Designed to Love by Elle Davis Page B

on
the floor, I am at complete ease with our decision. She
deliberately pivots in a slow 360 degree turn, smiling
provocatively, allowing me views from every angle, and any
lingering uncertainty about our compatibility vanishes completely.
I slowly walk over and help her out of the last remaining clothes
items, before carrying her over to the oversized king bed. Neither
of us is bashful or inhibited. We are in complete harmony as we
take and give without fear. Minutes turn into hours and when we're
finished, I conclude that it really is possible to love her even
more than I did when I woke up this morning. The only time I
question the experience, is when I feel her tears on my chest and
only then do I suffer from a moment of panic.
    "Cat, are you okay? Did I hurt you?" I ask
anxiously. As if on cue, she responds to the next question on my
mind.
    "It was perfect. From start to finish, it
was absolutely perfect," she whispers dreamily, and I feel the side
of her face turn up in a smile.
    "Perfect, really?" I ask, relief flooding
over me.
    "Yes, you exceeded every expectation I had,
and um,... even some expectations that I didn't know I could have,"
she giggles.
    It's only then, that I realize the meaning
behind her tears and I fight to keep from shedding a few of my
own.

CHAPTER EIGHT
    CAT
    "Mrs. Callahan, what are you going to order
for breakfast?" Ronan asks, grinning as he sits across from me in
the restaurant. Ever since our wedding, almost a week ago he
frequently refers to me in this way. He says he'll never get tired
of hearing me addressed with his last name, and when I jokingly
tell him I'm thinking about keeping my maiden name, he just about
chokes on his orange juice. When it comes to me, he has definite
traditional values and ideas.
    "I think I'll have pancakes today, Mr.
Callahan," I reply playfully, setting my menu aside. "So, are you
ready for today?" I ask, feeling the excitement build up as I
glance out the window at the diehard skiers and snowboarders
braving the cold, just to be the first ones out on the slopes. I
used to be one of them.
    "Yep," he replies confidently. He has never
skied before in his life, and even though I've tried to tell him
that it takes a while to get the hang of it, he assures me that he
will be able to keep up.
    "Ronan, I qualified for the Junior Olympic
ski team. I don't expect you to be able to keep up with me. It's
not something that you become instantly good at on the first day,"
I say, trying not to sound impatient with him.
    He simply replies, "We'll see," and
continues looking over the menu.
    Hmm, we'll see indeed,
Mr. Callahan, I think to myself, already making up my
mind that I wasn't going to go easy on him at all now.
    When planning our honeymoon, we couldn't
decide between sun and surf, or snow and ice, so we split the
vacation up, spending the first week in Hawaii and the second week
now in Tahoe, California. I was glad Ronan was the type of guy
willing to try anything and admittedly he did pick up surfing very
quickly, but snow skiing was different. There were a lot of
competing elements that required a certain learning curve to
master. It wasn't as simple as climbing on a board barefoot and
letting a wave carry you to shore. However, no matter how many
times I've tried to explain this to him, he still has it in his
mind that somehow he's immune to the effects of such things
as...gravity.
    ***
    "Following you," Ronan says good-naturedly,
as we dismount the chair lift and I push off ahead of him to
traverse across the ridgeline. I stop at Silverado, the black
diamond run that I nearly killed myself on three years ago, while
competing in a ski race. There are butterflies in my stomach as I
point my skis over the ridge and look down the near vertical
mountainside. I look over at Ronan and feel a twinge of guilt when
he smiles at me lovingly. He reacted offensively when I offered to
start out on one of the easier runs, so I irresponsibly decided to
take him straight to the