by Kyle Autumn
So I wrap my arms around her, let her fall apart, and try as hard as I can to transfer the hope I’m feeling to her. She needs it way more than I do right now.
Chapter 14
Patti
Zo hums as she wakes up next to me. It’s the ninety-second day we’ve woken up together in the same bed—our bed—but who’s counting? Besides those first few days, we’ve had really great ones. Blissful happiness, truly. I’ve never felt more sure that she’s the one I’m meant to be with, and I thought I was sure when I was sixteen. So that’s saying something.
She seems to want this as much as I do too. That’s what really makes it special. It’s not one-sided anymore. I’m not alone in my feelings. Though I want to shout it to the world, we’re still waiting. She’s needed more time, and I’ve never claimed to be an unselfish person, so I’ve agreed. If not for her, for my own sanity. We decided to make sure we are one hundred percent into this before we create chaos, and we didn’t think it’d hurt for her parents to get used to the fact that we live together.
Before Zo opens her eyes, I kiss her sweet lips and pull her against me. I know she’s awake, but she has the day off today, so she doesn’t want to get out of bed. I don’t blame her at all. A day off from work is the perfect excuse to stay comfy all day. But my idea of comfy includes being as close to my woman as possible.
“Good morning,” she mumbles against my lips, a small smile curving her mouth.
“Morning,” I reply. Then I trail my hand from her back down to her butt and squeeze.
She presses herself closer to me, encircling my neck with her arm. “I love waking up next to you,” she says next to my ear.
I roll her on top of me until her knees are on either side of my hips. “I love it too. So much.”
Resting her head against my chest, she releases a deep sigh and relaxes. We’ve done this very thing a few times now, and it’s becoming my absolute favorite. Taking a few moments to breathe this moment with her in helps me start my day on a positive, happy note. And I’ve had more happy days lately than I’ve ever had. Thanks to her and our life together. I’m pretty sure she’d say the same too, which makes it all that much better.
“I think today’s the day,” she whispers. Which catches me totally off guard.
Under her, I freeze. Did I hear her right? Is she talking about what I think she’s talking about? Can she possibly be ready finally? I mean, I am. I’m ready. Her mom will be upset, but I think her dad can handle her mom and make her see reason. Our friends are a nonissue, but I don’t want to falsely reassure her, either. And then—
“Did you hear me?” she says, turning her head and resting her chin on my chest to look up at me.
I crane my head to gaze back at her. “Do you mean it? You’re ready?”
She gently nods.
I want to be excited. My body’s buzzing with the idea of finally telling everyone we love that we love each other. But I don’t want to get my hopes up.
“Why now?” I question.
At first, she simply shrugs. But then she says, “We’re more established. We live together. You’re employed again. I think the medication is helping my anxiety.” She shrugs again, returning her cheek to my chest. “If we don’t do it now, we may never, and I don’t want to keep us a secret anymore.”
My breath catches in my chest, and my heart thumps beneath her cheek. I’m sure she can feel it, but I don’t care. And it’s not like I can hide anything from her. I don’t want to anyway. She should know how incredible she is to me.
“Hey,” I quietly say.
She lifts her head and aims her sleepy gaze at me.
I trace lines up and down her side with my fingers. Then I bring my hand to her face and softly run my knuckles over her cheek. “You’re beautiful. I love you.” With that same hand, I tuck some of her hair behind her ear. “And, if you’re ready, I’m ready.”
“I’m ready. I’m terrified, but I’m ready,” she says before extending forward and kissing me. Then she pauses with her lips still connected to mine. “Is that my phone buzzing?” She turns her head toward her nightstand.
I don’t hear anything, but I’m also riding high on a cloud full of Zo.
She grabs her phone and taps the screen. “Hello?” she asks when she answers it.
I can hear Shiree’s frantic voice, but I can’t make out what she’s saying. I don’t have to wait long though. Within thirty seconds, she tells her that we’ll be sure to be there, wherever there is, and then hangs up.
