Fire Flies

By the time she got to the word 'damn' I picked up the change in her tone. Her ice clinked unsteadily as she set her glass down a little too fast. I was waiting for the familiar pain at her words, but it was fainter than expected, so I simply watched her.

Liv's cognac eyes never left mine. "I am so sorry, Ian. I didn't mean... I am glad that you're here and of course I wish that Helen was as well."

"I don't -- not anymore." They were the last words I'd expected out my mouth; and even more surprising was the calm certainty with which I meant them. "I tried for longer than I should have to make Helen stay; and after she left me I did hurt for a very long time. But I want you to know that I'm okay now -- and you don't have to tiptoe around talking about her or making jokes about the past."

"All right."

"Do me a favour, though: quit poking fun at yourself all the time. You don't need to lose any weight. You're beautiful."

She got to her feet, shaking her head. "You're either blind or too kind."

"Rubbish."

Liv undid her striped sarong with a shrug and dove into the sparkling water. The way she glided through the water defied resistance. When she was younger, she'd seemed all straight lines and muted colouring -- maybe because I'd never looked past her school uniform as I suddenly was now. Out of the blue, there she was, all at once voluptuous and fluid; a body of strength and sensuality.

Pink nails matching her bikini and the flowers that filled my home with such a precious scent.

Somewhere out there was a young man dreaming of a woman exactly like her.

I watched mesmerised as her curves worked together to make the water obey her, flow with her. A few seconds later she surfaced at the shallow end.

After a few minutes I joined her. I suppose we raced a few times, but can hardly call it that considering how disorganised the direction of our swimming was and the abandon with which Liv laughed as she blatantly cheated. She teased me when I got out twenty minutes later and sought sanctuary in the shade.

"Remember the time we were all up in Zanzibar and you got sunburnt on the first day?"

"I take exception to the glee in your tone."

Outright laughter burst from her as she continued treading water. "Helen was so mad that she had to spend the rest of the week nursing and coddling your pale arse."

"Hey, language!"

Her head dipped under and she resurfaced laughing even harder and coughing a little bit. "Seriously?? You can't be serious."

I had been.

Just two days ago Olivia had lectured me on updating my website and my sorely lacking SEO knowledge. I'd chosen self-employment eighteen years ago -- yet still needed lectures on my professional image and selling my work. She'd also sourced me -- in two hours flat, astoundingly -- an IT and design genius to replace the team of four I'd been pissing away money on for the last two years.

And today I was admonishing her for saying a word in a way I shouldn't have liked.

"I meant how dare you call me pale," I lied.

I'd always liked Olivia, but in an amused sort of manner a not-quite-familiar friend would. I had a few things in common with her, but loved watching her learn her own things and piece herself together. Helen and I used to babysit her; and after Helen left I was kept alive by sharing a love of literature with Liv through the last of her high school years. I must have bored her to tears, but couldn't help enjoying how new the world was to her. She was nowhere as cynical and jaded as some of my colleagues and friends.

She found beauty in Dostoevsky's most melancholic lines.

What is hell? I maintain that it is the suffering of being unable to love.

The way she saw life and the mechanics of her mind were just a couple of my favourite things about her.

"You know why you're broody, right?" Helen had always teased after each of my days of teaching Liv something way beyond her years and returning from one of our walks full of excitement; not only at her sage grasp of adult concepts, but her questions and theories on matters most teens abhorred. "You want kids and now you're hogging Linda's."

"Linda has another kid," I'd joked. "She won't miss this one."

"So, you do admit that you like the idea of a daughter in the house."

"That is not what I said. And it's not what my time with Liv is about -- she's a gifted kid, Helen. I don't understand why you don't get that. She's one of those people who show you life through a new lens."

And then Helen left.

Turned out she was the one feeling broody, hoping year after year that my love for Olivia would evolve into a desire for kids and that we'd get to go back on our decision not to have children of our own. It didn't. I didn't. I'd meant that choice at thirty and even more so at forty-one. My love for Liv had always been an enjoyment and celebration of whom she was, not some fatherly attachment. Helen had never understood that.

Two years after Helen, Olivia left as well.

