Pause by Sara Stamey

Author:Sara Stamey [Stamey, Sara]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Women's Fiction, Romance Later in Life, Menopause humor, Divorce, Dating and Relationships, Domestic Abuse, Friendship, environmental
ISBN: 9781611389630
Publisher: Book View Cafe
Published: 2021-05-25T05:00:00+00:00

Newman’s heartbeat, beneath Lindsey’s ear, has settled into a slow, even rhythm. He begins to snore quietly, and she smiles, wondering when he last slept. He twitches then, arms tightening around her, and he wakes up with a funny little snort, to blink into her eyes.

He smiles. “I can’t remember when I’ve felt this… completely relaxed.”

She touches his chest, over his heart. “Feels like this is how it should be.” Another uprush of emotion fills her, and her vision blurs.

“Lindsey.” His voice is gentle, his hand stroking her hair. “This is….” His hands lift like wings, then settle again. “I am so drawn to you. Seems like we hardly have a choice but to make love if we so much as look at each other. But… I’m mixed up. I don’t know if I’m ready for this.”

A cold stab in her gut. This is what was in his voice on the phone. “Oh.” She starts to pull away, brushing her fingers over her damp eyes.

“No, stay here. Please.” He urges her back down to rest on his shoulder. “Lindsey, I’m not a talker, seems like words don’t always communicate the best way for me. But I want to tell you about being in Bali this time. Maybe it was sharing with you, being with you, before I left, but….”

He takes a deep breath, blows it out. “Being there, with the monsoon hitting and hunkering down with the villagers, and going out to see the temple we’d built years ago. It was exciting again. Being alive. I guess I didn’t realize how those last years of my marriage had sort of shut me down, and then the divorce was so bad. Still is, dealing with Kimberly…. But I reconnected in Bali. I remembered how life used to be an adventure. How the work I was doing then meant something, building the temples, passing on my teacher’s wisdom, and I was living fully in the moment.” He shakes his head. “This isn’t coming out right.”

She nods into his shoulder. “Keep going.”

“I was thinking about you. A lot. Wanting to feel you again, make love to you, open you up like a gift to both of us and find out all about you.” He sighs. “And I just don’t know… It was taking me away from that being back in the moment, that coming back to myself.” A little shrugging movement. “Maybe finding healing.”

“But….” Lindsey doesn’t know what he’s trying to say. “You think this is bad? I’m hurting you?” She touches his chest again, hesitantly this time.

“No. No, that’s not it.” His arms tighten around her for a moment, then loosen. “It’s just… when I heard your message, talking about the ‘Guest House’ poem, and I heard all that in your voice, too—so much turmoil like I’ve been going through over the divorce, and way before. I felt overwhelmed, Lindsey. Like this is too much, too fast.”

Lindsey pulls away from him, sitting up to take a deep breath, stabbed by the ice again.

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