Page 43 of A Follow-Through in Faking

Catalina

Santi has taken me to Zakynthos in Greece.

After my win in Italy, he told me to pack my bags because we were going on a trip.

He didn’t tell me where, only that I should bring lots of bikinis and summer dresses, shorts, light tops, and anything else I’d need on a beach vacation.

He promised me it’d be only for a few days since I can’t be slacking off this close to the second Grand Slam of the season.

I have to train every single day, and he assured me he’d even find courts there for us to play for a few hours a day if it made me feel better.

It did.

So, we packed our bags, made our way to Greece, and I haven’t asked him why we’re here once. I could have looked up what there is to do here, but Santi clearly has plans for us, and I don’t want to ruin the surprise.

Plus, I love surprises.

Not the people jumping out at your birthday and scaring the shit out of you kind of surprises.

But the thoughtful gestures that a partner does for you to make you happy.

Santiago has perfected those kinds of surprises over the last half year that we’ve been doing this whole fake/real dating thing.

I haven’t spoken to him about what the hell we are yet, but it’s a conversation that lingers on the tip of my tongue every single time I’m near him. Uncertainty is one of my worst nightmares, but at the same time, I can’t bring myself to start the conversation.

Our reputations have been cleared.

We are the couple of the world of tennis.

Most people love us together, and so do I.

I love us together so much, I’m scared that when I start asking him what he wants for the long run, it won’t be me.

That he’ll want more, or to get back to his life.

Before this whole charade we put on, Santi loved partying.

He loved going out and fucking a new person whenever he wanted.

What if he’ll want to get back to that as soon as he’s free at the end of the season?

What if I’m just a way for him to get sex?

What if I’m not enough for him?

As much as I try to logically stop myself from thinking such irrational things because I know how deeply he cares for me, these doubts attack the vulnerable part of my brain that harbors all of my insecurities like piranhas attack a piece of meat.

“ Mariquita ,” Santi says, and I snap out of my thoughts, turning my head to look at him abruptly. “What’s wrong?” he asks and cups my face, rubbing his thumb along my cheek in soothing motions.

“I hate how well you see through me,” I whisper, fighting back the panic crawling into my chest.

“No, you don’t. You’re a romantic who needs your partner to be able to pick up on the little things.

” He traces my bottom lip with his thumb, and I inhale deeply, taking in his scent, something that reminds me of pure sunshine, just like the man who emanates it.

“And I want to be your partner, Catalina. I want to be your partner in everything, not just while we train. Is that a worry you need to have soothed? Because I’ll say it again.

I’ll say it in every language you know until you believe me. ”

The car we’re taking to the location Santi didn’t tell me a lot about, hits a bump in the road that has me moving closer to Santi, our breaths becoming one as he leans down to close the distance between us even more.

“What are you? A fucking mind reader?” I ask with a frown, but Santi merely smiles at me before he kisses the corner of my mouth softly, gently, and oh so sweetly.

“I’m simply a man desperately in love with the woman he’s known most of his life.

I can read your thoughts in the same way you can read mine, carino , because that’s how well we know each other,” he says, sending tears straight into my eyes because a love declaration was the last thing I was expecting right here and now.

“It was bad timing when I told you that you’re my favorite person, but it was true. It is true.”

He doesn’t give me a chance to respond as he takes a deep breath and repositions himself, clearly gathering more courage.

“Catalina, you are everything to me. You are the very reason I look forward to getting out of bed in the morning, even on the mornings when I have a hard time doing so. You are my strength, my courage, my dream, and everything else in my life that keeps me going. I love you so much that life seems brighter now when I think about it. I love you so much that the only thing I ever faked with you was the contempt I thought I held for you. It’s why I thought I was dreading it at the beginning of this, but really, I was just terrified my feelings for you would grow and you wouldn’t feel the same way I do. ”

As much as I try to fight my tears, they roll down my cheeks during the most romantic speech anyone has ever given me in my entire life. Santi is careful as he wipes them away, always so gentle with me, like I’m the most precious person in the world to him, which I’m slowly understanding that I am.

“What about your life before? All the parties and people? Aren’t you going to miss that?” I ask, my heart sinking at my words, but it’s also still beating more rapidly than ever before. His amber eyes are on mine as he answers without hesitation.

“I don’t miss it. I don’t miss any of it.

I haven’t since we started this. You’ve kept my head so occupied with any and all thoughts of you, and I don’t need anything else, Cata.

All I need is you,” he says, and so many of my worries finally subside, replaced by the certainty that Santiago loves me.

He loves me more than anyone has ever loved me before.

He loves me even though he’s seen all of my ugly sides.

He loves me even though I hated him for so long.

“Santiago, I—”

“We’re here,” the driver of our taxi says, interrupting me. Excitement blooms on Santi’s face, and he kisses me before handing the driver some cash and rushing over to my side to open the door for me.

My head is spinning, but I take his hand and let him pull me out of the taxi, right against his chest. My other hand is clinging to the bag we brought, but Santi doesn’t force me to say anything back to his love declaration.

He simply kisses me three more times, melting against me when I wrap my arms around his neck and pull him closer.

“Let’s go, carino . This is a bit time sensitive,” he says, placing one last kiss on my forehead and then pulling me toward where a small boat is waiting for us.

The sun is blaring down on us, but I welcome the heat and the scent of saltwater as I follow behind Santi.

My flip flops get lost in the sand with every step, but it’s too hot to take them off, so Santi and I end up lifting our knees higher and laughing at ourselves for how funny we look doing so.

That is, until I curse when my feet get burned, and he scoops me into his arms so it doesn’t happen again.

“Will you tell me what we’re doing here yet?” I ask, smiling because of how light I feel.

