by refusing to let it win.” I take his hand and place it on my heart. “You’ve won. And you’ve won me.”
A shaky smile comes across his lips. “You’ll have me back?”
“I never even left.”
That smile breaks into a grin. He leans down and kisses me. He kisses me like it’s our first kiss and our last kiss all at once. It’s a kiss that makes my toes curl in my boots and my stomach do belly flops. It’s a kiss that makes someone in the coffee shop mutter, “Jeez, get a room.”
We break apart and we laugh, dizzy and intoxicated by each other.
“Want to go for a walk?” Padraig asks me, gesturing to the door. “I’ve never been to Philly before. Maybe you could be my tour guide. We could get lunch. I’m fucking starving.”
“I’d love that,” I tell him as he grabs my hand. “But I’m supposed to meet my sisters here … I’m guessing you already knew that.”
“They’re not coming until tomorrow,” he says, holding out my coat for me as I slip it on.
“So how did all of this happen?”
“Well, after my nan beat me with the wooden spoon, I got to thinking that I needed to go to ye. I needed to find ye and bring ye back and if you didn’t want to come back, then I’d stay with you and if you didn’t want that either well, at least I was fighting for it.”
“The fighting Irish,” I say as he leads me out of the coffee shop and we start walking down the street, heading toward the Liberty Bell.
“That’s the stuff. Anyway, I had your sisters’ numbers in case of an emergency so I contacted Angie because she seemed like the sensible one—”
“This is true.”
“And then she called me back and yelled at me for an hour, so I quickly regretted sending that text.”
I laugh. “So then I’m guessing you contacted Sandra.”
“Yea, she was less yelly over all. And she had this idea for you to come here and they would do a bait and switch. Said you probably wouldn’t want to see me if you knew.”
“But my mom this morning …”
“She knew too. I already spoke to her on the phone.”
I stop dead in my tracks. “You spoke to her on the phone??”
“I did. Seems like a nice lady. She talked to me for an hour, too.”
“And did she yell at you?”
“No, she just talked about herself and all the issues she’s working through. I’m not sure what went down over this last week but whatever it is, it sounds like progress.”
“Speaking of progress, how are you?” I ask him as we start walking again. Though his gait is even and steady (unlike mine), I’ve noticed his hands have a bit of a tremor to them and there’s this tic along his jaw, though that could be from stress or jetlag.
“I’m okay,” he admits. “I knew the flight would be rough but I got through it with a lot of melatonin. My vision is fine, like nothing happened, though I do get this blurriness at the corners when I’m tired. And I’m tired all the time. That’s the worst part. The fatigue.”
“Should we stop and rest?” I gesture to a park bench.
He shakes his head. “Nah. I feel better already. It’s probably because I’m with you. You’re the pulse of my heart, Valerie. A tonic to my soul.”
He stops and pulls me to the side of the sidewalk, placing his arms around my waist and pressing me again him. “You’re everything to me.”
And I’m happy. I’m just so fucking happy with this beautiful world of mine.
“Tell me you love me,” I whisper. “Tell me you love me, and I’ll tell you I love you more.”
“I love you, Valerie,” he says softly, his eyes pining me in place, making me feel his words to my very soul, where they grow and grow, like flowers on a vine, wrapping around me, making me feel beautiful.
“And I love you more.”
Padraig ends up staying with us for a week.
Right here in my parents’ house.
Squeezed on my old twin bed.
It actually goes pretty amazing, considering everything that happened and how everyone’s relationship seems to be in the middle of being repaired. There was no awkwardness or strained conversations, no faking a smile.
My sisters were there for the weekend, like they promised. We did more of the fun touristy stuff together and even took the train to New York City for the day. Sandra did her best to