“What’s going on?” I ask her as she scrambles off the bed.
“Lyra’s having her baby, so we’re all needed at the hospital.” She goes to her dresser and starts dressing her gorgeous, naked body. Which is such a shame.
I prop myself up on my elbows, the sheet pooled at my waist. “Is this a sign? Like today’s really supposed to be the day because we’re all going to be together?” When I get out of the bed, I head to the closet. It still gives my heart a little jolt when I remember why my clothes are all in here.
“Maybe,” she replies, pulling her shirt over her head. Once it’s in place, her arms fall to her sides. “Though it’s happening a lot sooner than I thought it would and that’s freaking me out a little.”
I peek out of the closet. “You sounded sure earlier. And it’s going to be fine. It’s just Shiree and Lyra.”
“Right. Lyra.” She throws her arms into the air. “Our friend who’s in labor. This is the perfect time to tell her we’re dating.” Vigorously, she shakes her head. “Nope. It was a bad idea. The universe is telling us that it’s not the right time. We shouldn’t do this today.”
Well, this isn’t how I saw this day going. So I rush over to her, half clothed, and wrap her up in a hug. “Hey. Come back to now, Zed. It’s okay. Breathe.”
Her body’s shaking with her heavy breathing, so I hold her tight to remind her that she’s not alone. She doesn’t have to do this by herself, and I’ll be right there next to her, risking just as much as she is. We’re in this together and that’s all there is to it.
A minute later, she relaxes. After a deep exhale, she says, “You’re right. One step at a time, yeah?”
I peel away to look at her. To make sure she’s not just telling me what I want to hear. Honestly, I can’t tell. Her anxiety has played tricks on me before, but she’s never outright said that she wants to tell everyone. So I nod in response, hug her again, and then finish getting dressed, praying that today’s really the day we can come clean and stop living a lie.
***
Zo
***present time***
“And you know what happened earlier, so...” I shrug from the same spot on the loveseat. “That’s it.”
Quietly, so as not to wake her sleeping babies, she claps her hands. “Oh my god!” she mouths to us. She clasps her hands together and smiles. Then she sobers. “I can’t believe it’s been that long though. I’m sorry you felt like you couldn’t tell us.”
“You don’t have to apologize for anything. That’s all me,” I tell her.
“Yeah, but you shouldn’t have made yourself suffer for it.” She gets up when Chaz walks through the door with the food she sent him to get. “I’m glad you finally said something.”
Chaz nods and smiles at us as he hands a bag to his wife. “Did I miss the rest of the story?” he asks, walking to the kitchen.
We all follow behind him, and Patti says, “Basically, we’re together and scared to tell her parents, but we were ready to tell you guys.”
Chaz unpacks the food bags at the kitchen counter. “What’s wrong with telling your parents, Zo?”
The whole room goes still, save for Chaz. When he finally realizes it, he does a double take at us.
“Oh wow. It’s gonna be that bad?” he asks.
“Charles Masters,” Shiree admonishes. “Way to be sensitive.”
“Sorry,” he starts to say, but then a baby starts to cry. “Oh, shit. I’ll go see what’s going on.”
Shiree takes over, pulling cartons of Chinese food out of a paper bag. My stomach churns though. I didn’t want to say anything, but it’s food from the same place my parents brought food from that night we got in a fight at Patti’s place. We’ve had Friday dinner since, but my mom has been pretending that the fight never happened. Which has been fine for the most part. I haven’t wanted to talk about it. But we’re going to have to soon. And the thought makes me sweat with panic.
When the second twin starts crying, Shiree sets a carton on the counter a little harder than she needed to. “I love these kids, you guys. But I’m exhausted.”
“We’ve been here long enough, huh? We can get out of your hair now,” Patti tells her, giving her a tight but warm smile. “We’ll clean up in here. Go do what you have to do.”
