The Conversation by Toots Chapter 14

Republisher’s Note: The version I had for chapter 1 was divided into chapters. The version I got from CountryKays is one long piece, which makes sense since it is one conversation, but I think it’s easier to read in I’m starting chapter 2, but I’ll have to guess and break chapters where it makes sense to after that. This conversation is between Danny and Michelle dealing with their past in bed one night.

Saturday morning – 9am

With their heavy curtains blocking the sun, they’re able to wake up slowly. Their sleep was so deep that they never changed their sleeping position. She awakens to his hand on her stomach and his beautifully scruffy face grazing her neck. She gently reaches up over her right shoulder and scratches his cheek, just enough to make him stir.

“Mmmm… morning.”

“Morning… ready for breakfast?” she asks, wide awake.

“Wow, I remember a time when you used to wake up with only one thing on your mind.”

He starts kissing her neck as he slowly turns her over to meet him. She giggles as she finds herself lying on her back, sharing their familiar morning kisses.

“I still wake up with only one thing on my mind – the bathroom.”

With that, she gets out of bed and leaves him wanting more. He gets up and heads in her direction, yelling through the crack in the door.

“I’ll meet you downstairs, I’m gonna start the coffee and breakfast.”

“OK… I think I can make it down in a couple of hours.”

“Okay, see ya then, ” he says, laughing.

Their playful demeanor is one reason they’ve always been happy together. He goes downstairs, smiling as he quickly recalls all the small jokes and playful times that his heavenly wife has brought to him. Her capacity for laughing at herself and any situation she’s in, whether intentional or not, is one of her qualities that he loves the most.

After another 15 minutes, she joins him as they sit and have breakfast. They quickly look through the newspaper before heading back upstairs, showering and dressing into their casual weekend attire, sans footwear. He’s making the bed as she finishes her hair.

“Ahh, much better,” she boasts as she puts her tresses into a clip. “Now I just wish I had a snack.”

“A snack? After the meal I cooked you?”

“Hey, I didn’t even get to eat it all! Someone stole my last piece of toast!”

She walks up to him and puts her hands around his waist, he holds her against him, bending down to kiss her forehead.

“Who? Me?”

“Yes you!” she laughs. “You stole nourishment from your only daughter.”

“Are you kidding? You eat like a pig! I was saving her from being crushed from all the food you eat!”

They laugh as they walk over to the bed, hand in hand. He helps her down and makes sure she’s comfortable before he crawls up and sits opposite her at the footboard. Just as quickly, he lays on his side, props his head up with his left hand and starts playing with her feet again with his right.

“So, I was in the shower thinking of where we left off last night…”

“Mm hmm?”

“And… I think we need to start with the night I faked my blindness, because there are some things I’m not sure you understand about that night.”

“Like what? One minute I’m talking with my grandmother, the next, you’re begging me to stay and talk with you and telling me you’re blind, what don’t I understand?”

“How I was feeling.”

“Michelle, I thought we went through this…”

“We can’t just keep saying that. It’s so much easier now, to understand, but I… we… we need to go back and feel it again.”

“I don’t have a lot to feel about that night.”

“Ok, fine. I do. Can you look at me, please?”

He stops playing with her feet and sits up.

“Sorry. Go ahead.”

“OK… this is right after I heard you talk with your grandmother. Like I said before, I was overwhelmed with all this…”

“Love?”

“Emotion. They were still feelings I wasn’t able to admit to. I knew they were there, but I didn’t know what to do with them. And then you told me that you had to go meet the shipment and I just knew…”

“Knew what?”

“That I couldn’t let you go. Do you remember finding me on the phone in the hallway before?”

“Yeah… weren’t you talking with Rick? Oh… I guess you weren’t, huh? Since you weren’t really going blind, I guess you weren’t really talking to him. Who was it?”

“It was Drew. I called her to tell her not to call the FBI.”

“You did what?”

“I did. I told her not to call them. I couldn’t let you get caught. I tried, Danny. You see? I really tried.”

“Then, what happened?”

“She told me she had already called them, and there was nothing I could do. They were already going to be there… so I did the next best thing, I got you to stay away. I wasn’t going to let you get hurt.”

“Interesting, because that’s exactly what I got.”

“I know… but just think back. I told you about this later, but I don’t think you were listening. But I want you to know now that I was trying… I was trying to protect you.”

“By keeping me there… by using… OK, I’m not gonna go over that again. But you knew I’d stay if you were hurt or if you needed me…”

“Yeah, I knew. Especially after what I heard you say earlier. I was desperate. I didn’t know what else to do.”

He shakes his head in hopes of making sense of the myriad of feelings and flashes of thoughts raging through his head.

“God, Michelle… do you have any idea how worried I was about you? When you had told me about the fire and about losing your sight, I remember when you told me, and I remember seeing how much it scared you. You had told me, do you remember? You had told me that every once in a while, when you don’t see something just right, just perfectly, that you… that you have that moment when you think you’re going blind again, and I remember how you said that those have been some of the scariest moments of your life. I would’ve done anything to protect you from that. Anything.”

The passion in his voice warms her as though wading through his protective sea. He listened, he cared. Those small moments, the nights before they would go to bed early on in their marriage. He listened, he cared. She never thought he did. Her greatest fears, that small conversation they had the night after they got married. He listened. He cared.

“And I knew it.”

Tags: Danny Santos, GL, Guiding Light, Manny Fanfic, Manny fanfiction, Michelle Bauer Santos