What bloody intentions?

I tried to shrug out of his heavy concrete grip. "Elliot, this isn't-"

"  …  how we wanted to tell them? I know," he interrupted again, his eyes pleading with mine for a split second. "It's-"

"It's perfect!" Mum blurted. "Oh my God! This is so, so, perfect. I knew it! I knew the two of you would end up together. All those years ago, when you would venture off to play together as soon as the sun rose and until it set, and then sometimes afterward." Her critical eyebrow once again lifted and, once again, was directed at me. "Yes, darling, I knew about those times you snuck out of the house to meet Elliot behind the lemon tree."

I blushed so hard that my cheeks could've toasted a marshmallow.

"You were both inseparable." This time it was my mother's turn to burst into tears. "And then  …  when we nearly lost you both during that storm  …  I  … "

Helen, too, resumed her intemperate sobs. Mum reached out and hugged her shoulder, and they both shared a fleeting moment of reflection that only two people who'd experienced something so emotionally scarring ever could.