by Chloe Liese
I stare up at him, fighting a smile. “You’re such a nerd.”
“Mhmm.” He grins. “You are, too, though.”
“Not like you. I’m just overly competitive at Trivial Pursuit.”
“You? Overly competitive?” He shakes his head. “No way. Never noticed.”
The line moves, making us next to order after the group in front of us. “Stop flirting with me. I need to pick my flavors.”
There’s a pause, before Aiden’s knuckles brush mine. “That’s what you said on our first date.”
I glance up at him quickly. “I did? How do you even remember that?”
His eyes hold mine. “I remember everything about that date, Freya. You wore a strapless yellow sundress and gold sandals, and your toes were painted hot pink. Your hair was down in these sexy beachy waves before you threw it up in a bun because it was sweltering hot. And you were so fucking pretty, I could barely remember my own name, let alone order ice cream. So I got—”
“Two scoops of vanilla,” I whisper. “You said you liked vanilla.”
“It’s fine,” he says, as his eyes travel my face. “What I liked was what happened when I got vanilla.”
A blush stains my cheeks. “I ate it.”
“Licked it.” He bites back a smile. “While your chocolate peanut butter swirl and salted caramel melted in your hands.”
“So we switched.”
He nods. “And then we shared. And it felt so…intimate. I was out with you, Freya Bergman, this knockout of a woman who was radiant—passion and vitality lighting you up from a place so deep within that I wanted desperately to know. A woman who painted her toes electric pink and sang along to music blasting from the outdoor speakers and stole my vanilla ice cream.” His eyes search mine. “You felt like the missing part of my life.”
Tears sting my eyes.
“W-what—” He clears his throat. “What do you remember from that night?”
I stare at him, warring with myself as his fingers dance along my palms, coaxing them to clasp his. Finally, I slide my hand inside Aiden’s. His grip clamps around mine like a vise. “I don’t remember what you wore or the precise date. I just remember standing next to you, looking into your eyes and knowing I was…exactly where I was supposed to be.”
Our gazes hold as our fingers lock together.
“What can I get ya?” the server behind the glass says, startling us apart.
I blink up at the menu, indecision swarming me. I glance over at Aiden helplessly.
He smiles, then turns toward the cashier and says, “Two scoops of vanilla in a cup, please, then chocolate peanut butter swirl and salted caramel on a waffle cone.”
Our fingers thread tighter as he says, soft enough for only me to hear, “For old times’ sake.”
10
Freya
Playlist: “when the party’s over,” Billie Eilish
Back at home, Aiden thanks the pizza guy. I find myself staring at the wave in his dark hair, the taper from his strong shoulders to his waist and that round, solid ass. My chest feels like a blender, a sharp, whirring mash of emotions—desire, sadness, longing, fear—observing this man who remembers what ice cream I got and what I was wearing on our first date, yet holds a part of himself in such profound secrecy, I had no idea it was suffering until our foundation was crumbling beneath us. I want to run out of the house, just as much as I want to throw myself on his lap and kiss him senseless.
I feel like I’m fraying at the edges.
Food in hand, Aiden shuts the door with his foot, and nearly trips over my shoes. On a hop and spin he saves it, then straightens out and gives me that I can’t believe I live with a slob like you look that’s so habitual, it sends a pang of bittersweetness tearing through me.
“Jesus, Freya. My life insurance policy isn’t that good.”
It actually makes me laugh. “All part of my grand plan to become a wealthy widowed cat lady.”
That makes him laugh, too.
As Aiden sets down the pizza box, I pour myself a glass of red wine without offering him any. Aiden rarely joins me, and if he wants to, he tells me. He barely drinks, and when he does it’s typically in social settings, something low-ABV that he seldom finishes. He says it’s because it clashes with his anxiety meds and makes him incredibly sleepy, but even before he was on Prozac, he never drank. I’ve always had a hunch it’s equally because his dad was an alcoholic, at least that’s what his mom says. Aiden doesn’t remember anything about his dad. He just knows enough to never want to be like him.
A few times we’ve shared a bottle of wine. Got a little buzzed and horny together. And I loved it—sharing wine in your veins, clumsy couch sex. But it’s been a long time. Which is why I nearly drop the bottle when Aiden gets himself a glass and sets it in front of me.
“Half a glass, please,” he says, focused on serving us food.
I pour carefully as Aiden selects two artichoke and olive slices for me, scoops some tossed salad from the bowl, sets it on my plate, then slides it my way.
He lifts his wine. I lift mine. Our glasses clang quietly in the kitchen. When he takes a sip, Aiden’s eyes don’t leave mine. The kitchen feels warm, and when I set down my glass, my hand’s trembling.
