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SHANDIE
Maybe sharing my life with Carlisle could work. What was I so nervous about? I already knew my program was right. The fact that my program had matched me with Carlisle pushed me into looking at him just a little differently.
Attraction wasn’t the issue. I found him extremely appealing and on the random chance that he would touch me or when we’ve kissed, the butterflies weren’t subtle. Now, though, it was as if the program was giving me permission to pursue him. Computers were my whole world and with my program pushing me toward Carlisle it was almost poetic. Pursuing a man was hard to do when you never left your house – that made finding one even closer to impossible than attending a concert. The ClickandWed program matched me and now I felt like the sky was the limit.
I couldn’t look at Carlisle the same anymore and it made me nervous to be around him. But it wasn’t a bad nervousness. Instead, I liked the slight tingling of excitement and I wished all my anxiety was like that.
The afternoon following move-in day, Carlisle needed to go to the store. He stood at the front door with his keys in his hands and a jacket covering the breadth of his shoulders. He smiled at me from my position on the couch. “Do you want to go with me?”
I shook my head, wrinkling my nose. The butterflies in my stomach fluttered up a storm, but this time it was a combination of excitement and fear. “I was serious when I said I can’t go.”
He moved toward me to sit on the armrest of the couch. “What you think you're afraid of?” Carlisle didn't look at me with judgment in his eyes. He actually looked like he was curious.
Standing up from the couch, I walked over to stand beside them. “I'm not sure. I think it’s mostly people. My therapist once said that standard agoraphobia tends to circle around the inability to control a situation, but I’m fine like on a boat or in the car for the most part. I think mine stems from the fact that I can’t control other people and their actions. You don’t know who is after you or who wants to take advantage of you. Usually gatherings of more than one or two people besides myself demolishes my comfort level. If I know in advance, it’s even worse.”
He quirked his head to the side. “So just people do it for you?”
If only it were that simple, but for the most part, I think that simplified it enough to help him understand. “If I didn't have to see people, I think I would be fine.” I turned and looked out the window facing my backyard. “My own yard is fine. I have that high security fence that protects me from people. I usually can get in and out of a car, if I can't see people driving. Going inside stores or even just walking on the sidewalk up to the office freaks me out thinking of what could happen. The trust issue is what can happen. What can they do to me or to people around me? I don't know and that terrifies me.” I lifted my hand and ticked off on my fingers. “It's paranoia and fear and insecurity and distrust all rolled into one anxiety box. I can’t get out of the box and there’s no way to calm them down.”
And not for the first time, Carlisle reached out and wrapped his arms around me. The strength of his hold comforted me and I didn’t realize that I was in need of being comforted. His chin moved against the top of my head while he spoke in soft warm tones. “We’ve got this. It’s okay. You’re not alone now. I’m going to the store. Do you need anything?”
I needed some way to tell him thank you for not judging me, but the last time I checked, they didn’t bottle gratitude and sell it.
~~~
A FEW DAYS PASSED AND Carlisle seemed to settle in to my home rather easily. We searched for a routine that worked for both of us. The few times I’d run into him outside of the bathroom while I was in a towel or he was made me doubt my need for a set schedule.
Lunch was our center point of the day as we came together from our respective tasks and sat and talked together. Lunch that day took the butterflies I felt around him and turned them in condors and not necessarily in a good way.
He sat at the counter while I handed him the sandwich I’d made him. I loved cooking for other people and he loved eating, so the arrangement worked great. He held a long strip of thick black material in his hand and draped it over the side of the counter when he accepted the plate.
As we ate and he didn’t address the presence of the strip, I let my curiosity get the best of me. Nodding toward the material in his hand, I asked, “What’s that?”
His pretended nonchalance created a furor in my abdomen of fluttering and he barely glanced at it as he ate. “It’s just a blindfold.” He continued eating and altered the direction of our conversation to something mundane that I barely registered.
A blindfold? Was he crazy to think I wouldn’t be consumed with wondering over its purpose?
He didn’t say anything about the material he carried around with him the rest of the afternoon. Nothing. He didn’t forget it as he left the kitchen, he didn’t leave it behind or even get rid of it when he went into the office. He carried it in his right hand as if it were the most important thing he owned.
Why was he carrying around a blindfold?
We had dinner, and I don’t remember what it was. I only remember staring at that blindfold sitting beside his plate and chewing on my lip.
The sun had set at about five, normal for the autumn hours in north Idaho. I grabbed a sweater and finally acknowledged I was probably going to have to start using the wood fireplace pretty soon. Sunlight warming up the conservatory usually filled the house with enough heat until clouds permanently covered the skies.
Carlisle came up behind me at the coat closet and reached in past my shoulder. He pulled my large winter coat off its hanger and handed it to me with a smile. “Come on. I have a surprise for you.” He nodded toward my coat he had suspended in the air toward me. “You’re going to need this.”
I shook my head. “You gotta be kidding me. I told you, I don't go anywhere.” I stared at the coat and then he turned me around and put the sleeves on my arms anyway.
He had heard me tell him I was an agoraphobe. We’d even talked about it multiple times. I tried to breathe calmly past the tightening in my chest and blinked rapidly to clear the misunderstood tears from my eyes. He was asking me to leave. Why was he asking me to do that? “I can’t. I can’t do this. I can’t—”
“Sh.” Carlisle hushed me, his tone comforting. “I need you to try. I’m not going to put you in danger, I promise. I want you to trust me, but you can’t test that trust from in these walls.”
