“Do you hate me?” he asked her softly. He had thought of it before, but told himself he was insane. He didn't want to confuse things while they were working together. And now it was too late. They were about to leave. But he had shared his most important piece of work with her. And he treasured her as a friend.
Tanya slowly shook her head. “I don't hate you. I already miss you, and you haven't even left.” Life was so strange sometimes. People came into your life and left again, sometimes kindly, sometimes cruelly, and always with regret. She was going to miss them terribly. She looked into Phillip's eyes, wondering what the kiss meant.
“I don't want to leave,” he said softly. The emotions he had held back for months were spilling over him, and nearly drowning him, now that the walls were down.
“Then don't,” she whispered back.
“Come with us.” His eyes begged her, and she shook her head.
“I can't. What would I do there?”
“The same thing we did here. We could make another movie together.”
“And then what, when the movie ends? I'd still have to come back. My children are here, Phillip.”
“They're almost grown up. We need you, Tanya …I need you,” he said with tears in his eyes. He didn't know what to say to her, but he didn't want this to end. This trip. This time. The life he had shared with her, that was about to end forever when they left.
“Are you serious?” she asked as he nodded and kissed her again. “Now what are we going to do?” she asked, looking distressed. Why had this happened now, so close to the end? It seemed too late. They had to leave, and she had to stay here. But her life would seem empty now without them.
“I'm very serious,” he said somberly, pulling her tighter into his arms. “I fell in love with you the day we met. I didn't want to screw things up by saying anything while we were working together.” It was the opposite of what Gordon did, playing on every movie he made. Phillip had been professional till the last. Perhaps too much so. They had wasted months that they could have spent together. She had felt something, too, but had chosen to ignore it until now. She had poured her heart into Isabelle and Rupert, and his film. But now she couldn't ignore what she felt for Phillip. All he wanted to do was hold her, and stop time from moving forward. They were down to their final days together, and then would go their separate ways.
“Let's talk about this tomorrow,” she said softly, and he nodded. There was a smile in his eyes now, a spark of life. Some part of him was coming alive again, and he could see it in her eyes, too. “Are we completely crazy?” she asked him, looking worried.
“Yes. But I'm not sure we have a choice here. I don't think I can do otherwise.” She wasn't sure that she could either. She was feeling swept away on the tides of what he was saying to her and what they were feeling for each other. Everything between them was changing. She wanted to stop and be sensible, to make reasonable decisions. But the decisions seemed to be making themselves. She felt as though she were losing control over her destiny as she looked at him.
He kissed her again and left, and she lay awake all night, next to Isabelle in the bed beside her. She held the little girl close to her, and thought of him. What strange fate had brought them all together? And why, if they were going to have to leave each other again? She didn't want to love one more person she couldn't have, or one more person who would leave. They were leaving in three weeks. And yet, she realized now, she was falling in love with him, or had been all along. Not only him but his children. And there was no way she could go with him and live in England. There had to be some other way. The secret was to find it. If it was meant to be, she told herself, they would find a solution. If not, they wouldn't. All they had to do was be brave enough to look. And braver still if they dared to trust life again.
Chapter 25
The rest of their trip to southern California was a strange journey for Phillip and Tanya. They spent most of it looking at each other over his children's heads and smiling. They had found something magical on the trip. Something they'd had all along and didn't even know. But now that it was out of the closet, it was impossible to resist, and neither of them wanted to. Now there was no putting it back or hiding what they'd found and finally admitted. It was out in the bright sunlight, blinding them with its light.
They took long walks on the beach in San Diego, walking behind the children, watching them as they got their feet wet in the surf, and picked up shells to give the children.
“I love you, Tanya,” he said softly in the accent that was so familiar now. She had been firmly convinced she would never hear those words again from a man, nor wanted to.
“I love you, too.” But she had no idea what to do about it. They both thought about it quietly on the long drive home.
The girls seemed not to notice the transformation that had happened on their travels. Jason came home, and they all went to Lake Tahoe. It was only once they were there that the older children became aware of something different happening between their mother and Phillip. Until then, they had been firmly convinced that all their mother and Phillip shared was work. They liked him, although their situation seemed complicated even to them. He was leaving for England with his children in two weeks. He asked her one night if she would move to England with him, and she said again that she couldn't. She said that she had children and a life here.
“I can't leave my kids.” And he couldn't stay in the States either. He had no permit to work, except on this film. And it was finished. He had to go back. They were going to be six thousand miles apart. It seemed a cruel turn of fate to both of them.
And then as Molly talked about spending a semester in Florence, Phillip and Tanya looked at each other across the table at dinner one night, and their eyes met. They had the same idea at the same time. He waited until the children had gone to bed to ask her. She knew what he was going to say before he said the words.
“Would you be willing to live in Italy with me for a year while we figure this out?” One or both of them was going to have to move, and it was too soon to make any decisions yet. They knew each other well after six months of working together, but there was much they didn't know, and needed to find out. Things they had both forgotten and thought they wanted to forget, until now.
“My kids won't be home again until Thanksgiving,” Tanya explained to him. “I suppose I could come to England and stay with you after they leave for school in September, and I could stay for a couple of months. Maybe while I'm there we could look for a house somewhere near Florence. If Molly goes to school there for the semester after Christmas, we'd be close to her. She could even stay with us. Maybe Megan would want to come, too.” Jason was far less interested in studying in Europe, but he was also less dependent on her and he could come over to visit for vacations, which would be less disruptive for him. “Could you and the children come here for Christmas, Phillip?”
“I don't see why not. I've got some free air miles floating around somewhere.” His eyes lit up as he said it. They were finding solutions. It was like fitting the pieces of a puzzle together. It seemed miraculous that the bits of sky and trees were beginning to fit, when only days ago they made no sense. “If you come to England in September until Thanksgiving … and we go to Italy and look for a house … then I come back with you for Thanksgiving and Christmas … we go to Italy in January when Molly starts her term there … we stay until the summer, or even for the rest of the year, if we love it. It's a bit of a patchwork, isn't it? But I think it could work. It gives us a year to see what happens. By then we'll know what we want to do … won't we?” He looked at her cautiously, and she laughed.