“Hold still,” Aiden says, his hand gently cradling my jaw. His thumb slides along the corner of my mouth, catching a drip of wine. He brings it to his lips and sucks with a soft pop.
Shit. It’s hot in here.
Blinking away, I scoop up the pizza and take a bite. “Thanks for this. It smells great.”
“’Course,” he says quietly. “Congratulations again on your promotion, Freya. You should be proud.”
I peer up at him, swallowing the pizza that lodged in my throat. “Thank you. I am.”
He nods. “Good.”
Just as I’m about to have another bite of pizza, he blurts, “I’m working on an app.”
Horseradish and Pickles choose this moment to start tangling beneath our feet, meowing loudly because I’ve raised monsters who expect cheese from my favorite artisanal wood-fired pizzeria. “I’m sorry?”
“I’m…” He runs an unsteady hand through his hair, ignoring Pickles, who puts her paws on his knee and meows. He clears his throat. “It’s an app. It’s…it’s hopefully going to help equalize the higher learning experience for business and economics students.”
Halfway through her meow, I pick up Pickles and set her in my lap. I need something to hold and ground me. Because the world feels like it’s tipping sideways. “What? How?”
“We’ve recorded tutorials on initial high-level topics, started beta testing, creating an app interface. If it does well, if we can secure a major investor, we’ll reach out to more academics to record tutorials. The brightest business minds out there, experts on every business economics and management concept out there, available to any kid who can afford ten dollars a month, not just those who can pay for an Ivy League education. The hardest part has been up to this point, Freya. We’ve begun pitching to prospective angel investors. Once we have one, I’m…free. Well, I’ll be freer. Much freer. Able to relax.”
I blink at him in complete shock, and Aiden presses on.
“I’m working on selling prospective investors on apportioning funding so people without financial means can apply for relief when months are short. It could change…everything. For us, for students like I was, struggling so much to get the opportunities they deserve. So…that’s what the private phone calls have been. I’m sorry I worried you, that I weirded you out with being so secretive.”
An app. He’s designed an app to help kids kick college’s ass and get where they dream of going in business, regardless of their backgrounds or resources. I almost want to laugh with relief. But hurt chases my surprise and swallows it up whole. “Why wouldn’t you talk to me about this, Aiden?”
Becoming a bit of a refrain, that question. Isn’t it?
“Because, like I said in counseling, I was trying to keep one
more thing off of your plate. It was an idea, a dream, and I had no idea if it was going to amount to anything.” He holds my eyes intensely. “What if I put it on your mind, showed you how invested I was, then I failed?”
“Then you’d have pursued a dream and tried and failed and learned something, and I’d be there for you.”
“Watching me fail,” he mutters. “Burdened by that.”
I roll my eyes. “Aiden, come on. You’ve failed at shit before. It hasn’t scared me off or worn me out, has it?”
He rips off a tiny piece of cheese from our pizza and bends to feed Horseradish, cocking an eyebrow. “What have I failed at?”
Ugh. Male arrogance.
“Well… You’ve failed at hanging pictures. Hardcore. And I had that huge wall of photos I wanted. You can’t play charades to save your life, like, you are the worst at it. Ever. You’re way too literal, and no one ever knows what you’re doing with your hands. You’ve failed at getting roses to grow—every year you try and they keep dying—”
“Okay.” He throws back his water like he wishes it was instead the wine he’s been responsibly sipping. “Thank you for enumerating my random personal flaws. I meant big stuff. Work stuff. Provision stuff.”
“Ah. This is about your dick—I mean your job.”
His face blanks. Silence rings in the kitchen.
“What?” I ask, picking up my pizza and stealing a bite. Pickles stares at it longingly.
“Saying my job is about my dick is reducing it to being about my ego, Freya. Like I’ve got something to prove.”
“Don’t you?”
He exhales roughly, like I punched him.
“Aiden, it was a joke.” Which, like most jokes that sting, is a little too close to the truth. Men’s ego in their work has frequently struck me as poisoned with the need for masculine validation.
“Yeah, I get it, Freya.” His voice is flat. “I just didn’t find it funny. You know what work means for me.”
“Oh, do I ever, honey. It’s been the third member of this marriage since Day Fucking One.”
His jaw tics. “I know I take work too seriously. I know I fixate, okay? I feel like shit about it as it is. I don’t need anyone else making me feel worse.”
I throw my arms up, making Pickles startle and jump off my lap. “Gee, wonder why we haven’t been talking? The moment I open my mouth, I make you feel like shit.”
