Third Base

by Author Stella

  I laughed. “So are we going to pretend like you don’t live with your girlfriend who you’ve never taken out?”

  “Well, when you put it that way, it’s not nearly as romantic as it was in my head.”

  “I’m just playing, Coby. It was very sweet.”

  “Anything for you, my precious little rosebud.” He pecked my lips before smacking my behind. “Get dressed, and we’ll go to dinner.”

  I didn’t argue. My insides fluttered with nervous anticipation of what dating Coby would be like. I couldn’t wait for our first date and bounced out of the room to shower and change.

  Coby had seen me dressed up a handful of times, but he was usually traveling when Ryan and I had gone out because I tried to spend time with Coby when he was home—usually on the couch in comfy clothes, no makeup, and my hair in a messy knot on top of my head. But tonight, when I came into the living room, his mouth dropped just slightly, and the stunned expression melted my heart.

  “Jesus, E.T., you’re gorgeous.”

  The heat of embarrassment crept up my cheeks, but the moment he kissed my lips in a short exchange, those feelings floated away. “You’re not too bad yourself.”

  In the last few weeks, my mind had started to allow me to see Coby in a light I never had before. Things I’d taken for granted in the past suddenly drew me to him like a moth to a flame. I couldn’t get over how stunning his eyes were, and truth be told, his forearms made me weak in the knees. Coby was swoon-worthy hot, and for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out why it had taken me so long to see it, and why another woman hadn’t snatched him up while I was blind.

  He grabbed his keys off the counter and took my hand in his. I let go to walk to my side of the car, but he followed, attempting to open my door for me. We both reached for the handle, bumping into each other in an awkward exchange. Withdrawing my hand, I allowed him to help me in. The conversation to the restaurant centered on the same crap it always did—who the Titans were playing, Gage, school, and our parents.

  It hit me like a ton of bricks. “Oh my God, Coby—what are we going to tell our parents?”

  He wrapped his fingers around mine on the console and glanced at me briefly before returning his gaze to the road. “Whatever you think we should.”

  “Is it wrong if we keep this just between us for a little while?” I uttered the words hesitantly. I didn’t want him to think I was hiding our feelings. “I just that our relationship has always been on display. Since we were kids, people were always telling us who we were together, and then as we got older, everyone assumed they knew. I kind of like the idea of the two of us sharing a secret no one else is in on.”

  His hand squeezed mine. “If that’s what makes you happy, that’s fine with me.”

  Regardless of what anyone says, the word “fine” means the same thing coming from a man that it does a woman…and it’s anything but fine.

  “Just for a few weeks. Let’s see how everything goes. Give ourselves time to get used to being an us in a different sense than we always have been before letting anyone else in.”

  The corners of his mouth turned slightly down, and I could tell he was disappointed. “So how long are you thinking? Thanksgiving isn’t that far off. They’re going to figure it out when we go home. I wasn’t kidding when I said you weren’t sleeping anywhere but next to me.”

  “Coby, we’ve shared a bed hundreds of times before. That wouldn’t be anything unusual. But, I was thinking more like Christmas.”

  The muscles in his jaw flexed in irritation; nevertheless, I had no doubt he’d give me this. Not because it was what I’d asked for, but we both knew it was what our parents had dreamed of our entire lives. Giving them a glimpse of it only to snatch it away could be damaging to all the relationships involved. And regardless of whether it was what he wanted to do or not, he would do what was best for everyone.

  “You’re probably right. But make no mistake, I will steal every opportunity for secret moments with you while we’re home…even if it means we’re in the back seat of my car in a parking lot.”

  “Deal.”

  He parked, and I hopped out as he rounded the corner. I wasn’t sure what to do with this Coby. I appreciated the courteous gestures, but they were odd in our relationship. I tried to shake off the feeling of discomfort, realizing it would take time to adjust to the changes in our relationship.

