4 August 2012
-NATE-
"What's that over there?" Tiffany asked as we lay on the sandy white beach later that afternoon that circles the island.
"It's one of our neighbouring islands. It's a six star hotel, so if we want to go for dinner or to a spa or something then we'll go there"
"Are we totally alone on here?"
"Fingers crossed. There's a cleaner who comes twice a week when there's someone staying here, so you might see her at some point"
"There's no deadly animals is there?"
"Deadly? No. There's quite a few animals mind...." I trailed off, knowing she wouldn't be happy when I revealed what there was surrounding us at this very moment.
"Nate?" she asked, sitting up.
"It's nothing, you'll be fine"
"Nate, what's on here?"
"Stay with me and you'll be fine"
"It's spiders isn't it!" she asked, making more of a statement than a question, slightly distantly. I stayed quiet, knowing whatever I said would make her scared, but she questioned me again "On the land or in the water too?"
Again I stayed quiet, but she'd guessed. The island was covered in spiders: from the sea surrounding us to above the doorways in our bedroom. Spiders didn't bother me much. Sure, they were a little creepy and I sure as hell wouldn't remove one of the large ones from a wall, but I wasn't scared of them. Tiffany on the other hand was renowned for being absolutely petrified. Even spiders that are smaller than one centimetre squared freaked her out big time, so I didn't want to think about how she'd react if she saw one the size of her head, which was quite common around the Maldives.
"I've had someone in to remove as many as possible, and de-spider the house, but we need to make sure all the windows and doors are always closed"
"Oh Nate" she whined in terror as she clung to me again.
"Sweetie we'll be fine. Please don't worry about it. It's just one of those things" She winced and tensed her whole body into a tight ball, keeping her eyes firmly open. They were darting around the whole time watching out for something approaching us on the sand.
"They don't really like the sand baby. You'll be fine on here" I said, pressing her head into my chest so she couldn't see as much surrounding us.
I, however, was lapping up this view. We were surrounded from all sides with a thick wall of water, that appeared to stretch for eternity around us. It was broken only by the three visible islands around us, which were almost identical to ours but they were more densely inhabited with hotel guests.
Our island was barren for most of the year. I rented it out to a few people over the course of the year, and my father uses it as a retreat at times, but other than that it's rarely inhabited, making it one of the most peaceful and serene islands.
In the centre, there's a small area covered in tropical trees, that are very rarely in bloom, and despite my efforts to introduce sprinklers they were still dying due to lack of water.
This part of the world is very hot: the sun beats down for about 15 hours of the day, but the heat still continues in the evenings. I suppose that's one of the disadvantages of being near the equator, but it certainly made this island more and more like paradise.
As we headed back to the house that evening, I had to check around to make sure everything was shut and that there were no remaining spiders. Tiffany sat with baited breath in the kitchen whilst I did a sweep of the house.
It was a little steep to call it a house: it was more of a shack with a lot of rooms. It was made in a traditional style out of wood, just like the luxury rooms in the hotel 'next door' but it had air conditioning and all the necessary amenities that they didn't. On the ground floor was an entrance room which doubled as a living room, a kitchen and a small bathroom, and on the top floor was two bedrooms, an office (installed by my father) and a large ensuite bathroom to the master room.
It was quite a small house, and definitely not what Tiffany was used to, but it's location gave it top marks and pushed it that little bit higher than the Hampton's house.
"All clear baby" I shouted down before I hurtled down the stairs to see her again.
When I came downstairs, she was wearing the same Givenchy dress that she'd worn on our date up the Rockerfeller Centre, and it still looked as gorgeous.
"What do you think?" she said, smiling and twirling for me.
"It looks even better than last time" I said, running my fingers across the familiar material
"I asked Mollie to pack it just before we left"
"You look incredible" I said, stepping back and admiring her. "Does this mean I have to take you to dinner now?" I moaned sarcastically.
"I think it does" she laughed, throwing me a shirt.
"Want me to get changed right now?" I said, looking at my watch which told me it was almost 6pm.
"Yes please" she said, sitting down and gesturing for me to begin.
"You're so unfair" I called, rolling my eyes at her.
"Do as your wife says" she declared, looking incredibly full of herself.
"Sorry ma'am"
"Excused"
I pulled my tshirt off for the second time that day, enjoying the feel of her eyes burning away at my chest as she looked on longingly. As I replaced it with the white shirt she'd thrown me, I started to button it up, not feeling her gaze leave me once.
"You look so good in a white shirt" she said, standing up to do up the rest of the buttons for me, leaving the top one undone.
She threw me a selection of other clothes that I put on until she agreed that I looked respectable enough to take on her arm.
"I'll call for a boat" I said as I headed to the phone that dialled straight through to the hotel.
A few minutes later, a speed boat pulled up that whisked us away to our first date as a married couple.
Love You Too: PART EIGHTY • Opuss № I