Love In The Shade
What makes a truly happy marriage?…
Amy glanced across the swimming pool. Josh sat in the shade, as she basked in the sun. It had been this way all holiday. All honeymoon, to be exact.
Each morning they laid a towel on a lounger with an umbrella for him, and
another for her in the spot that stayed sunny all day long.
She hadn’t imagined it to be like this.
She’d pictured them side by side, hand in hand. Like twins, joined at the hip.
Just as you are when you line up to clear security checks at the airport. Territorial. Protective of your shared space.
Maybe her aunt was right, perhaps they had married too quickly.
Last night they’d chatted to a couple who said they came back to this hotel
every year to avoid wet Wales. By coming to Goa, you could have as much sunshine as you liked, they said, especially in winter.
July was the start of the rainy season – but they liked it now, too. And so
far the rain had stayed away.
These were the sort of people who finished sentences for each other. They
probably had an almost telepathic link after years of living together.
She remembered how Pat had linked her arm through Frank’s as they left the
bar to walk back to their room. How readily he’d reached to pick up the bag of souvenirs they bought at the market.
A patch of shade registered on her face. She squinted to open her eyes.
“You’re turning a bit red, love,” Josh said, looking down at her. “Just saying.”
“Can you put some lotion on my back while you’re here?”
“Sure.”
She handed him the bottle and rolled into position. He drizzled the cool factor
five on her skin.
She groaned happily as he massaged her shoulders.
They didn’t feel pink. Another few hours would be fine.
Turning her head to one side, she could see a fragment of the world in the space
between her hair and above her arm. A little triangle of holiday.
The lady who was on the sunbed next to Josh’s smiled over at them. She probably thinks we’re happy, Amy realised.
And in that moment she acknowledged her emotions.
They’d been gnawing away like a patch of raw skin after wearing new sandals… Had-They-Made-A-Mistake?
Josh kissed her and slunk back to the shady side of the pool. To be fair, he did
turn into a human tomato after a while. He was blond.
The factor 30 had let him down a few days ago and he was reluctant to get burned again.
Perhaps they should have brought a stronger type.
Or maybe he should have married a vampire! They could have lived in perpetual darkness, slept in a double width coffin and only risen to go and feed.
Amy smiled inwardly at the picture. It was more entertaining than her book.
Perhaps it was her vivid imagination that was causing her doubts.
She watched as a daddy taught his little girl to swim.
Hopefully this is how it will be for us, she thought, assuming we stay in
Cornwall next year where the sun won’t be so fierce.
Her belly was only just plumping out.
You could be forgiven for thinking that she’d had too many poppadoms, not that she’d made a contraceptive mistake.
She had always been such a good planner, which made it feel especially fateful that she’d messed up with her pills.
Aside from living a celibate life, nothing was a hundred per cent reliable anyway, so her doctor had said.
Amy remembered how completely she’d trusted those little white tablets with her future.
Or perhaps she’d unconsciously done something wrong to fulfill a secret biological urge. Stranger things had happened.
Her family and Josh’s were both traditional, she discovered. They hadn’t
talked about their backgrounds on that first night they’d slept together, nor the
next, or during the following six weeks.
Not during the passionate hours, nor the sleeping-curled-up-together moments in between.
It wasn’t until she’d clocked the lack of stomach pain or her usual monthly mood
swings that she’d caught her breath and noticed she was late.
A pair of blackbirds hopped to the edge of the water and drank.
It was probably full of chlorine and bad for them, but they seemed to know what they were doing.
One of them screeched and they flew away together.
Nobody had pushed her and Josh into a shotgun wedding – far from it – but it
was done, and everybody had released their collective shoulder muscles.
A few generations back, they would have been shoved up the aisle by both sets of
parents.
In this decade, they were left to make their own decision… with help.
They’d had a timely ceremony and a honeymoon from Dad for being a good
girl. Smiles from the mums, nods of approval from her older brothers.
A white dress – why not? Nothing shows, sweetheart.
Flowers arranged by her best friend, a party that went on ’till dawn. It was so easy to get caught up in the spirit of Doing-The-Right-Thing.
And she did love him. She loved him very much.
Even so, it was scary to be finding out so many new things about her husband after the wedding.
She’d never envisaged this was how it would be when she tied the knot.
A kind breeze took the heat off her skin. She stayed on her front, on the basis that
soon, she wouldn’t be able to.
An even tan was essential to the single girl – was it possible for married women? Would it even matter once her priorities changed?
She watched the scene around the pool from her limited viewpoint.
Sometimes she turned her head to the left and looked for Josh. He was still reading.
A Russian couple swam up and down a few times. The woman wore a minuscule
bikini. She was tiny, like a little bird herself. She hardly made the metal stairs creak as she climbed up and out of the pool.
Amy got it. That would be why Josh was still engrossed in his book while the other husbands turned their attention to the tiny woman.
Casting so little shade, the skinny Russian had nothing of interest for him!
