His hands slid down her shoulders with a lingering reluctance and dropped right away, and she pushed the hair from her eyes so she could see his face. He looked serious. Too serious.
‘Is everything okay?’ Crikey. Maybe she’d been a hopeless kisser and he was embarrassed.
‘You kiss like an angel.’
Her cheeks flamed. Had she said that out loud? He went on with a twisted smile. ‘And it seemed prudent to stop.’
Not quite sure how to take that but maybe with sincere gratitude because it wasn’t unreasonable to think that kiss could have led to an embarrassing incident. ‘Oh. Well.’ She brushed the hair out of her eyes again. ‘You’re pretty good yourself.’
The ferry pulled into Balmain East, tied up then untied and chugged across the harbour to McMahon’s Point. They both watched the busy deckhand with an intensity born of diversion from what they wanted to really do. Marco squeezed her hand and she squeezed back.
When the ferry pulled into Milson’s Point wharf, at least they had a purpose as they stepped across the walkway to the pier.
The laughing-clown mouth of the entrance invited them to join the milling crowd and Marco couldn’t help looking up at the squealing victims spinning above their heads on a swirling circular ride. His stomach contracted at the thought.
‘You like these rides?’
Emily laughed. ‘Not those ones. Though I am partial to the view from the Ferris wheel and a trip on the Wild Mouse.’
‘A wild mouse?’
She pointed. ‘Up there. It’s a mini roller-coaster that makes you think you’re going to fly out over the harbour and instead turns the corner suddenly. It’s Annie’s favourite.’
‘It sounds like your favourite. Not Annie’s.’ This one didn’t look too bad. At least it didn’t turn upside down.
He crossed to the payment window and purchased a wrist-banded ride pass for both of them.
‘Come.’ He lingered over the word until she grinned. ‘We will see who is the most frightened.’
They jogged up the gaily painted steps hand in hand and Emily turned to him. ‘Can’t you feel the infectious enthusiasm from the young crowd?’
He wasn’t sure if he was infected yet. The teens were having a ball on this Friday night and her smiling face turned from side to side as she caught glimpses of the screaming occupants … and perhaps seeping some foolishness into him.
A battered little red car on rails trundled across and stopped in front of them with a clang. ‘Jump in,’ the laconic ride attendant drawled, ‘man at the back, lady between his legs. I do the seat belt.’ Marco could tell he’d said the same a million times.
This idea improved with time, Marco thought with satisfaction, as Emily snuggled into the space between his legs with her skirt smoothed out in front of her. Nice. Warm and soft and in need of protection during this coming adventure. It was a very small car.
She had to lean back into his chest and his arms came along the outside of hers to grip the same handle. Snug. The car shunted off with an unexpected jerk and Emily was forced back into his chest with a bump. He tightened his hands and prepared to enjoy the ride.
They rolled down the first hill and jolted onto a runner to be pulled up the next and then gathered speed. It blurred after that.
The first sharp corner loomed as they rocketed towards it and he read the sign just before they turned.
‘Brace Yourself!’
He braced and Emily slammed into him and he slammed into the side of the car, she laughed and he had to laugh as the next corner came up and it seemed they would sail out over the harbour, but the trusty wheels remained hooked to the track as they flew around that one.
Emily laughed again and he could feel the spread of a huge smile across his face as the ride rocketed on. Up and down steep little hills that lifted them out of their seats as they bounced at the bottom, still stuck together, and he decided then they would repeat this experience before they went home.
The car rolled to a stop. It was over. Shame, that.
‘Lady out first. Then the gent. Keep to the left and down the stairs.’
Emily waited for him to climb out, not as elegantly as he could have wished but that smile seemed glued to his face and she laughed at his expression. ‘You’d think you’d never been to an amusement park before.’
The laughter fell away. No.
He tried not to think of his lonely childhood, his family moving towns in the dead of night, and those periods of abject poverty when his father had been in gaol.
‘Oh!’ She was not slow. The smile she threw him would have lit the whole harbour in a power failure. ‘In that case, we need to really make a night of it.’
She grabbed his hand and dragged him down the stairs. ‘It’s Coney Island for you. I want to see you in the rolling pipes and if you don’t get motion sickness I’m going to stick you to the wall in the Rotor.’
And the darkness was gone. Lifted from him by the light of her joy. He followed her, soaking in her delight in silly games, ridiculous rides and fairy floss. Her hand in his, laughing and looking at him to be sure he too enjoyed the night. A strange feeling to savour that she cared so much that he was the happy one.
He kissed her as she reached the end of the wacky walkway, kissed her after the slippery slide, and leant her back into the wall and kissed her thoroughly after another ride on the wild mouse.
The most memorable kiss—though not the most successful—was upside down in the centrifugal chamber where the forces glued them to the wall while the floor fell away. They only just made it back to upright before the floor came back and gravity returned.
From there it seemed natural to walk her back to his flat, hold her as they ascended the lift, and lean her against his outside wall while he opened the door.
Emily was in a fairy floss coloured daze. She hadn’t laughed so much for years. She knew it wasn’t real, it was all an illusion like the wacky mirrors that made you first fat and then thin. She was happy at this moment and she refused to look into the future and see the end of this night.
She’d never felt so silly, so beautiful, so protected. But she hadn’t intended to come back to his flat. Tomorrow was a little too close for that.
And then they were inside and the door was shut. ‘Now, how did I end up here?’
He watched her indulgently. Like she was a child. She may have behaved like one but so had he. Make no mistake, though, she was a woman.
Marco said, ‘It is your fault. You and your amusement parks exposing me to the testosterone of teenage boys and the flirtatiousness of a woman who could be a teenager herself.’
‘I did not flirt.’
‘Did you not? Then you were yourself. Incredible, whimsical, amazing self, and I am enthralled.’
She turned her back on him. Stared through the glass across the room at the harbour and thought of stopping this right here. Not taking this to the logical conclusion for a man of the world and a woman who had always wondered what good sex would be like.
She had to remember this man was heading off to the other side of the world very shortly. But maybe that was a good thing.
His arm dropped around her shoulders. ‘Let us view the harbour.’
She glanced at his face. ‘You didn’t say come.’
‘Perhaps later.’