Cast Ashore — a novelette in 15 chapters
Cast Ashore: Chapter 12
An Undeserved Grace
The uneasy, stormy late summer passes into a warm, quiet autumn. Kaja and I settle into a routine.
The consensus is that my place is charming — and romantic in a grungy, boho way — but hers is more comfortable. She comes down to fetch me from my work every evening.
‘This studio is amazing! The cutest thing I’ve ever seen. How ever did you get the tram? How ever do you find anything in here? What’s this? I love that — how did you make it?’
Endlessly curious, she loves hearing about my work, right down to the details I always thought tedious to anyone but myself.
We open a bottle of red on the deck. Eat chips, watch the sun go down. Wave at curious locals walking by, trying so very hard not to seem nosey. Giggle a lot at their expense.
I never thought to experience such a thing again.
Those days and nights of limerence. Those endless moments when the profile of a nose, the turn of a cheek, the soft pressure of thigh on thigh, arm on arm is enough to fill life to the brim. That wonder in the otherness of the adored other. I’d thought that it was gone for ever, a fading dream of my youth.
