15) The mud that binds us.

15) The mud that binds us.

The gravel path crunches beneath my boots as I walk, my cane sweeping in low arcs ahead of me.

The sound tells me what I need to know all different in both sound and touch.

Each surface is different. Loose stone, packed earth, a slight dip to the left where water collects after rain. Al has a different sound, a different resonance. A difference I have come to appreciate and differentiate between the sounds.

The afternoon air carries the scent of cut grass and something sweeter underneath, jasmine maybe, drifting from a hedge I cannot see but know is there because the fragrance thickens as I pass by it.

I should have told Jon where I was going.

The thought arrives the way my cane finds a kerb suddenly, with a small jolt.

I push it aside. This is precisely the point. I want to do this myself. I want to walk into a space, feel its dimensions, listen to its acoustics, and decide whether it is right for our wedding the way any sighted woman would.

Not because Jon guided me there. Not because someone described it to me in patient, careful sentences. But because, Because I chose it. And I chose it by myself, for myself. With no one helping me, guiding me. I could have got Jon, or mum, or Sandra or Stacey, or a staff member to help me.

But that is the whole point I don't wait or need their help. I can do everything else by myself for myself. And I can do this as well.

And here I am, filled with confidence and emotions, I am happy and content knowing why I am here and what I am here for.

Aqua Haven's gardens stretch out around me in directions I can only piece together through sound and smell and the way the wind moves. I formulate a vision if you'll pardon the pun. Of what it looks like, smells like. Where the guests will sit and where I will stand. As I marry my beloved.

The brochure I listened to this morning three times, earphones in, as Jon was snoring softly beside me described a duck pond, weeping willows, a gnarled oak. A ceremony space. I am here to find it.

Find it and evaluate it by myself.

I have a fleeting thought god already planning things without his knowledge and we aren't even married yet. Is this a foreboding of the future?

My fingers brush the folded paper in my jeans pocket.

I printed the map in Braille at work last week, pressing each dot carefully, and I have studied it until the layout sits in my mind like a floor plan. It tells me where things are, how many steps in what direction things are.

I am at the point where the path forks ahead.

I 'read' the directions and the braille printing tells me where I am and how to get where I want to be.

Left toward the pond.

Right toward the wine lounge. I go left.

I walk slowly tentatively but also excitedly.

The gravel gives way to softer ground.

Grass, damp and thick, brushes the tops of my boots.

The air changes temperature its cooler here, shaded by a large tree. Possibly the gnarled oak or one of the willows.

The weeping willows announce themselves before I reach them: a whisper of narrow leaves trailing through breeze, a sound like pages turning. Most people wouldn't notice the sound, but I do.

For thirty years my hearing has become more attuned to the smallest things, Jon teases me about able to hear a fly fart.

But it is nice to have a companion at last, it feels like I have waited a lifetime for someone like him. And I have found him, my Jon. I smile and I touch the chain around my neck, the chain with the locket on it. You might wonder why I wear a locket, it isn't like I can see a photo in it. I can't measles when I was four took that away from me. But instead Jon chose the locket because it is heart shaped and I can feel the shape and I can open it and feel the note attached inside it. And it's Braille love note. I open it and feel the writing.

'Meg, I love you now and for always. Together forever.' It reads in Braille. It always brings a small tear to my eye when I read it.

I smile and I slow my pace.

My cane finds the edge of a root, gnarled and thick, and I step over it carefully, adjusting my weight.

This is the oak. I know it by the way the air goes still against its trunk, the bark is rough and ridged beneath my palm when I reach out. I lean against it for a moment.

The pond must be close. I can hear water not moving water, but the flat, glassy silence of a still surface, broken only by the soft plop of something landing.

A leaf, perhaps. Or a duck sliding in. I remember before I went blind, before I went so brutally, swiftly dark I used to chase the ducks by the pond.

I pause for a moment and listen, smiling.

A quack. Then another. I smile.

I have always liked ducks, one of my earliest memories is of me chasing ducks, trying to catch them. Their brown, grey feathers and yellow beaks attracting me. When I could see them.

But I have always appreciated them, they mate for life and are good parents. Something I too have always wanted and I am confident I have found in Jon.

"Yes, This could work." I murmur to myself

I imagine standing here in a dress, Jon beside me, our friends and family gathered on the grass. The oak behind us, the willows framing the space, the pond catching whatever light falls on it.

I do not know what light looks like, not really, but I know it's warmth on my skin.

I know the difference between morning light and afternoon light, and this this mellow, golden warmth on my forearms is afternoon. Late afternoon. The kind of light that lingers.