Strangely, I'd spent those two years believing -- hoping desperately -- that Helen would come back. Yet, on the very day of Olivia's departure, I'd accepted that she was off to start her life and would never return. Once her studies were done, she'd find a job and a place of her own, no doubt. She'd appear on holidays and take up space without ever really being there...

But that isn't what happened. My expectations were flipped: Helen never looked back, never called to say she still loved me and wanted to return. Instead Liv was the one to change her mind five years after leaving, and announce that she'd be home indefinitely.

Now she was facing her biggest challenge to date and confiding in me more than her own parents.

One does need a step back from the closest loved ones at times, so I was happy to let her lean on me. Cry on my shoulder, so to speak.

Losing her coveted job after struggling to keep up with it had scared her -- yet she spoke of the fear with the attentive acceptance it had taken me years to cultivate after losing Helen. Sure, she had come home to take stock of how thin she'd spread herself and how dismally she'd done in the dream environment she spent years studying for. It was frightening to suddenly be part of the unemployment statistic, yes; crushing to suddenly doubt who you are and question the choices you've made, absolutely. But none of that had broken her.

Her voice and spirit stopped me in my tracks.

As did her glistening skin after her swim.

"In any case, I'm not here because of getting fired." She bit into a large strawberry. "I'm here because of Derek."

***

I was in the sort of physical shape that meant I needn't have spent the last seven years with as little female company as I had. And I was proud of the shape I was in. I was confident -- considered somewhat intimidating, truth be told. But I'd never considered myself aggressive exactly.

Liv said that name in a way that made me want to hunt down whoever that was. Size him up. I knew nothing about him and I already wanted to punch him.

She hadn't bothered to towel off. My chair was securely under the umbrella, but she'd pulled hers back a few centimetres into the sun. Sparkling drops of water fell from her hair, her chin and elbows.

I hoped my sunglasses were dark enough to shield my alertness. "And who is Derek?"

"A guy I was hoping would love me back."

My heart was a beast ramming against the bars of its cage. "And... he doesn't?"

"I met him when I started my new job, and thought he was the perfect Prince Charming." She pulled sunscreen from her bag and started applying some. "Intelligence, ambition and stunning blue eyes... What more could a girl want?"

"Requited love?"

Her smile was wry. "Indeed, Mr Macallan -- how impressively observant of you. Now, how did I not think of that at the time?"

"Because you are twenty-three and in love --"

"Was in love... and barely brinking on love, mind you."

I spoke on without falter. "-- yet you still know more than I did at that age. Hell, since you've been back, I've been thinking you know more than I do at forty-eight."

She was perched on the edge of her chair, legs stretched out and crossed at the ankle whilst her hands rubbed thick sunscreen into her arms and chest. Helen had done the same for her many times a couple decades ago, and then Liv would giggle whenever Helen joked that the oily cream loved her skin so much she was soft and shiny as a baby seal. I couldn't remember that giggle clearly anymore; it had been replaced by her current sultry chuckle.

"Love is torturous enough when everything does work out," she declared. "There should be a law against being tricked by love into thinking it's all working when it actually isn't."

"Tell me about it." I reached for my beer and tapped her lemonade glass.

A new line of water trickled from her hair, skimming over the freshly applied sunscreen. Liv tugged her wet headband off and gave her hair one more thorough wring. More water flowed.

Her bikini top now clung to her, making me realise I could just make out the outline of dark nipples. I shifted in my chair and turned to study the pool instead.

"I've been watching out for the wrong thing all this time, you see." She looked around her for something then got up to search her bag that lay on the table. "I had always told myself that not getting someone I want would be fine; even being dumped would be fine. That is what I had decided -- ages before Derek."

I looked up at her. "How sensible."

She stopped suddenly, alarm and regret on her face. "No! I'm sorry, Ian -- I didn't mean that Helen's choice should have been a breeze for you or --"

"Come now, lovely, I hadn't been thinking that at all." I reached out for her hand.

She misread my movement and bent down to meet me halfway... then tried to retreat swiftly when she realised I wasn't leaning forward to embrace her. Her jerky withdrawal was totally off-kilter. The result was a cute albeit high-pitched squeal followed by me grabbing her to keep her from tipping the wrong way and banging into the iron table.