“Don’t worry about it,” she says, coming over to us. She squeezes us both at the same time. “Thanks for trusting us with your secret. We won’t say anything until you’ve told everyone.” When she pulls away, she says, “But Lyra’s going to be so happy for you two. I promise.”
I want to believe her. And I think part of me does. But that doesn’t stop my heart from galloping toward a heart attack at the thought of telling more people. We hug her back, though, before she slips away to take care of her twins with her husband.
When we walk outside, Patti takes her phone out of her purse and sends a text. I don’t know who it’s to, but I don’t spend any energy wondering about it. Instead, I get in the passenger’s seat and wait for her to sit behind the wheel. Once she does, she looks at me, not yet starting the car.
“Blake said Lyra’s up for another visit if you want to finish what we started here. No pressure though. It’s totally up to you.”
Sure, it’s up to me. I can say yes or no. Hope shines in her eyes though. And the last thing I want to do is crush her when she’s looking at me like that. So I nod. It’s now or never now that we’ve already told someone.
“Okay. Let’s go.”
That hope shines even brighter, and even though I’m sweating and shaking a little, I’m starting to feel like I’ll do almost anything to keep that hope there in her eyes.
Almost…
Chapter 15
Patti
Shiree was right—though post-pregnancy hormones might be to blame too. Lyra squealed, cried, and hugged us so hard. Blake, on the other hand, wasn’t surprised in the least. Apparently, he’s always thought there was something between us, which is strange considering that the people who know us best were shocked. Happy for us but shocked nonetheless.
We didn’t stay long. Visiting hours were almost over when we got there, so we told them and left. Now, we’re back in the car, headed for—believe it or not—her parents’ house. It was her idea, and she made me drive so she can’t chicken out. I think she forgets that I’m just as fucking nervous as she is. But I’m not about to disappoint her right now. She’s been so brave today, and I’m super proud of her.
Though I do wonder if she’s done too much today by now. Her face is pale, she’s deathly silent, and she’s staring out the window like she’s not seeing anything at all.
“Hey.” I put my free hand on her leg. “Talk to me.”
She doesn’t move. Or speak. So I pat her leg a few times.
“Zed. What can I do?”
“Nothing,” she says after a moment. Then she sighs. “I’m about to lose my parents. But I have you and Shiree and Lyra. That’s all I need, right?” Finally, she faces me.
I glance at her before returning my gaze to the road. “Yeah, babe. But I don’t think you’re going to lose your parents. It’s gonna work out, okay?”
It’s wishful thinking, but there’s no use worrying about it right now. Except we’re talking about Zo here. She worries about everything.
“Yeah. Right.” She stares out the window again.
I shake her leg. “Come on. So many people are happy for us. That counts for something, right?”
Absentmindedly, she nods. “I don’t know if four is ‘so many’ though,” she mutters.
“Kimber’s happy too,” I say, trying to reassure her. “So there are at least five. Plus us. We’re—”
She rounds on me, her head whipping around faster than I thought she could manage right now. “You told Kimber? That barista?”
Oh shit. That was not the right thing to say.
“Well, no, not exactly,” I start to explain.
“What the heck does that mean?” she spits out at me.
“If you’d let me finish…” Out of the corner of my eye, I peek at her.
She crosses her arms over her chest, waiting for me to do what I asked her to let me do.
“When we were at Thirsty Thursday with Shiree that night and Kimber bought me that drink—”
“She what?”
Fucking hell. “Hey. It’s no big deal.”
“It is a big deal, Patti. You didn’t tell me that part.”
I grip the steering wheel tighter. “Because it’s not a big deal! I tried to pay for it myself, but she insisted.”
“Why would she even want to buy you a drink?” she asks.
“Probably because I tip her at the coffee shop,” I offer.
But she doesn’t buy it. “That’s what you’re supposed to do. That doesn’t mean she should buy you a drink.”
“She used to do that when we’d see each other out before. That’s all,” I tell her.
“What?” she shrieks. “Did you, like, date her?”