It’s a wonder what a healthy dose of communication can do for an overthinking mind, especially when the reassurance comes from the person you desperately need it from.

And I love Santi even more for never shying away from telling me how he feels.

As soon as we’re not in a rush anymore, I’ll allow myself to be as vulnerable as he was with me.

“Not yet. But we’ve almost made it,” he assures me, offering me another one of his smiles.

My favorite smile in the entire world.

Once we arrive where the boat is, the person there speaks to Santi in hushed voices, and I do my best to relax my face because my cheeks are burning from how much I’m grinning.

“Perfect,” is all I hear Santi say before lifting me into the boat.

Santi gracefully gets into the boat too before the short man with brown hair, hazel eyes, dark skin, and a kind smile finally starts the boat and makes our way to our location.

The wind is warm as it blows my hair around, and Santi chuckles as I try to get it back under control.

He takes my hair tie from me to twist my hair into a bun at the back of my head, placing a kiss on my lips as soon as he’s done.

I nuzzle against his side, the view of the ocean and the land beside us almost as wonderful as Santi’s words that continue to bounce around in my head.

Catalina, you are everything to me.

I love you so much.

All I need is you.

Over and over as I study the waves the boat makes. As I let the sun heat my skin. As I take in all of the smells around me, my favorite still being Santi’s. I inhale it with every breath, his arms firmly wrapped around me.

It’s a short boat ride, and I wish it was longer because I adore the way Santiago holds me. He holds me like he’s never held me before. He holds me like I’m the very reason he lives. He holds me like I’m exactly who he said I was.

His everything.

“We’ve arrived,” the boat driver says, pulling me back into reality and out of the fantasy land that Santi drags me into whenever we’re together.

“Arrived where?” I ask Santi, and he untangles his arms from me.

“To swim with sea turtles,” he says, pulling me off the seat with him to move to the edge of the boat where I see several sea turtles swimming in the water.

More tears flood my eyes, and my hand lifts to my tattoo instantly.

“You said you wanted to find a way to feel closer to your mamá before the next Grand Slam,” he explains, and I cover my mouth with my hand as I study the majestic creatures swimming around in the ocean.

“You brought me here so I could feel closer to Mamá,” I repeat, unable to process the information, but Santi is patient.

He simply says, “Yes,” and rubs my arms to comfort me.

The man in the boat turns out to be one of the instructors who bring people here to swim with them, so he spends the next little while explaining everything we have to know before we’re allowed near them.

Stay at least three meters away from them unless they approach you.

Only approach them from the side. Don’t make any abrupt movements.

Don’t touch them. He explains several more things, but then Santi and I make our way into the water together.

I do as the man instructed, keeping my distance from them.

I’m slow in my movements, waiting for them to approach, if they choose to do so.

Considering sea turtles are docile unless they feel threatened, and these ones are used to people in their habitat, they waste no time investigating Santi and me.

A rather large one approaches me, swimming against my legs and then toward the man I love.

He smiles brightly, and I let out a small laugh when an expression of awe covers his features.

The same big one that approached me first keeps returning, swimming with me and even moving against my stomach and back as if it can’t quite sever itself from me. The same awe that crossed Santi’s face fills me from top to bottom.

“That one’s name is Veronica. She’s the one that likes people the most.” I look at the man on the boat right as he tells me something that has my heart stopping entirely.

“I was there the day she was born eleven years ago.” Santi looks at me at the same time I look at him, at the same time the sea turtle nudges my leg again.

“What day?” Santi asks, voicing the question I don’t have the power to force from my lips.

“March 20th.”

It’s a coincidence.

I know it’s a coincidence.

It can’t be anything else because I don’t believe in any of that stuff, rebirth and such. At least I didn’t, not until that sea turtle that loves people and was born on the same day my mother passed eleven years ago, swims with me through the water, never leaving my side.

It’s a coincidence , I try to tell myself over and over.

“Don’t overthink it, Cata. Let what you feel be,” Santi says, and damn him, I allow that feeling of connectedness I was looking for to spread through me.

I allow the tears to fall.

It’s not her, but maybe it’s her, and I’m too heartbroken and lost without her to fight it. So I let it be.

I welcome the proximity of the sea turtle as she follows me around as if it is enough to assure me my mother is here and telling me I’m going to be just fine.

And once it’s time for us to leave again, I do so with a heart that may feel heavier but also more healed than it has in years.

It’s when Santiago hugs me to his chest and lets me cry it out that I know no matter where in the world she is, a part of her will always live inside me and be with me.

“We can come back whenever you want to,” Santi says once my sobs slow and the peaceful sound of the waves fills my ears.

“I love you, Santiago,” I say against his chest, all of my emotions too much for me to hold back the words. “I’m in love with you,” I add, feeling him tense and then untense as he processes my words.

“You don’t have to say that because of what I said in the car earlier or because I brought you here,” he says, but it’s not in a condescending way. I know him well enough to sense that it’s fear making him say these things, and that won’t do at all.

I lean back and grab his face in my hands, tilting it down to make sure he pays close attention to my next words.

“That’s not why, Santi. If it was, that would make things so much easier, but they’re not easy.

I don’t want them to be. It wouldn’t feel real to me if they were because you and I have always been complicated, but that isn’t a bad thing.

On the contrary. To me, working for something to have it makes it that much sweeter.

It means more than if things simply flew into my hands. ”

He leans into my left hand, kissing the palm of it as his eyes close.

“You’ve become my favorite person, too, Santi. A day I don’t spend with you is a day I don’t see the sunshine that I so desperately crave,” I say, and he pulls me close, capturing my mouth with his.

“I love you, mariquita ,” he says, taking my mouth before I have a chance to respond, and I don’t mind.

I’ve finally shared my feelings with him.

I just hope neither one of us makes me regret it.