My phone vibrates in my back pocket. I ignore it. It vibrates again. I pull it out and run my thumb across the screen, finding the voice assistant.

"Read notification," I say.

"Megan, you off somewhere? Thought we could look at venues this weekend. J." The voice assistant says.

I press my lips together. I will tell him. Later. When I have something to show for it.

Not a place I can show him, because I cannot show anyone anything, but a place I can describe with certainty.

I can tell him about the oak and the willows and the way the ground feels beneath my boots, solid and level enough for chairs, for guests, for my cane.

I can tell him the ducks quacked and that I laughed. I can bring him here and already know it. Already own it.

I pocket the phone without replying.

The wind picks up. I notice it first in the willows the whisper becomes a rush, a clatter of leaves against each other.

Then against my skin. The temperature drops. Not gradually, but in a single, sharp shift, as though someone has opened a door into a colder room. Or left the freezer door open.

I straighten from the oak and turn my face upward.

The sky, I cannot see it, but I can feel it. The warmth of the light on my arms vanishes.

The air goes heavy and close, pressing against my chest like a hand.

The birds stop. The ducks stop. Even the pond goes silent, as though the water itself is holding its breath.

Then Thunder. Not close, but deep and rolling, a vibration I feel in the soles of my boots before I hear it properly. Then the first drop.

It hits the back of my hand, fat, cold, startling.

I flinch. Another lands on my forearm. Another on my hair, large enough that I feel its weight against my scalp. Then the sky opens. The sky really opens up with all its fury. I'm sure I can almost hear it's evil chuckle.

I have been caught in rain before. Quick showers, brief downpours, the kind that pass through and leave the world smelling of wet earth.

But this is not that. This is a wall of water falling so heavily that the sound of it against the ground drowns out everything else.

The gravel path I came on must be turning into a stream. The grass beneath my boots softens instantly, water pooling around the leather, seeping through the seams.

I turn back toward the path. My cane finds mud where gravel was moments ago.

The surface has changed entirely it is now slick, yielding, gripping at my soles with each step.

I take another stride and my boot slides. I catch myself, arms wide, heart slamming. My cane goes sideways, skittering across the surface. I grab for it and miss.

The next step is worse. My right boot loses traction entirely and my leg shoots forward. I go down hard on my hip, then my palm, then my elbow.

Mud, but not like the hot mud I enjoy so much at Rotorua but mud cold, thick, gritty coats my right hand, my forearm, the side of my blouse. I push myself up and slip again, this time onto my back, and the impact drives the breath from my lungs.

I lie there for three seconds. Rain hammers my face, my chest, my legs.

The grass beneath me has become a slick of mud and water. And no matter how I try I can't get traction.

My blouse, green, short-sleeved, chosen this morning because it made me feel pretty clings to my skin. I know what that means without seeing it.

Wet fabric on a pale body becomes translucent.

I know my black bra is visible through it.

My jeans are soaked through, heavy, pulling at my belt weighing me down.

My hair, wavy and red and carefully brushed this morning, is plastered to my skull and shoulders, streaming water down my neck and into my collar. And worse of all streaming the coldest or rain water down under my collar and into my bra and between my cleavage.

It feels almost deliberate as the stream of water turns from a trickle into a torrent, down under my collar and down between my bosoms.

I try to stand. My boots have no grip. I get one knee under me, push, and slide forward onto both palms. Mud grinds into the lines of my hands, under my fingernails, into the creases of my gold watch. I can feel the watch arms against my wrist, still ticking, but the face is caked. I can feel it.

It will take a lifetime to clean.

My bracelet is slick with it. My necklace the fine gold chain Jon gave me has twisted sideways, clinging to my wet skin.

I lay there, I think maybe I should have told Jon where I was going and have him come with me, to guide me.

Or see if a staff member could guide me.

But just once I wanted to do something unknown to me, something out of the ordinary.

By myself, for myself.

Just like any sighted woman would do, NO not like any sighted woman like any woman would do.

I silently curse my own enthusiasm, my own independence and stubbornness.

And I cry.

The tears start before I can stop them. They mix with the rain on my face, hot against cold, and I cannot tell where one ends and the other begins.

I am crying the way I cried as a child open-mouthed, gasping, the sound swallowed by the downpour. My cane is somewhere to my left. I reach for it and find only grass and mud. I reach again. Nothing. But a handful of mud, coating my palm, my hand, my knuckles.

Whatever I reach for or try to grab hold of is either out of reach or slips through my grasp.

I begin to sob, I can hear that there is no one else around to help or assist me.

This is it I am alone. Alone lying in the mud, sobbing, wet, cold, dirty and sobbing.

I am able to roll over and get on my hands and knees, I sink slightly and the mud makes a squelching noise.