  He held my hand as we entered the building and then all the way to our table where he pulled out my chair. I smiled at him when I sat down and noticed he appeared just as awkward as I felt. When he asked what I was going to order, he wasn’t satisfied with my answer.

  “Get whatever you’d like, Ellie. It’s my treat.” Something about that didn’t sit right with me. It wasn’t that he offered to pay for dinner so much as we’d never talked about a bill before, and he’d never questioned my decisions—especially not about what I chose to eat.

  Once I convinced him of my selection, he placed our orders with the waitress, not allowing me to speak for myself. And in some weird way, he ran over me in the conversation. Everything about it was so different from anything I’d ever witnessed from Coby, and I didn’t have a clue how to respond other than grin and bear it. I wasn’t sure if it was nerves or if he had an alternate personality I’d never managed to meet in twenty-two years.

  By the time we got back home, all I wanted to do was change clothes and go to bed. The evening had been exhausting trying to play a role for a part I hadn’t auditioned for. There was no way I could endure the strain, and our relationship couldn’t handle it, either.

  Flicking on the light in my bedroom, I kicked off my heels next to the door. Coby appeared in the doorway with a huge smile on his face and anticipation in his eyes. I tried to mask my frustration, but I yanked on my dresser drawer a little too forcefully, and the second I realized he’d witnessed my agitation, I took two steps back and sat on the bed in a huff. Before my hands could reach my face, I started to cry.

  “Ellie, baby, what’s wrong?” I nearly swooned at the sound of hearing the term of endearment come from his mouth, but all I could think of was screwing this up and losing my best friend.

  He raced to my side and pulled me into his lap the way he’d done countless times over the course of our lives. I let him curl my body into his chest and allowed the tears to fall. My arms slipped around his waist, and I held on for dear life. He ran his hand over my hair and kept me close until the emotion subsided.

  “What’s going on?” His words were soft and comforting, the way they’d been for as long as I could remember. “Talk to me,” he whispered into my ear.

  With no way to eloquently say what I was feeling, I vomited the words, accumulating bile in my mouth. “I hated every minute of tonight. It was forced and not…us. Coby, I want this, I want it so badly, but not at the expense of our friendship.”

  “Hey, what are you talking about? So tonight wasn’t perfect. We’ve never done this version of us before. There’s going to be bumps in the road.”

  “But not these kinds of bumps.” I hiccupped. “I can deal with the kind life throws at us unexpectedly—we know how to be Coby and Ellie.”

  He laughed, but I felt like I had missed something. His fingers found my chin and lifted it so my eyes met his gaze. “I was just trying to impress you. I’m sorry.”

  “Coby, you don’t need to impress me. I know all your dirty secrets, all your weird quirks, everything about you. The only thing that needs to change is me sleeping in your bed and someday taking your last name.” That last part had slipped out unexpectedly. “Crap. I’m just adding to the complication.”

  “How? By admitting you dream of being my wife? Do you think I haven’t thought about that a hundred times in the last few weeks?” He shifted me on his lap, forcing me to straddle his waist and face him. He held my cheeks in his hands and confessed, “You will wear my ring at some point. And we will figure this out. But there is no way in hell I’m letting you back out of this.”
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br />   “Just be you. I don’t need you to throw money at me or show me how alpha you can be. My best friend with a side of romance that’s uniquely us will be perfect. I want to watch movies wrapped up in each other and eat pizza after we have sex and make fun of Gage when he’s around. And then, at the end of the day, I want you to make love to me before I fall asleep on your shoulder, believing with every ounce of me that nothing in the world will ever penetrate the fortress you have surrounding me.”

  He placed a soft kiss on my lips before pulling back. “Then that’s what you’ll get. An intimate version of us.”

  I nodded, unsure of what else to say. I knew Coby well enough to know that he’d do everything in his power to give me what I’d asked for.

  “Why don’t you get your pajamas on and come to our room? We can watch an old movie in bed.”

