“Do you want to try something?” Colin asked.
“What?” Lizzie cocked her head as she looked up at him.
“No shrieking this time, please,” he said as he took a step towards her and lifted her behind with both hands. “Wrap your legs around my waist.”
Elizabeth did as she was told. He took a step back into even deeper water. She felt indescribably light. She spread her arms in the water and leaned back to see the sky. She was floating on her back while holding onto Colin with her legs. She started laughing with joy and glanced at her husband, who was smiling proudly.
“This is wonderful!” she exclaimed.
“My view is more wonderful,” Colin teased, and she looked down at her wet dress that now revealed her puckered breasts as clearly as if she, too, were naked.
She lifted her torso back to his chest and pinched his waist. Colin laughed with his head thrown back. He looked much younger than he usually did.
Later, Elizabeth sat on the machine steps with only her legs underwater as Colin swam around, clearly with the goal of impressing her with his ability. She was quiet as she stared at the horizon.
All my worries are small and insignificant,she thought as she inhaled deeply with her eyes closed.The world is so much bigger than I am.
“What are you thinking about so intently?” he asked when he swam closer to the steps after a while.
“I’m trying to think of the words I can use when I try to put this in a letter to send home.”
“Is it more difficult to find the words for this experience for some reason, compared to others?”
“I am overwhelmed by this sight,” she admitted as she stirred the water with her legs. “I’ve only ever experienced something close to this when we were in the forest with Bruiser and Miss Judy.I never felt this way in London, not even in the most beautiful of gardens or parks. It makes me think, is this how and where humans were meant to live?”
“I don't have the answer to that," Colin said, uncharacteristically humble. "You seem to think about your London home a lot. Do you miss it?” He asked as he held out his hand to her, and she accepted it.
She joined him in the water and, willingly this time, went deeper with him.
“I miss the people in it. And since I remember how we all used to read Thomas’s letters together and how we learned new things about the world from them, I want to give them that gift as well. Although now I see that reading is one thing, and living is another.”
“I wish you had replied that, yes, you couldn't wait to go back to London,” he said, obviously trying for a light tone, but not really succeeding. “Since we have to go back soon.”
Elizabeth stiffened. Colin stroked her arm.
“The Parliamentary proceedings, I can’t excuse my absence any longer, now that most of the harvest is over,” he explained patiently. “You could stay here, of course, but I don’t like the idea of being away from you for so long.”
Hearing that made Elizabeth feel better, and she looked at him with a small smile.
Colin lifted her in the water, and this time she immediately wrapped her legs around his waist as he kissed her instead of saying anything else. She tasted salt as he parted her lips with his.
Lizzie smiled and said, “I rather like the taste of the sea.”
“I told you drinking sea water is good for your health, you should taste some more,” he said with a rakish smile.
She slowly brought her face closer to his and licked his lips, then his cheek, then his eyelids, at first jokingly, but then with increased urgency. He started kneading her behind as he moaned while she licked his neck and earlobe. The evidence of his arousal kept poking her stomach as they moved in the water.
”You truly are a little kitten,” he said in a hoarse voice, and she laughed, embarrassed by her eagerness and boldness.
“Should we go back to shore?” He asked after a while.
“Not yet,” she said sleepily. “Who knows when I’ll be able to sea-bathe again?”
“Don’t be dramatic, wife,” Talbot said, and she laughed. “Just imagine, if you’d gone to America, you would have missed all this.”
“I’m sure they have a beach over there,” she laughed.
“Not like this one,” he said seriously.