Did I trust him? The question wasn’t could I trust him. Obviously I trusted him enough to move into my house and take over pieces of my space. I’d trusted him enough to go with him to an event I had to medicate myself to get through.
The question was more along the lines of did I want to be surprised or thrown off routine by someone who knew better? He really was asking me to accept the fact that he wanted to do something nice for me. There was no way Carlisle would set out to hurt me or scare me. I nodded slowly as I finished pulling my coat on. “Okay.” I was scared, no, I was freaking out, but I would give it a shot.
He blindfolded me, the soft material pushing my lashes down until I had completely closed my eyes. I couldn’t see and that took even more of my control. My chest moved rapidly and I started to gasp for air, but Carlisle’s arms wrapped around me and almost immediately I calmed.
“It’s okay, I’m going to lead you to the car. Let’s go slow.” He walked like that behind me until he was helping me into the front seat of his car. He buckled my seatbelt and shut my door.
I knew the car was his because I was enveloped in the scents of vanilla and new car air fresheners. I gripped the edge of the seat, my knuckles popping with the strength of my grip and my rising panic.
He kept up a smooth commentary that I was listening to, but his voice helped with the stress as we drove about ten minutes from my house. We didn’t get on any highways, judging by the noise from the road. Where could he be taking me? Of course there would be people there. It was too cold to go somewhere without people. I lifted my left hand and breathed into my cupped fingers as if I had a paper bag to breathe into.
I’m not sure my breathing could get shallower. It was taking everything in my power not to hyperventilate and pass out. I hadn't even had the time to take a Xanax.
Carlisle parked the car and turned off the engine. It was fairly quiet, with no sound of traffic or anything else but the sound of my breathing. His low murmur broke through my mounting panic. “You can take off the blindfold. We're here.”
Did I want to take it off? I was comfortable in my ignorance, even as panicked as it was. Did I really want to take the chance of seeing what was out there?
But the minutes dragged on and I realized I wouldn’t get to go home until I completed whatever task he’d set out for us to do. I wanted to go home more than anything. I slowly lifted my hands and drew the black strip from my eyes to fall around my neck.
The sun had set a couple hours before and white lights blinked up and down a long grass–covered runway.
My breathing immediately calmed as I realized there was no one else there and he’d brought me to a private airstrip. We had parked not more than twenty feet from a small two-man plane.
The moon was high overhead and for once, the autumn sky was clear, allowing me to see the moon and the stars. As the car cooled off, I could see my breath puff gently in front of me.
My heart double-tripped and might have even skipped a beat. I brought my closed fist up and pressed my knuckles to my lips as tears welled in my eyes. Memories flashed in my mind of the last time I’d gone into the sky with my dad. It was the last time before my anxiety had blocked us from doing anything normal. My panic attacks were too upsetting for everyone in the family. If we’d known what triggered it back then, I probably could’ve continued doing these types of things.
Maybe. I wasn’t sure.
“Are you okay?” Carlisle’s concern warmed me.
I nodded, more excited than nervous. I glanced around for the pilot or anyone else and furrowed my brow as I turned back to Carlisle. “Do we get to go up?”
His eyes twinkled in the moonlight. “You bet we do. I’m the pilot.”
I squinted at him, unsure of the viability in a person just saying they were a pilot. That hadn't been in his background check. He had no record of being a pilot anywhere. I didn’t know if they gave licenses to people who just said they were pilots. “When did you learn to fly a plane?” I didn’t want to admit that I’d looked into his employee records and searched out background checks on Carlisle Smith when I’d first started going to the office to meet with Colin. He’d been an average person and I hadn’t looked any closer.
“I learned with my dad. This is his plane. Normally he keeps it down in the Hayden field but he brought it up here for me to use tonight. I didn’t go to school or anything but I’ve taken the tests and I have an impeccable record.” He glanced at me, a smile quirking his lips. “I wouldn’t put you at risk, Shandie. I wouldn’t do anything to put you in harm’s way.”
His words calmed the anxiety creeping up to clench around the back of my neck. I nodded and followed him from the car. He helped me climb into the plane and I watched as he did all the preflight instrument checks. His confidence gave me confidence and I breathed a little easier.
Trust wasn’t something I gave away flippantly. Carlisle was doing awesome at earning it.
The plane rolled over the slightly bumpy ground and we took off, lifting into the air without incident.
Flutterings in my stomach whirled and stretched. Nothing but joy filled me and excitement kept my breathing shallow but in a good way.
The stars competed with the lights from town as we circled above the lake town of Sandpoint. We crested out over the water and the stars seemed to grow larger as their shine allowed us to see the shadows of the mountains around the water. If I closed my eyes, I could pretend I was with my dad in the sky, doing what he loved best.
Glancing at Carlisle, I tried not to let the tears of gratitude slip down my cheeks. I hadn’t been able to leave my house in forever because my anxiety was too debilitating. But, one little afternoon and a request for trust had me up in the sky in a plane. I was overcome with emotion and I folded my arms to try to contain all my appreciation for the man beside me. He’d become a blessing and one I wasn’t ready to push away.
We got to the car and he put the blindfold back on me. “This way you don’t have to see anyone.”
His consideration struck me silent and the gentle touch of his finger on my jaw held me there.
After a moment, his lips grazed mine and my heart wanted to explode. It was brief and I longed for more, but he moved me to the car and helped me in again.
If I had enough courage, I’d ask for another.
