Upside Down(38)

“I’m not. But you still haven’t asked me.”

He smiled, more relieved than happy, I thought. “Would you mind if I held your hand? Do you like holding hands? I don’t know what you’re comfortable with because we haven’t got that far yet—”

I held out my hand. “I like hand holding. I actually like it a lot. And the nervous rambling you have going on right now is kinda cute, but I have the nervous rambling market cornered. There are trademarks and patents pending. In case you were wondering.”

He took my hand, feeling the weight of it as though it was quite a monumental thing, before threading our fingers. Then he looked at me with the dopiest grin on his face. “I like holding hands too.”

Then we stood there on the footpath for a while holding hands and smiling at each other like a pair of idiots. “Should we?” I asked, nodding toward the stairs to the art gallery.

“We should.”

So we did, holding hands. We took in the creations and masterpieces that adorned the walls. We didn’t speak much in the few hours it took. Hennessy would stop and stare at a particular piece and I’d wait patiently until he’d taken in every line, every stroke of paint or charcoal, every shade. Don’t get me wrong; I admired the artwork too. It really was amazing. But watching him process each piece was kind of amazing too.

“You love it, don’t you?” I asked him quietly.

He nodded, then turned from the charcoal artwork to me. “I do. I know the saying is a picture paints a thousand words, but it’s more than that. It’s like a book on canvas. Every stroke of the artists hand is a word, a sentence, a chapter. The whole picture is a story in itself. Don’t you think?”

I swallowed hard and nodded. And I knew, I just knew that we had to have that dreaded talk about expectations and limits and what we wanted from each other. There was no going back now. Because there, while the world spun around us, surrounded by white walls and priceless art, holding hands and hearing him talk about the correlation between art and books, well… that was it for me.

Like I took a miscalculated step or like I missed the last stair, I fell headfirst right into love with Hennessy Lang.

Motherfucker.





When we left the art gallery, we grabbed some lunch at the Pavilion, then set off for a stroll through the Botanical Gardens. It wasn’t long before Hennessy slipped his hand around mine. “So how was it? Did you really like the exhibit, or were you bored out of your mind? You can tell me honestly.”

“On a scale of one to best second date in the history of ever, it was a nine.”

“Just a nine?”

“Well, it’s not over yet.”

He smiled. “True.”

“I liked how much you liked it,” I admitted. “The fact you find beauty in art tells me a lot about you.”

“Is that so?” he mused. “Do I want to know?”

I saw a bench seat in the sun overlooking the park and pulled on his hand to lead him toward it. We sat, almost touching. “It’s a good thing, don’t worry. It tells me that you have great visual awareness; you notice smaller details others might overlook. It’s probably why you’re so good at your job. But also that you can appreciate things you find beautiful, simply for what they are.”

He was quiet a moment. “You got all that from one visit to an art gallery?”

I laughed. “I’m a librarian, remember? I can tell a lot about a person by what books they choose. Like you said, artwork is like a novel, yes?”

He nodded. “I guess.”

“It’s subjective, though. Art and books,” I added. “I’m no expert in art, but I know books, and there is such a misconception about what genre people prefer. I don’t give a fuck what people read, as long as they read. From manga to gardening books, it doesn’t matter, and why people scoff at romance, I’ll never know. Because isn’t it a beautiful thing? Romance, that is. People wanting a happy ending. How is that ever wrong? But that being said, I’d like to think I know a lot about a person by what they read. Knowing what people choose to read or study or what books they enjoy in private is akin to seeing someone’s browser history, their true selves. Autobiographies, murder mystery, self-help, romance… And then you have sub-genres within those genres, which adds another layer of awareness. Some people like any and all crime and thriller, yet some will only read true crime or fictional crime where the protagonist is a forty-year-old woman with mummy issues.” I took a sip of my coffee. “It can say a lot about a person.”

“And what do you think my choice of audiobooks says about me?”

“That you have eclectic tastes. That you like a broad range of subjects, so you have a well-versed scope on how humans think, and in world affairs, that you’re open minded, always learning. You like some escapism but enjoy being challenged. I’d say you’re rather clever, smarter than you like to let on. And I think you thrive in your own company, and you need to be mentally stimulated by something, or someone, before you delve a little deeper.”

He blinked. “Holy shit. I’d say… you’re not wrong.”

“I know I’m not.”

“And what does your love for eighteenth-century French poets say about you?”

“I can’t answer that for me. You tell me what it says about me.”