“We have to save it for tomorrow.”
I huff, lay my head on her shoulder. She hasn’t touchedme since we arrived.
“You’ve been planning this, haven’t you?”
“Since before we left New York.”
“You’re insane.”
“Oh, definitely.”
Her fingers find their way into my hair and traceover my scalp. My wife knows how to
shut me up. I fall asleep watching the light fromthe television flicker over her face.
The next day is much like the previous, which I don’tmind.
We snag a traditional English breakfast from the McDonald’sdown the street and walk
down to her family’s bookstore. Her parents don’tappear the slightest hungover from last night’s
dinner and are resolved to show us everything to beseen in Wiltshire. It’s mostly little stone
cottages on cobblestone streets. So much stone. Thedull gray blends into the overcast so that one
can’t even find the horizon. Even in the summer, thiscountry’s weather is determined to be
solemn.
I wonder if it’s boring, for her. She grew up here.But when I glance at her every now
and then, she seems content, if a little distracted.
Her parents are interesting. She has her father’snose and her mother’s eyes, but her
mouth is all her own. My English rose is no rose atall, maybe a sunflower instead. Something
tall, steady. Unabashedly staring into the sun.
We go to lunch at her parents’ favorite pub and whilethey’re filling her in on what drama
one of her cousins is embroiled in, I watch her speak.I know after a drink or two she’ll begin