I crawl. There is no dignity in it. I am on my hands and knees in the mud, my blouse transparent against my skin, my hair hanging in ropes, my boots filled with water, and I am crawling toward where I think the path is.

My palms sink. My jeans are so heavy with water that the belt digs into my hip. I find the gravel with my fingertips at least the stones give me something solid -- and I pull myself onto the path. It is a river. Water rushes over my knuckles.

I have given up trying to find shelter.

I sit on the path. And I sob, not a quiet sob but a loud sob, my shoulders shake, tears stream.

I pull my phone from my back pocket. The screen is wet. I wipe it against my ruined blouse, which only smears it further. I find the voice command by muscle memory, pressing the button on the side three times.

"Call Jon," I say. My voice breaks on his name.

The phone rings. Once. Twice. Three times. Each ring stretches out like a wire pulled taut.

I grip the phone with both hands, mud squelching between my fingers and the case.

"Meg?" Jon answers.

His voice. Oh his voice. The sound of it does something to my chest that I cannot control.

"J, J, Jon." I say stammering. I am sobbing now. I cannot form proper sentences.

"I'm at I went to Aqua Haven, the gardens, there's a pond, I can't, I can't I'm in the mud, I'm soaked, I can't find my cane, I can't stand up properly." I say through the tears sniffing occasionally as I do.

Jon picks up on my distress. His tone changes.

"Megan. Stay where you are. I'm coming. Ten minutes." He says in an authoritative tone, powerful yet reassuring.

"Jon, I, I." I stammer in reply.

"I'm coming. Right now. Do not move. Can you get under the oak tree? Get under something." Jon says.

"I, I, I think so." I stammer in reply through the tears. I feel totally useless, useless hopeless and silly.

"Do that. Then sit down and wait for me. I'll find you." Jon says firmly.

The line goes dead. I lower the phone. I push myself to my knees and feel my way along the path toward the oak.

The trunk is there, solid and rough, and I press my back against it. The canopy gives some shelter not much, but enough that the rain is no longer hitting me in the face directly.

I pull my knees up. I wrap my arms around them. I press my face into my forearms and I cry.

I cry because I am wet and cold and muddy. I cry because I was trying to do something ordinary and it has gone wrong in the way things always go wrong for me, spectacularly, messily, in a way that requires rescue.

I cry because I am thirty-four years old and I cannot check a weather forecast the way other people do, and even if I had, I wanted so badly to do this one thing alone.

I sob and I let it flow, my will to fight it has gone. I am cold, wet, muddy. So I just there and cry. Knowing my prince is on the way. I feel equal parts reassured, hopeless and useless.

Even the duck that has somehow found shelter next to me doesn't lighten my spirits.

But it doesn't try to attack me, it just sits there. I know it's a duck by its quacking as if it too is complaining. Complaining but in some way sitting with me, as if it is protecting me until my hero, my prince, my Jon comes.

I do not know how long I sit there. The rain does not ease.

If anything, it intensifies, the drops hitting the oak leaves above me with a sound like static.

My body shakes. My teeth chatter. The mud on my clothes has gone from slick to stiff, drying against my skin in patches even as the rain keeps falling.

Then, through the rain, through the static of the leaves.

I hear it. Boots on gravel. Fast. Heavy. Not running exactly, but the long, purposeful stride of someone tall and urgent.

"Meg!" I hear Jon cry. Above the sounds of rain, wind and thunder.

"Here! By the oak!" I cry out in reply.

The boots come faster. I hear the squelch of mud, the snap of a twig, and then his hand is on my shoulder. His touch firm yet tender, caring.

His palm, broad and warm even through the wet fabric of my blouse, cups the curve of my shoulder and squeezes once.

"I'm here. I've got you. I'm here. It's alright." Jon says reassuring. His posture is crouched so he is almost level with mine.

I reach for him. My hands find his chest, the wet fabric of his white shirt, the hard plane of muscle beneath it.

I grab fistfuls of it and pull.

He comes down to me, kneeling in the mud, and his arms go around me.

One hand cups the back of my head. The other presses flat against my spine, pulling me against him. I bury my face in his neck. And I let the tears flow.

I cry, the tears are tears of happiness and joy, or feeling assured. And also tears of frustration. I tried to do something for myself, by myself and I needed to be rescued.

He smells like rain and aftershave and something warm underneath skin, heat, the particular scent of him that I know better than my own.

"You're freezing," he says. His voice is close, his lips near my ear.

I pull my head back and Jon takes the opportunity to wipe away the tears from the corner of my eyes, well mixture of tears, rain and running mascara.