What kind of shadow were they making? Did her husband have reservations of his own?
It hadn’t felt quite the same as an arranged marriage until now. Not quite.
She slept. Then she woke confused and hot. Then registered a wet towel being
draped over her neck.
Josh crouched beside her.
“I went to the room for some cash to pay for lunch but I couldn’t open the safe,” he said. “Turned out I’d used the wrong combination.”
She ran her tongue around her dry mouth, trying to wake properly. Why was he talking about the safe?
“Have I been asleep for long?”
“About half an hour, I guess.”
She turned onto her side to look at him.
He was assessing her skin once again. He pulled her hand to get her sitting upright.
The mental fuzziness cleared and she could see the whole picture. He tugged her hand.
“Come over with me, I’ve put a towel out on the lounger to keep a spot for you.”
“Isn’t it a bit too cold over there under the trees?”
“Amy, it’s 33 degrees and it feels like a sauna. You’re not going to get cold.”
He gathered up her books and led her to the other side of the pool.
As they walked over the sandstone tiles, she thought about all the marriages where the wife had to make more compromises than she’d ever have to.
She was lucky. She’d married him of her own free will.
Today was just a wobble. Just an uncertain moment on their first trip abroad. Surely that was all?
He was right. The temperature was still warm on the other side. Very warm.
She smiled at him.
“Do you think that one day we’ll be like that Welsh couple we met last night? You know, coming back here every year?”
“Could be. Though I’d welcome some of that promised rain.
“But we shouldn’t limit ourselves to one place too soon anyway. It’d be great to see more of India, and the rest of the world, of course. We should make some kind of list.”
The tension eased from her shoulders. She slipped further down on the sun lounger, adjusted to the new bed she’d chosen to lie on.
The woman next to her caught her attention. The woman who thought they
were happy.
“Excuse me, dear, I couldn’t help overhearing. I think you mentioned Pat
and Frank, the people from Cardiff?”
“Yes, do you know them?”
“I do – very well, actually. We often arrive here the same weeks they visit.”
She put her magazine away in a canvas bag.
“You see, they used to come here with their spouses until she was widowed and he lost his wife in the same year.
“They both came back for the winter holiday without knowing the other would be here, then they ended up together.
“I can’t help it, I love telling their story. It’s so romantic, isn’t it?”
“Gosh, I hadn’t realised.” Then Amy remembered the hand holding, the eye
contact and it all made sense.
“Knowing their respective spouses as I did, I’m certain they’d be happy for them,”
she continued. “Otherwise they might still both be living alone.”
Amy nodded.
The woman glanced at Josh, who was back into his book.
“Your husband kept such an eye on you in case you burned. This wind can be deceiving. You forget how strong the sun can be here.”
“Yes, that’s true, I suppose. And thank you for telling me about your friends – I
wouldn’t want to put my foot in it if we talk to them again.”
“Oh, they would happy to share their story, it isn’t a secret. Far from it, dear.
“In fact, I’ve missed the best bit – silly me. It was his daughter who insisted he keep the holiday booking. Turns out she knows Pat’s niece on Facebook.
“It was the niece who travelled here with her aunt before going on to the Taj to meet friends.”
As she digested the tale, Amy put aside her initial reaction.
Even that loving couple were not quite what they’d seemed.
And they should be together, of course. How sad if they had both remained alone, for some sort of nod to What-People-Might-Think.
It was another marriage where family approval had lent a hand.
She recalled how they’d told her and Josh about the waterfall they should visit,
about the spice gardens and the lively beach bars at Candolim. But some travel
tips came from her, some from him.
Wasn’t that the essence of a good marriage anyway? A merger of two people’s past lives and a shared future?
“They do seem happy.” She smiled.
“Oh they’re a lovely couple, yes,” the woman agreed. “Right, I must go and find my husband and pack. Our flight is tomorrow morning, too early for my liking. I want to shop for some presents before we go.
“Have a good holiday, pet.”
As she left, Amy watched Josh as he started another chapter of his book. She
noticed the familiar curve of his shoulder, the dark blonde stubble on his chin.
His watch had slipped further up his wrist and there was a lighter patch of skin where it had been.
Just as there was a band of white on his finger, beneath his wedding ring.
Their marriage was making changes like that. Making big changes on her body too.
He glanced at her, and smiled.
“Are you happy over here?”
“Yes,” she said, because she was. She truly was.
She had been frightened; they’d made a leap of faith and she had to adjust her expectations with the reality of their relationship.
But didn’t everyone?
Suddenly it was a genuine, wholehearted commitment.
This is the start of our merger, our marriage, she thought. And soon we will be parents, coating our baby in protective lotions against the fierce rays of the sun.
There had never been much dividing them. Just an umbrella and a puddle of
shade. And she could live with those.
We’ll be sharing another lovely escapist holiday story from our archives, every Monday and Thursday during June. Look out for the next one!
