Hugo & Rose by Bridget Foley Read Free Book Online Page B

was there in his smile, when she’d catch him looking at her across the dinner table. It was in his eyes as they made love—his eyes, always open, always full of love and hope. His eyes, always on hers.
    And it was this certitude, this intensity of his love, that worried her. It was the root of her avoidance, that even the slightest physical contact could lead to the intimacy he craved. Rose often worried he’d interpret her distance as a loss of affection. But the truth was far more complicated.
    *   *   *
    New lovers become old lovers. Their ways become practiced. In time they come to see less of each other, their minds wandering while their bodies couple.
    But Josh had never stopped seeing Rose. He made love to her in the same way he had when their love was fresh—more practiced than he was then, an expert now in her body, but still the entire world eclipsed by her . Looking at her. Smelling her. Being with her.
    Rose never wondered if he was thinking of someone else while they had sex … his eyes were wide and clear and hungry. There was no escaping them.
    But Rose was terrified of being seen.
    Josh had barely changed, but she had dissolved into a frumpy housewife, overweight, overtired. Sexless where she had once been sexy.
    Each time they made love she thought surely this time he would finally realize she wasn’t worthy of his worship. Surely, this time, he would realize he could find someone more beautiful to give his soul to.
    Rose ached at the thought. She could not lose Josh.
    But she also knew that she risked his loss by not letting him make love to her. So she parsed out sex to her husband, rationing it like a finite resource.
    *   *   *
    If they had stopped loving each other, they would have settled into a comfortable acceptance of their lives. If they had stopped loving each other, Josh’s mind would have wandered while they fucked and Rose would have felt shielded from losing him. If they had stopped loving each other, Josh wouldn’t have been so driven to protect their future together and he would have been able to be home more.
    If they had stopped loving each other, it would have been easier.
    *   *   *
    Rose and Hugo spent her dream retrieving the Blanket Pavilion from the Natters nest. They had been resting inside when an avian shadow had suddenly painted itself on the ceiling of the tent. There was a screech and suddenly they were naked to the pearly sky of the island, watching the larger of the two Natters fly into the distance, white sheets trailing in his claws. Hugo and Rose had traveled to the reaches to get it back, climbing the bird-poop-stained peak to their nest. Both giant seabirds were there, beaks poking the fabric of the tent into the bed of their home.
    â€œWhy have they never laid any eggs?” whispered Rose, hiding beneath the lip of the nest.
    â€œBecause we never let them finish it.” Hugo winked and leaped into the bird’s line of sight. “Hey, you, overgrown seagulls!”
    The birds startled, their huge gray-tipped wings whipping the air. The female drew back her throat and released a shattering cackle, while the male snapped his beak at Hugo. He turned and began running down the side of the mountain.
    Rose waited, holding her breath. For a while it seemed that only the male was going to follow him. The female had hung back, chattering and beating at the air.
    The male pursued Hugo on foot, his razor-sharp beak pecking at the ground behind him. Hugo turned toward the bird and slipped on a patch of scree. His feet flew out from beneath him and suddenly he was sliding down the side of the mountain on an avalanche of gravel.
    The male cried and launched himself into the air. In the nest, the female finally gave up holding back and took off, the air of her wings buffeting Rose’s body.
    Rose pulled herself up and made quick work of pulling the cloth of the Pavilion out of the