Liv instinctively trusted my grip and went with it. The shape of her was so pronounced, I was a little surprised at how easily my large hands managed to steer her to safety. She landed in my lap, breath caught for a few more beats and eyes wide. Once sure she was safe, a short laugh burst from somewhere around her thudding heart.

"You okay?" I smiled at her shaky recovery. "Sorry, I was just reaching for your hand."

Her nose crinkled with what appeared to be self-consciousness, but she did eventually nod. Something bothered me, something I took a while defining: I didn't understand why she was embarrassed; her mistake hadn't been that big a deal. Or was it that she'd wanted me to put my arms around her? Did she...?

No. That was a crazy thought not even worth completion.

She reached for my beer. "Hey, I get to do this legally now..."

Her breath was still coming a little fast, but otherwise she seemed relaxed. No surprise, really. She used to do this as a kid. While the others played with her brother, splashing in the water or running about and climbing the jungle gym, Liv would sneak into Zama's lap while I kept Linda occupied and he'd let her have a sip of his beer. The occurrences had been very rare through her teens; and the final one had been at eighteen, a few weeks before she'd left for varsity.

Three sips. From age eight to eighteen, she'd always only ever taken three sips -- and it was the tradition of our rules and tactics that had the three of us knowing that what we did was more about the closeness of that bond than the beer itself. In fact, I was somewhat certain Liv never quite grew to like the taste.

"I wonder if it'll still feel as precious without the thrill of having to sneak three sips past mom..." She put the bottle to her lips. "God, Ian, have you still not found a better beer?"

I plucked my bottle back. "It's not the beer that's the problem -- it's your tastebuds."

"I told Derek to buy this, but he'd never heard of it." Her tone and gaze were thoughtful. "Are you sure this is gourmet stuff?"

"Gourmet?"

"Or whatever. Fancy stuff."

"Why did you want Derek to start drinking my beer?"

"Haven't a clue." A shrug. "I brought it up last year, purely on impulse... Maybe I missed you?"

I poked her. "What the hell do you mean 'maybe'??"

Her smile was big as she neatly heisted my bottle again with both hands. "Okay, I definitely missed you. I just meant that I wasn't consciously thinking of you when I suddenly suggested this to Derek."

Something rose up my spine, pouring heat into my bones.

"Okay, quit stalling and tell me about love's injustice." I leaned all the way back, sinking into the thick cushion behind me. "What could possibly be worse than outright rejection or being dumped?"

"I was minding my own business -- and he just came along and made me see and love him."

"I thought you barely made it to the brink of love."

"What are you, the precision police?" Sip number two. "Yes, I did say that. But you should know a woman in self-preservation mode when you see one."

She had pulled an elasticised hairband from her bag earlier and slipped it onto her wrist. My eyes were on that red band as she took her final sip. It was red and sturdy-looking, her fingers elegant as she tipped my bottle. It was a strange combination to witness: Olivia, girly with her bright ensemble, her frilly red band... yet so undeniably grown with her wry sense of humour and graceful hands.

"We didn't work at the same place, but for some reason our paths kept crossing. He was a bit of a pretty boy -- a little vain, a little cocky. I was sure he wasn't my type. But a few months into bumping into him on a weekly basis, I realised I liked his sense of humour and that his cockiness hadn't turned him selfish at all. We started hangin' out and I just couldn't get over the fact that a guy that gorgeous and sauve actually liked me."

"I'm surprised at guys who don't." My hand came up to give her shoulder a reprimanding nudge, but ended up lingering in a reassuring squeeze. "I don't know how you manage to be so confident while also being so harsh on yourself."

She was still warm from the sun.

"I'm not harsh on myself." Her head tilted. "... Am I?"

Her jawline cut a distinct line of regal femininity. My eyes followed its path then skated down her throat to the slopes of her shoulders.

"You believe in yourself in most ways," I conceded. "I just don't understand where the physical self-criticism comes from."

"They don't put girls like me on magazine covers, Ian."

"I've seen the girls they put on magazine covers, Ms Hani -- and you're intelligent enough to know you're out of their league. They haven't figured out how to line up depth, strength and a loony sense of humour with beauty in their cover shots just yet."

