Message in a Bottle - Nicholas Sparks [68]
Theresa watched him carefully, wondering if Garrett had been as intuitive with Catherine as he seemed to be with her. It was as if he could almost read her mind whenever they were together—if she wanted him to hold her hand, he reached for it before she said anything. If she just wanted to talk for a while without interruption, he listened quietly. If she wanted to know how he was feeling about her at any particular moment, the way he looked at her made it all clear. No one—not even David—had ever understood her as well as Garrett seemed to, yet how long had she known him? A few days? How, she wondered, could that be? Late at night, she thought about the answer as he lay sleeping by her side, and the answer always came back to the bottles she had originally found. The more she had come to know Garrett, the more she believed that she was destined to find his messages to Catherine, as if there were some great force that had directed them to her, with the intention of bringing them together.
On Saturday evening Garrett cooked another dinner for her, which they ate on the back deck under the stars. After making love, they lay in his bed, holding each other. Both of them knew that she had to return to Boston the following day. It was a subject they had both avoided talking about until now.
“Will I ever see you again?” she asked.
He was quiet, almost too quiet. “I hope so,” he said finally.
“Do you want to?”
“Of course I do.” As he said it, he sat up in the bed, pulling slightly away from her. After a moment she sat up and turned on the bedside lamp.
“What is it, Garrett?”
“I just don’t want it to end,” he said, looking down. “I don’t want us to end, I don’t want this week to end. I mean, you come into my life and turn it upside-down, and now you’re leaving.”
She reached for his hand and spoke quietly.
“Oh, Garrett—I don’t want it to end, either. This has been one of the best weeks I’ve ever had. It seems like I’ve known you forever. We can make it work, if we try. I could come down here or you could come up to Boston. Either way, we can try, can’t we?”
“How often would I see you? Once a month? Less than that?”
“I don’t know. I think that depends on us and what we’re willing to do. I think if we’re both willing to give a little, we can make it work.”
He paused for a long moment. “Do you really think it’s possible if we don’t see each other very much? When would I get to hold you? When would I be able to see your face? If we only see each other once in a while, we won’t be able to do the things that we need to… to continue feeling the way we do. Every time we saw each other, we’d know it’s only for a couple of days. There wouldn’t be time for anything to grow.”
His words stung, partly from the truth and partly because he seemed to want to simply end it here and now. When he finally turned to her, a regretful smile on his face, she didn’t know what to say. She released his hand, confused.
“You don’t want to try, then? Is that what you’re saying? You just want to forget everything that’s happened—”
He shook his head. “No—I don’t want to forget it. I can’t forget it. I don’t know…. I just want to see you more than it sounds like we’ll be able to.”
“So do I. But we can’t, so let’s just make the best of what we can. Okay?”
He shook his head almost dismissively. “I don’t know….”
She watched him closely as he spoke, sensing the presence of something else.
“Garrett, what’s wrong?”
He didn’t answer, and she went on. “Is there a reason you don’t want to try?”
Still he remained quiet. In the silence, he turned toward Catherine’s picture on the nightstand.
“How was the trip?” Garrett grabbed Catherine’s bag from the backseat as she stepped out of the car. Catherine smiled, though he could tell she was tired.
“It was good, but my sister’s still a wreck. She wants everything flawless, and we found out that Nancy is pregnant and her bridesmaid’s dress isn’t going to fit.”
“So what? She’ll just get it adjusted.”
“That’s what I said,