I want to tell her that she should know this stuff. We were best friends before this, and we talked about everything. But I never gave names because a part of me was always holding out hope that Zo and I would work out someday. And I was trying to avoid this very thing. This jealous-girlfriend routine does not fly with me. Not when Zo knows how much I love her.
“Zo. Calm down. We both have pasts, okay?” I try to reach over to her leg again, but she swats me away. “Oh my god,” I breathe out, frustrated. “Yes, we kinda dated or something. But neither of us wanted anything serious. That’s all.”
“That’s not all. You slept with her.”
I turn my blinker on to make a right. “You’ve slept with other people, Zo. Don’t make me out to be the bad guy here.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t sleep with the barista who makes my coffee before I’m even there to pick it up in the morning,” she throws in my face.
“For fuck’s sake. It’s not even like that.”
But she won’t listen to reason, and she tosses more accusations at me. “Have you slept with her since we got together?”
“Of course not!” I make that right as soon as the light turns green. “And, if that’s what you think of me, why are we even going to tell your parents that we’re together?”
“We had those weird six weeks, Patti,” she reminds me. “Let’s not pretend that it’s out of the realm of possibility.”
“And I spent the whole thing working, waiting for you to come back around, and dreading telling your parents about us.”
“Because you’d rather be with Kimber?” she asks, her voice shaking now.
When I take a second to actually look at her, I see a scared woman. A woman who fears the truth in her words. I don’t know what I’ve done wrong for her not to understand how much she means to me. That she’s absolutely it for me. That I’ve never wanted anyone and won’t ever want anyone more than I want her.
With a deep breath, I calm myself down and then approach this in a nicer way. “Of course not, Zed. You are everything I could possibly want and more, okay?” I reach over to put my hand on her leg again, and this time, she lets me. When I squeeze her thigh, I say, “Just you. There’s no one else. And there won’t ever be. Nothing I’ve ever done has been easier or more right than being with you. Don’t ever doubt us.”
She’s silent as I park the car in front of her parents’ house. Once I’m able, I turn to look at her, and she starts sniffling. As best I can, I gather he
r into my arms and let her cry. God, this is all so messed up. Love shouldn’t be this stressful or hard. Nothing about it should be this difficult. But I have to believe that, in the end, it’ll be worth it. When she’s not flipping out about ex-flings, she’s more than worth it. So I squeeze her tight so she’ll feel how much I love her and want to keep her safe. But she’s falling apart, trembling in my arms, and I don’t want her to face her parents like this.
“I’m sorry,” she chokes out between sobs. After sucking a breath in, she says between sniffles, “I don’t even know why you like me. I’m a mess.”
“Oh, Zed.” I tighten my hold on her. “You’re the kindness person I know. You want to take care of everyone. You nearly want to save your parents’ feelings by resigning yourself to a life without me. You just want everyone to be happy, but you need to see that you deserve to be happy too. And what other people think, including your parents, has nothing to do with you and your happiness. You deserve it just as much as they do.”
When I let her go, she’s nodding and wiping her eyes.
“I know,” she says. “but it’s not easy to turn that part of me off. Change isn’t easy.”
I shake my head. “It’s not, but you’ve been doing it so well. This won’t be any different.”
She’s still pale, and she’s clutching her stomach now. “I lied. I’m not ready.” She looks at her parents’ house before turning back to me. “But it’s too late now.”
“Do you want me to tell them?” I offer.
It’s her turn to shake her head. “No. I need to do this.”
“Okay,” is all I can say.
When she places her hand on the door handle, she shakes until she grips it and opens the door. I want to pull her back and keep her in the car. Take her back home until she’s physically ready to do this. I feel like that’s my job—to protect her. She’s clearly bad at doing it for herself, and all I want to do is care about her the way she cares for everyone else. I don’t think today’s the right day anymore, and now, my stomach is doing somersaults as my heart lurches into my throat. Shit.