Late in the Season by Felice Picano

Author:Felice Picano [Picano, Felice]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781602824492
Publisher: Bold Strokes Books, Inc.
Published: 2009-06-16T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve

The next afternoon, they were walking together barefoot along the main boardwalk leading to the village where they would buy groceries, when Stevie felt a slight snag on her foot. She looked down to see blood pumping from under a deep cut on the underpad of her big toe.

“Oh, damn,” she said. Stopping, she leaned on Jonathan’s shoulder and angled the foot back and up. The cut flapped closed, but blood continued to seep out, defining its extent neatly.

“Does it hurt?” he asked, holding her lightly around the waist for support.

“A little.” It was beginning to throb, but she thought she could handle it.

“Hold on,” he said, then, reaching into the back pocket of his shorts, he brought out a handkerchief. He leaned over her and wrapped the toe tightly in the handkerchief.

“Ouch!” she said, feeling like a sissy.

“I want to keep it from bleeding too much,” he said. She leaned against his arm, and Jonathan looked around without saying a word. Then he reached around her again, and she felt herself suddenly lifted up by her bottom, and slung into his arms.

“Hey!” she said. She faced him, looking backward. “I can walk on it.”

“Maybe. But you shouldn’t walk on it. Not until we see how bad it is.”

“Jonathan! Put me down. I feel silly.”

“You’re light,” he said, striding ahead with her. “When I get tired, I’ll make you ride piggyback.”

“Where are we going?”

“You’ll see.”

She’d said she felt silly. The truth was she felt wonderful: as light as he said she was (though she couldn’t really believe that—she weighed over a hundred pounds) and somehow privileged. She couldn’t remember the last time anyone had carried her like this. She supposed the last person was her father, Lord Bracknell, putting her to bed when she was a sleepy nine-year-old. Not since then. Bill certainly hadn’t ever done it. And, of course, it was somewhat bridelike too, wasn’t it? Being carried across a threshold by the man you loved.

They had arrived at the harbor village. She’d assumed they’d go into one of the stores there and ask for bandages, but Jonathan continued walking on past the harbor.

Holding him around the neck she could look at him closely for once without having him look back and question her. She liked looking at his profile. She found it terribly handsome, and somewhat exotic—those almost Semitically open nostrils of his, the swirling little tempests of hair where his sideburns melded into his beard. From this angle, his eyes, too, seemed slightly different: not large and round, but almost almond-shaped, long, hooded over, like snake’s eyes. She could stare at him and not wish to do anything else. Just by looking at him, she would be sent off into little mental side trips, speculating on anthropology, history, color physics, anatomy, and always be able to return to his features with fresh wonder. So this is what it means to be infatuated, she told herself. How rational and yet how completely mindless it seems.

“Got a present for you, Barbara,” Jonathan said to someone.

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