"Can you stand?" He asks tenderly, his voice is close and level to me. His face is directly in front of mine. I can tell by the way his voice sounds and the direction it comes from.

"I think so. I slipped. I can't my cane." I say like a stupid person.

A stupid helpless little child.

I know I'm not but that is how I feel at the moment. It is how the world sometimes sees me

"I've got it." Jon replies.

He shifts, and I hear him reaching through the grass.

"Here." Jon says and he presses it into my hand.

The familiar handle, smooth rubber on white aluminium, now gritty with mud. I grip it. I grip it, It has been my constant companion for thirty years.

I equal parts hate it, need it and like it.

In some cases it is more akin to my security blanket.

He stands first. His hands find my elbows, and he lifts me. My boots slide on the mud and he adjusts one arm going around my waist, pulling my weight against his side. I lean into him. His body is solid and warm against my soaked, shaking frame.

"Can you walk?" Jon asks tenderly, slowly.

"Yes. Slowly. I hurt everywhere." I reply.

"Good, but if you want me to carry me it's ok. Just say so." Jon says reassuringly, partly joking.

It's then I realise as it touches me he isn't wearing anything protective.

No raincoat or jacket, just his usual attire of suit jacket.

He pulls me close to him, kisses my temple and then opens his cab's umbrella and holds it over me. He doesn't care for his own wellbeing, he wants me protected.

We move together. His arm stays around my waist. My cane sweeps ahead, but he guides us both, his stride shortening to match mine. I walk slowly tentatively, bearing in mind my recent experience.

The gravel path. The fork. The main garden.

Each step is an effort my jeans are heavy, my boots squelch, the mud sucks at my soles. I debate whether to ask him to carry me.

But then I decide if I did it would make me feel more helpless, more useless, more hopeless. So I decide against it.

I slip twice more and both times his arm tightens, holding me upright. I know he doesn't see me as helpless or useless, the blind woman who has to have everybody help her. Instead I feel supported and cherished.

Jon announces every waypoint on the way to the carpark the gravel path, the concrete footpath, the main garden as we walk on.

Seemingly alone. Jon affirms this my saying in a light-hearted tone that we are the only ones here.

"We are the only muppets out in the rain." He says jokingly.

We walk for what seems like an age.

Jon is soaked, I can feel his soaked jacket and shirt as he holds me close. I feel his warmth seep through to me.

"Car's in the car park. Not far." Jon says.

I nod. I cannot speak. My teeth are chattering too hard. We reach the car park I know it by the change underfoot, the slightly rough concrete giving way to harder, smoother tarmac, and he guides me to the left.

The beep of the Skoda's unlocking echoes off something solid.

A wall, maybe. He opens the passenger door for me and guides me in. I don't need it I know the layout of his car by now, where things are. But it is nice and thoughtful perhaps this caring streak is what led him to train as a nurse and later become a cop.

"Sit. I'll get you a towel." Jon says to me as I slide into the leather of the passenger seat.

I sit, huddled like a cry-baby.

He is gone for five seconds. I hear the boot open, close.

Then he is back, draping something terry and thick across my lap and shoulders. I lower myself into the seat.

The leather is cold against my soaked jeans, but then he reaches across me and presses a button, and within seconds warmth begins to rise from beneath me. Heated seats.

I always questioned the need for them, but this definitely changes my mind.

The heat seeps through my wet jeans, through my underwear, into muscles that have been clenched with cold for what feels like hours.

He closes my door. I hear him walk around the car. The driver's door opens.

He slides in. The engine turns over the familiar diesel purr of the Skoda and he pulls out of the car park without a word.

I sit in the warmth, wrapped in the towel, shaking.

My hands are still muddy. I hold them in my lap and try to stop the trembling, but it continues small, persistent shudders that move through my whole body.

Jon reaches across and takes my hand. He does not wipe the mud away.

He simply holds it, his thumb tracing a slow circle on my wrist, just below my gold bracelet. He says nothing. The car hums. The heated seats warm. The rain drums against the windscreen, and the wipers swipe in steady rhythm.

I lean my head back against the headrest and close my useless eyes behind my dark glasses. And I think. I Think 'What was I doing?' ' I am useless and hopeless.' 'Why is Jon is with me?' 'He could have found a nice, sighted woman who isn't so much trouble, so much hassle?'

Then I realise I am lucky to have him. He could have had any number of other women, but he chose me. ME. Poor little blind Megan. Except I have never seen myself as poor little blind Megan. And neither has he. His rubbing slowly warms me. Not only my arm but also my heart, my soul.

We pull into his driveway twenty minutes later. I know it by the way the car turns left, then the slight bump of the kerb, then the smooth concrete of his drive.