"And, by 'loony sense of humour', you mean 'irresistible charm and wit', right?"

"Naturally."

She rewarded me with a grape.

Her fingertips slowly traced the back of my hand. "Derek spent a year getting to know me. Granted, the first few months were totally coincidental -- but even that meant something, surely? Why else would he have spent the next few pursuing me like he did?"

I sat up and touched the tip of a wet kink. "You have a light about you, lovely. You draw people in."

She bit back her words right on the verge of protest. "You think so? I just don't know anymore... Either way, I finally let him catch me. I let myself fall for him. And just when I started dreaming of what our second year together would be like, what a real relationship with him could be... he asked me to help him win Katie's heart."

"Katie?"

She tugged the hair I held from my fingers. I watched her pull her hair back a little too tight; curl it into a bun a little too proficiently; and tie her bright red hairband around the bun with snappy motions that were a little too quick.

"Liv?" I touched my palm to the back of her bare neck. "Who's Katie?"

Her hands stilled. "My flatmate."

The pool water was still and heartbreakingly crystal blue.

"I met her at varsity," she elaborated. "Katie is tall and elegant -- so beautiful to watch."

This uttered by the most beautiful woman I knew.

Beauty is mysterious as well as terrible. God and the devil are fighting there, and the battlefield is the heart of man.

I found safer words to speak. "Beauty is a matter of opinion -- not fact."

"Well, then the only fact that matters is that Derek's opinion confirmed her beauty."

"Is that really all that matters?" My hand moved from her neck to rest behind her heart. "Look, I know you're hurting, but... some guys are too stupid to make out treasures that are right in front of them."

"Nah, it wasn't that." Her gaze surfed along the pool's sparkling surface. "I wasn't the girl for him -- I need to accept that. It was stupid of me to fall the way I did in the first place."

"Or you're just more woman than a boy like that can handle right now."

She turned suddenly. I wasn't sure if the corner of her mouth was curling in amusement or intrigue.

"Woman, huh?" It was intrigue. "I wasn't sure how you see me."

And in that instant I knew without hesitation that I needed to get her off my lap.

"Not that my perception of you matters," I rejoined hastily, pushing forward just enough to indicate I needed her to move so I could rise to my feet.

Olivia let me come close, but didn't get up. And, once I was close enough, she pressed her lips to mine.

I should have pushed her away. But it didn't surprise me that I didn't.

What did surprise me was that I'd never seen this coming before. Not consciously.

All those days and years of learning and laughing with her? Then the five years of longing for her when I should have been thinking of Helen? I'd told myself that I missed Helen and wanted her back; and I'd believed that -- until Olivia had left and I got a true taste of losing a part of myself.

I loved Helen -- but with Liv I'd forged a strange connection free of labels, expectations and the dramas of any type of recognised relationship. Not once had it ever been romantic, definitely not sexual -- it was beyond basic affection, attraction and camaraderie. It was... strange. We each instinctively and easily followed the simple rule of letting the other be themselves, year after year. We'd lived together in a way, shared our lives -- yet applied none of the conventional rules of cohabitation to our proximity.

When she'd left I couldn't compute the loss. So, I'd shut down all emotion. I told myself I was learning to accept Helen's departure and maturely letting go of Liv and wishing her well. But really I had simply switched to survival mode by turning off my feelings.

I had created a winter inside myself, one of greyness and solitude.

I should've recognised from the beginning that more was different than Olivia's maturity. I was so stuck on her being a woman that the new feelings rising to the surface, summoned by this woman I had to get to know from scratch, my feelings had slipped by unnoticed.

My lips parted. I knew I had to stop her; I was desperately searching for the right words. All I needed was the strength to grip her arms firmly and push her away.

But then the tip of her tongue touched the inside of my lip. And my world shattered in silence. I could taste her; with each inhalation, I could make out hints of lemonade, strawberry and her.

That fire returned to forge my bones from within. The beast inside roared at its sudden release. I felt as if my veins were being flooded with the warmth and electricity of feeling again. The world was coming to life again, filling with light and colour.