  I climbed out of his lap to do as he requested, and he got up to leave the room. Stopping in the doorway, he turned around. “Hey, Ellie?”

  I met his stare with puffy eyes.

  “I love you. I’ll do anything to make you happy.” He tapped his palm on the doorframe, but just as he took a step, I stood and moved toward him.

  I placed my hand on his chest to stop him and lifted my index finger. “You’re my entire world, Coby. I love you, too.” I waited until he matched my gesture, and then let him go.

  Coby delivered on his promise. We watched Some Kind of Wonderful at my request because it seemed so apropos. Coby laughed at me when Keith admitted how much he loved Watts and I cried, and then I shed tears again when he gave her the diamond earrings. Eric Stolz rocked my world in this role from the first time I’d ever seen it. Looking back now, I wondered if my infatuation was my heart trying to tell me that my Keith had been right beside me all my life. But that was just the romantic in me.

  I fell asleep to his fingers stroking my hip and his heartbeat beneath my ear. When I woke up, he turned into me, securing me in his arms locked tight behind my back. A smile broke out on my face as I watched him sleep, barely able to move in his death grip. I couldn’t help my desperate need to reach up to kiss the lips I hoped to get to kiss every day for the rest of my life.

  He stirred when I couldn’t let go with just a simple peck, and he opened his mouth to allow me entrance without opening his eyes. I’d never been overly sexual—I’d fooled around with Ryan, yet I didn’t have that drive Melinda had—but maybe it was just because I had been with the wrong person. Now, with Coby, in a matter of less than thirty-six hours, all I could think of was stripping him bare and staying that way until I couldn’t move.

  It took all of about thirty seconds for Coby to join me in that thought process and press his hardened length against my thigh. “Ellie Teller, when did you become so insatiable?” He murmured the sentiment against my lips through a smile.

  “Are you complaining?” I gave him a coy grin.

  “Hell no. You can take me anytime, anywhere. I don’t even care if we have an audience.”

  I didn’t need any further encouragement. While I ripped my clothes off, Coby pushed his own shorts down and lost them beneath the blankets. The moment he settled onto his back, I tossed my leg over his hips and hovered over him on my knees. I’d never done this, but luckily, neither had Coby, so my insecurity was lost when I sank down on his length. The way his eyes practically rolled back in his head sent me into overdrive, and Coby and I spent the morning exploring positions and each other.

  After our conversation last night, our lives resumed status quo. He gave me everything I asked for—we were still Coby and Ellie, though we’d just added sex to our list of favorite pastimes. And true to his word, I hadn’t spent another night in my room. I hadn’t made a production out of moving my stuff to what was now our bedroom, but little by little, my clothes found their way to his closet, and my personal effects to his bathroom. The knick-knacks that meant something to me moved one by one to the dresser we now shared, and I officially had my own side of the bed.

  I hadn’t redecorated because I had helped Coby pick everything in the room when he’d first moved in. He kept asking about it, and today when we were channel surfing from the couch, I stopped on a home makeover show. Coby had gotten up to go the bathroom, but when he came back, the television sparked the conversation again.

  “Are you ever going to make any changes in our overly masculine room?” He’d been ribbing me about this since the night I’d given him such a hard time about not making his room ours.

  “Nope.”

  “Do you want to move?” The question came out of nowhere. Coby wasn’t big on change, so it couldn’t have been a desire he had.

  “Of course not. Why would you think that?”

  He resumed his spot next to me and attempted to pull me onto his lap, but I held firm and turned to face him, waiting for his response.

  “I don’t know. I just wondered if you thought of this as my house and would like to buy one together. One that’s ours.”

  I rolled my eyes. “You’re insane. The next thing you’ll do is try to add me to your bank accounts.”

  “Is that a bad thing?”

  “I don’t guess so, but Coby, we picked this house out together. We bought everything in it together. I realize I didn’t pay for it, but I’ve never felt like it wasn’t mine.” Maybe that was an assumption I shouldn’t have come to, but Coby had never made me feel like a visitor, and I’d lived here for years.