He parks. The engine cuts. Silence, except for the rain on the roof.

"Come on, Inside. Let's get you warm." he says gently. AS he opens the passenger door and extends his hand outward.

I can see why he became a nurse and then a cop. He has that inner warmth and warmth to share.

He comes around to my door. I step out. My boots are still wet, my jeans still heavy, my blouse still clinging to my skin.

He does not comment on the state of me.

He takes my arm and walks me to the front door. The key turns. The door opens. The air inside is warm and dry and smells like his or should I say OUR house, roses, wood polish, the faint cedar of the hot tub drifting in from the back deck.

He guides me to the bathroom.

Let's get those wet things off. I'll put them straight in the wash. There are dry towels on the rail." Jon says tenderly.

I close the bathroom door. I peel off the blouse, it peels that is the only word for it, the wet fabric sucking against my skin before releasing.

My black bra is visible underneath, the cups dark with water. I unclasp it and drop it. And a few drops of water actually fall out of the cups and hit me on the hand.

My jeans are harder the belt is stiff, the denim waterlogged. I yank at the buckle, pull it free, and push the jeans down. My boots come off with effort, each one making a sucking sound. My socks are black with mud. My panties are soaked through.

I stand in the bathroom, naked except for my jewellery, and reach for the towel on the rail. It is large and warm he must have put the heating on before he left.

I wrap it around my body and stand there, dripping, my red hair hanging in wet ropes against my shoulders.

There is a knock.

"Can I come in?" Jon asks almost tentatively as if he is in trouble.

"Yes." I say.

He enters. I feel his presence in the shift of air, the creak of the floorboard.

He has changed, I can tell because his clothes do not rustle the way the wet suit did. Soft fabric. A t-shirt, maybe. His hand finds my shoulder.

"Better?" Jon asks.

"A bit." I answer.

"I've started the hot tub. Come out to the deck. It'll warm you through." Jon suggests.

I hesitate in answering.

"Jon, I'm not, I'm not really in the mood. For anything. You know." I reply alluding that I am not in the mood for any romantic overtures or amorous advances.

A pause. Then his hand moves to my face. His thumb brushes my cheekbone, gentle, tracing the line of it.

"Just the tub. Nothing else. I promise." Jon says softly.

I nod in reply.

He takes my hand. I follow him through the house, hallway, living room, the sliding door to the back deck.

The air outside is cool against my skin, but the gazebo overhead blocks the rain, and the solar lamps cast warmth that I can feel on my arms.

The cedar hot tub hums and bubbles.

The scent of it wood, steam, something mineral and clean fills the space. And fills me. My nostrils and my heart.

He helps me into the tub. The water hits my feet first, then my calves, my thighs, my waist. As I slide in naked.

It is hot. Not scalding, but a deep, penetrating heat that seeps into muscles still tight with cold. I lower myself onto the seat inside the tub and the water rises to my chest. I let out a breath I did not know I was holding.

Jon gets in beside me. The water shifts with his weight. His knee brushes mine. He too is naked.

I can tell because there is no fabric against my leg when he moves, just skin, warm and wet.

"Turn around," he says.

I turn. My back faces him. His hands find my shoulders.

He starts with my neck. His thumbs press into the muscles at the base of my skull, working in slow circles. The tension there, tension I did not even recognise begins to loosen.

His fingers trail down to my shoulders, kneading the knots along my trapezius, pressing firmly enough that I can feel each individual digit.

His hands are large. I know this from years of touching them, but feeling them against my back, in hot water, after the afternoon I have had, they seem larger. More capable. More affectionate.

"Your hair's a mess," he murmurs. There is amusement in it. Not mockery, something softer.

"Thanks." I reply half-heartedly. He laughs in reply. His laugh is a low vibration I feel through his hands.

I hear him as he reaches for something. The slosh of a bottle. Then his fingers are in my hair, working shampoo through the tangled, mud-caked strands.

He is careful. He takes sections between his fingers and works from root to tip, untangling as he goes. Almost like an expensive hairdresser.

The scent of the shampoo, it smells tropical, frangipani and passionfruit hits me. This and the gentle touch of him shampooing me lets me know that here, here I am safe and loved.

His nails scrape gently against my scalp. I close my eyes my dark glasses are somewhere inside an unnecessary gesture, but instinctive and I lean back into his chest.

His lips touch my shoulder. A press of warmth, deliberate and slow. Then another, slightly higher, near the join of my neck. His mouth lingers there, and I feel the tip of his tongue trace a small circle against my skin before he pulls away.

"You taste like passionfruit." he says.

"You literally just washed passionfruit into my hair." I joke back.

Jon laughs.

" Good point. I can't hide anything from you can I?" Jon jokes as he massages me.

He stops momentilary and then I hear the slosh of water as his arms move and then I hear music come through the hard wired outdoor speakers.

'The look of love.' By Diana Krall fills the area. It is a song I have never heard and isn't my usual muscular genre. But I let it play it is relaxing and oddly sensual.

"Jon who is this?" I enquire.

"This my little ginger princess is Diana Krall. A Canadian jazz singer and pianist. Why?" Jon answers.

"She sounds nice very soulful." I answer back.

"Yes but have I coaxed you out and away from your hard rock/ metal?" Jon says half-jokingly.

"NO! Of course not." I say.

"Good because it is part of what makes you, you. And funny thing is. Diana Krall has been in my backseat a number of times. I first picked her up a couple of years ago. Before I met you. She is now one of my regulars when she is in the country." Jon says to me.

I knew Jon had a lot of high powered upper end clients but I didn't realise just how much of a small world it is.

We share another laugh. His hands move down my arms, lifting them, massaging the tension from my forearms. He takes my left hand and works each finger individually pressing, rolling, pulling gently. He does the same with my right. My gold ring catches against his palm. He pauses when he reaches it, and his thumb traces the band.

"Mine," he says quietly.

"Yours," I confirm.

He releases my hand and reaches for a cloth. I hear him dunk it in the water, and wring it.

Then he is washing my back, long strokes, firm, from my shoulders to my waist. The cloth is rough against my skin, and the combination of heat and friction and his steady, methodical attention begins to do something to the tightness in my chest. Not erase it, but loosen it.

He washes my neck. My collarbone. The tops of my shoulders. Each pass of the cloth is followed by his palm, checking the work, smoothing over skin he has just cleaned. He is thorough. He is patient. He does not rush. He does not want to rush. I don't want him to rush.

"Better?" he asks again.

I nod. The tears have stopped. The shaking has stopped. The water is hot and the steam curls around us and Jon is behind me, solid and warm, and I am no longer in the mud. Instead I am in the hot tub he specifically bought and installed just for me. And he is lovingly washing and massaging me. Taking away all the emotional distress and turmoil of the day. He reaches for his phone. I hear the tap of his finger on the screen.

"What are you doing?" I ask.

"Ordering dinner." He replies.

"What kind?" I ask back.

"The kind you like." Jon replies. I wait. A minute passes. Then he says,

"Done. Pizza and ice cream. Thirty minutes." He says.

"From where?" I ask.

"That place on the high street. The one with the thick crust and the pistachio gelato."

I smile. It is the first genuine smile since the rain started.

"You remembered." I say back to him, touched

"I remember everything you tell me, Meg." Jon says back as he starts to wash me where he left off.

The delivery arrives in twenty-five minutes. Jon climbs out of the tub, water streaming from his body, and pulls on shorts and a t-shirt.

I hear the sliding door open, then the front door, then muffled conversation with the delivery driver. The smell of pizza reaches me before he does, tomato, basil, melted mozzarella, the rich yeasty warmth of thick crust. Then he comes back.

"Come on. Out. We're eating under the gazebo." He says commandingly.

I climb out of the tub. He tenderly, gently wraps me in a towel large, thick, tucked under my arms.

He guides me to one of the chairs at the outside dining table. I sit. The air is cool against my damp skin, but the gazebo keeps the rain off, and the solar lamps cast their dim amber light that I cannot see but can feel as warmth on my forearms.

We eat. I do not bother with clothes. Neither does he. The pizza is hot and greasy and perfect the crust, thick enough to hold, the cheese stringy and sharp. I eat with my fingers, tearing pieces, licking them clean. Jon does the same. Between slices, we drink nothing fancy, just Coke Zero.

He opens the gelato. I hear the lid come off, the spoon scraping the surface.

He holds a spoonful to my lips. I take it. The Pistachio ice cream is sweet, cold and slightly bitter.

The cold of it against my tongue after the heat of the pizza makes me shiver.

"Good?" Jon asks.

"Perfect." I murmur softly in reply.

We sit in silence for a while. We have eaten all the pizza, and are quite rapidly finishing the Pistachio ice cream between us. A small drop has landed on my decollage and Jon tenderly wipes it up with his finger and I suck it off his finger.

The rain has eased to a steady patter against the gazebo roof. The hot tub hums behind us. The roses on either side of the deck release their scent in the damp air their aroma is heavy, layered, almost overwhelming.

"Meg." Jon says to me across the table.

"Yeah." I answer back to him.

"Why were you at Aqua Haven today?" Jon asks me directly

I put down my slice of pizza. I wipe my hands on the towel. I breathe in. The rose scent fills my lungs. I decide to tell him.