  “I just need you to know I’m all in.”

  “Adding my name to a deed or a bank account doesn’t prove that.”

  A flash of defeat crossed his face.

  “Don’t do that. I didn’t mean it that way. You’ve always treated everything you have as ours. Even before I lived here, I never felt like a visitor.”

  And just like that, he shut down the topic. He’d gotten really good at using sex to manipulate a situation to give me what I couldn’t seem to get enough of, while also getting his way in return. Silencing me by orgasm had become one of Coby’s favorite games. But I couldn’t complain. Coby loved me exactly the way I’d always dreamed a man would. He was perfect for me in every way, even when he was a total pain in my ass and pitched a fit anytime I left my shoes in the middle of the floor or my purse on the counter.

  Somehow, our short relationship seemed like a lifetime. We’d been together for twenty-two years, he’d always given me what I needed, and I hoped I did that in his life, too. We were both perfectly content just being the new version of us. We’d figure out how to navigate adding people into our new fold, but other than Gage, no one—not even the staff at school—was aware our relationship status had changed. The secrecy of our connection had become as much fun as the connection itself.

  Neither of us would be able to hold out much longer. With Thanksgiving approaching, we were coming closer to the time we’d have to tell our parents, but sneaking around kept the newness alive. So, until we gave our parents a Christmas present they’d always remember, Coby and I enjoyed being us.

  Together.

  Epilogue

  Coby

  My heart was in my throat, my palms perpetually sweating no matter how many times I wiped them off on my pants. This was the moment I’d both anticipated and dreaded. Ever since the idea came to me, I couldn’t stop planning it. That had been six weeks ago. Now it was go time, and I only hoped I could get through it without losing my mind.

  When I came out of the bathroom, I found Ellie’s dad alone in the living room, messing with his new camera. Ellie was in the kitchen with her mom, preparing for Christmas dinner, and my dad had made up an excuse to run home, giving me the time I needed to get through this.

  “Hey, Mr. Teller,” I said and sat on the couch.

  He turned to me from his spot on the recliner with a smirk playing on his lips. “When will you stop calling me Mr. Teller? You’d think after twenty-two years, you’d give in and just call me Doug like everyone else.”

  “My dad taught me to treat my elders with respect, s
ir.”

  “Elder? Son, we’re family.” He rolled his eyes and went back to tinkering with his new toy.

  “Well, speaking of being family, there was something I wanted to ask you.” I cleared my throat and prepared myself for the biggest question of my entire life—well, second biggest. I wasn’t worried about his answer—I had no doubt he wouldn’t object, but I was nervous about his reaction.

  Ellie and I had decided to keep our relationship quiet until we had everything figured out. However, it didn’t take the school long before the other teachers had started to figure it out. At first, we brushed it off, but just after Thanksgiving break, we finally caved and admitted it. Although we still kept it from our families. It wasn’t that we didn’t want them to know, because we did. Our reason for keeping quiet in front of our parents was to spare them the heartache in the event our romantic relationship didn’t work out. It would be a lot harder for them than it would be for us if we realized we were better off as friends—which I felt certain wouldn’t happen.

  “You should probably go ahead and ask before Ellie comes back into the room. I’m sure you don’t plan for her to find out this way.”

  I cocked my head to the side, wondering how he’d guessed my intention.

  “Coby…” He set his camera on the table and leaned forward, settling his elbows on his thighs. “I’m not sure when your relationship moved from friends to more, other than it was before Thanksgiving. Your efforts at trying to keep us in the dark are noted, but I’ve gotta tell ya, son…you two aren’t fooling anyone.” A huffed chuckle seeped out as he shook his head in jest.

  Had I known we hadn’t been as secretive as we’d thought, there would’ve been no need to stay at separate houses that weekend. But I pushed past the groan that rumbled in my chest, unable to go back in time and change things now, and moved forward with my question.