"I wanted to see it. The venue. The duck pond, the oak, the willows. I wanted to check it myself." I answer just as directly. Knowing by now Jon understands my non intentional pun.

"You went alone." Jon says.

"Yes." I answer.

"In the rain." Jon says.

"I didn't know it was going to rain. I can't, I can't check the weather app the way you do. I listen to the radio, and it said scattered showers, not, not whatever that was." I answer almost defiantly

He is quiet. I can hear him breathing. His breathing is slow, measured.

"I wanted to choose something," I say.

"For the wedding. I wanted to walk into a place and decide if it was right. Not because you described it to me. Not because someone told me it was pretty. Because I stood there and I felt it and I knew." I explain to Jon.

My voice is steadier now. The words come out in the order I need them to, each one placed.

"I wanted to choose something like a sighted woman would." I explain defiant.

There is a long pause. The rain on the gazebo roof. The bubbling of the hot tub. A duck quacking somewhere in the distance the same ducks from the pond, I think, or maybe different ones.

"And," I say, quieter now. I pause and take a sigh.

"There are times when I think I might lose you." I admit to him, my tone somewhat sad.

Ther is nothing from him. No sound from him. No movement.

"I think about it," I continue.

"Not often. But sometimes. You could find someone who doesn't need rescuing from a muddy garden. Someone who can look at a sunset with you. Someone who can." I say

"Megan." Jon replies interrupting me.

His voice is low. Not angry. Not sharp. Low and rough, the way it gets when something hits him somewhere deep. It is the sound he makes before he says something he means with his entire body. His entire being.

"Don't." He says.

I stop.

He moves. I hear the chair scrape. Then his hands are on my face both of them, palms flat against my cheeks, fingers curling into my hair. He tilts my head toward him.

"I love you," he says holding my face in his hands.

"Deeply. Truly. Not out of pity. Not out of obligation. Not because you need me or because I need to be needed. I love you because you are you. Because you went to that garden today to choose a place for us to get married, and you did it alone, and you did it for me. That is the most. That is." Jon says his tone resonating in its truthfulness he is speaking from the depths of his heart. And he means each and every syllable.

Then his voice breaks. And he clears his throat.

"That is the most extraordinary thing anyone has ever done for me. And I am not going anywhere. Not now. Not ever. You hear me?" Jon says his voice rising almost as if he is ready to growl at me.

I nod. His hands hold my face steady.

A tear slides down my cheek. I feel it warm, tracking the curve of my cheekbone, reaching the corner of my mouth. His thumb moves. It catches the tear at the edge of my lip, tracing the moisture away with a single, deliberate stroke.

"There, Gone" he says.

I laugh. It is a small, wet, ridiculous sound.

Half sob, half giggle. He laughs too, low and warm. I reach for him. My hands find his face the clean line of his jaw, smooth, no stubble tonight. I pull him toward me and press my mouth to his.

He kisses me back. Slow. His lips are warm from the pizza, slightly salty, slightly sweet.

He kisses me the way he does everything, with patience, with attention, with tenderness.

His mouth opens against mine and I taste him beneath the food, beneath the cedar, beneath the rain.

Just him. I make a small sound against his lips. He pulls back. I pull him back. We kiss again. His teeth catch my lower lip in a gentle tug, just enough pressure to send a spark down through my chest and into my stomach.

We giggle. Foreheads pressed together, breathing the same air, we giggle like teenagers.

"Come inside," He says.

He helps me up. We leave the pizza box, the gelato, the towels, everything stays where it is, where it has fallen.

He takes my hand and walks me through the sliding door, across the living room, down the hallway to the master bedroom. I let him guide me.

The carpet is soft under my bare feet. I know this room the queen bed with the sheets, Sheets that soft and comfortable. the three-piece suite, the dark carpet that muffles every sound.

His room. 'Our' room now.

He tells me to wait. I hear him moving.

The strike of a match once, twice, three times, more.

The scent of candles reaches me. Not perfumed. Plain wax, possibly with some honey or honeycomb, they smell warm and honeyed.

He places them around the room I track them by the slight change in air temperature, the flicker of warmth at different points around the bed. And the direction that the scent comes from.

"Lie down. On your front." Jon commands me.

I climb onto the bed. The sheets are cool against my bare skin.

I settle onto my stomach, turning my head to one side, my wet hair spreading across the pillow.

I hear him open a bottle. The scent of oil perhaps lavender and almond, something herbal spreads around the room. It may not mean much to the normal average woman, but with my blindness. I am more attuned to scent and I appreciate it.

He straddles me. I feel the weight of him settle across the backs of my thighs, warm and solid. His hands, slick with oil, press into my lower back.

He starts there. His thumbs work along the spine, pressing into the muscle on either side. I feel each vertebra acknowledged, each knot found and addressed. His hands move upward lower back, middle back, the muscles between my shoulder blades that have been tight since I first stepped off the gravel path. He works them with the heels of his palms, slow and firm.

Finishing the work the hot tub started, the warm soak loosened my muscle now he is finishing it with a delightful sensual massage.

His hands reach my shoulders. He kneads the trapezius muscles with a pressure that makes me gasp, gasp not pain, but in the release of tension held so long I had forgotten it was there. His fingers find the tendons in my neck and press along them, from base of skull to shoulder, shoulder to base of skull.

"You're tight here," he murmurs.

"I fell on my back." I say half moaning.

"I know. I can feel it. The muscle's guarding. You may have some beautiful bruises in the morning" Jon says.

"Ahh." I groan at his touch.

He works the spot. Small, precise movements, his thumb circling a point just left of my spine. It hurts. Then it does not. Then the muscle releases, and the relief is so immediate that I exhale in a long, shuddering breath.

His hands move down my arms. He lifts my right arm and works from shoulder to fingertips, the same methodical attention he gave me in the tub. My gold watch is still on. He unclasps it and sets it on the bedside table. My bracelet follows. His hands return to my skin, unobstructed now, and he works each finger, each knuckle, the webbing between each finger. Every Nanometre of my arm covered.

He does my left arm. My left hand. He lifts it to his mouth and presses a kiss to the inside of my wrist. His lips linger there, warm against my pulse.

His hands return to my back. Lower now. My hips. The curve of my waist. He works the muscles along my spine, down to the sacrum, and his palms flatten against my lower back and press. He presses softly and gently.

I feel the warmth, the warmth of him, his hands, his thighs against mine, the candle heat drifting across the room.

He works my legs. Calves, hamstrings, the tight tendons behind and around my knees.

He lifts each foot and presses his thumb into the arch, working the fascia in slow strokes.

I sink deeper into the mattress. My body is heavy and warm and loose.

He leans forward. His lips touch my shoulder. Then the space between my shoulder blades. Then the nape of my neck, where my hair has dried in loose waves. His mouth moves along my spine a kiss for each vertebra, descending slowly. His hands follow, smoothing oil into skin that his lips have just warmed.

"I love you," he says against my back. The words vibrate through my skin.

"I know," I whisper in reply.

"Say it back." Jon says commandingly.

"I love you. Truly, madly and deeply. I love you." I reply.

I feel him smile against my shoulder. His teeth graze my skin it's a playful nip, barely there, enough to make my breath hitch.

He soothes it with his tongue, then pulls back.

"Stay there, Stay here all night." he says.

He lies beside me. His body stretches out, and I feel the heat of him along my left side chest, hip, thigh.

His arm drapes across my back. His hand rests between my shoulder blades, palm flat, fingers spread. A weight. An anchor.

The candles flicker. The room smells of warm wax and almond oil and Lavender and him. The sheets are soft beneath me. His breathing slows. I match it inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale until our rhythms sync.

I lie there, loose and warm and held, and I think about the oak tree. The willows. The still pond with its ducks. Even the protective little duck. The sound of gravel under my boots. I chose that place. I walked into it alone, felt its dimensions, listened to its silence, and I chose it. Not because someone told me it was beautiful. Because I felt it and I knew. I knew it for myself.

Jon's hand moves in a slow circle on my back. His thumb traces my spine. His breath is steady against my hair.

Tomorrow I will tell him about the pond. I will describe the weeping willows and the gnarled oak and the way the ground felt solid beneath my cane. I will tell him that I want to stand under that oak and marry him. And he will listen, the way he always listens, with his whole body turned toward me.

But that is tomorrow. Tonight there is only this, the sheets, the warmth of the candles, the steady beat of his heart against my shoulder. The way his hand rests on my back as though it has always been there. As though it will always be there. I close my eyes. I do not need them. I never have.

The candles burn low. The room goes quiet. Jon's breathing deepens into sleep. I follow him down, slowly, the way water finds its level settling into the warmth, into the dark, into the steady presence of him beside me.

A presence that will always be there. I have chosen him and he has chosen him. And the thoughts of him running off with an able bodied sighted woman are unfounded. He loves me and only me with all his heart, soul and being.

He is lucky and so am I. So even though I have had a bad day with horrible weather and an accident. And a blow to my confidence, we have each other. And as we fall asleep in each other's arms. I think of the mud I was covered in, and how it is the mud that binds us.