“Fuck.” He shuts his eyes and breathes deeply. “Okay. I’m sorry. Let’s just…table jokes about work. And dicks. And yes, I’ll acknowledge I’m sensitive about them.”
I take a viciously large bite of pizza, chew, and swallow. Aiden opens the box, serving himself another slice and then a scoop of salad. And our recent companion, stilted silence, is with us once again.
After a few more bites of food, my ears no longer ringing with defensive anger, I can see I didn’t help us with that jab.
Groaning, I rub my forehead. “Aiden, I’m sorry. I was out of line. I’ve been…I’ve felt replaced by your work, and I dug at you about that. It’s been hard not to take it personally. Like you want to work instead of wanting me.”
Aiden stares at me, for a long moment, then drops his fork. “I need you to understand this.”
He steps between the gap in my legs and tilts my head so I’m looking at him, my face held firmly in his hands. “How I’ve gone about work lately has made you feel like you’re less than the center of my world. That’s wrong, and that’s what I’m going to fix. Because you have to know, Freya, that everything I do is for you. I want to give you everything you deserve. I want to lay the world at your feet.”
I bring my hands to his wrists, stroking his pounding pulse with my thumbs. “But I never wanted the world, Aiden. I just wanted you.”
He stares at me with such earnest confusion, it makes my heart ache. “Wanted?” he whispers.
I blink back tears. I can’t even begin to know what I want, except for Aiden to know this, to get the truth through his thick skull, because if this doesn’t stick, then we really have no hope, and my husband knows me much less than I ever thought he did. “I would have lived in a flimsy cardboard box,” I tell him, tears thickening my throat. “Under a shitty run-down bridge, with nothing but the clothes on my back, so long as it was with you.”
His eyes dim. “Spoken like a woman who’s never been poor.”
“No, I haven’t.” I swallow my tears. “But I’ve had a roof over my head these past six months. I’ve had a soft bed and heat and water and food in my stomach, and I haven’t felt comfort or warmth or satisfaction. I’ve felt empty and cold and lonely because you weren’t here, not really, Aiden.”
His eyes glitter with unshed tears as he stares down at me. “Freya. Life’s not that simple.”
“But my love is,” I say hoarsely, squeezing his wrists. “And you don’t get to say otherwise. It’s my heart. I know it. I can see now that it’s not the case for you, even if I don’t understand. So I’m telling you right now, the only reason I care about this app of yours is because it does something good for others, and because it means something to you.
“I’ve never cared if you made us gazillionaires. I don’t want fancier clothes or a second car. I don’t need a bigger house or a new fridge. I’ve needed hugs and trust and kisses and laughter and that us against the world feeling I knew in my bones the day I stood in my parents’ backyard and held your hand in mine and said I do.” Searching his eyes, I whisper, “What is it you need, more than that?”
He swallows roughly. “To keep you safe, and when there’s a baby, to keep them safe, too. I need that, Freya.”
My hands slide up his arms. “I just wish it didn’t cost you so deeply. I wish it hadn’t drawn us apart.”
Aiden’s eyes dance between mine. His hands slip in my hair. “I wish that, too,” he whispers, his eyes searching mine. “Please know, Freya, I’m trying. Trying to do better. I know it’s not great. It’s not nearly enough. But I am trying.” He pulls me from the stool and holds me close, burying his face in my neck. “I just need some time. Please don’t give up. Not yet.”
I swallow tears, heart aching, wishing I had more to promise him than the truth. “I’m trying my best, too.”
He sighs roughly, holding me tight. I press my nose to his hair and breathe him in, cool and crisp as the ocean, a whisper of mint because he brushes his teeth three times a day, without fail after breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Because his mom taught him to as a kid, since they couldn’t afford the dentist, and it’s a habit he says he can’t quit for the life of him.
I still remember the first time I stayed over at his apartment for the weekend and I caught him brushing after lunch. He blushed and glanced down at the sink as he told me why. I wrapped my arms around his waist, hugged him hard. Then I picked up my toothbrush and brushed with him.
My hands slide up his chest and freeze. I feel it beneath my fingers, warm and smooth, the rounded rectangle. My fingers drift higher, tracing the chain beneath his shirt. The pendant I gave him on our wedding night.
Tears burn my eyes as I remember his gift, a gift that told me how deeply he knew me: a song. A song he wrote and sang softly in my ear as we danced under moonlight. A song that he couldn’t play on the guitar like he’d planned, because Mom and Dad sprung a destination honeymoon on us, and all our cool-weather Washington State clothes and his guitar were left in place of haphazardly packed shorts and tank tops that never got worn. Because we never even left our tiny little bungalow on the water.
“You’re still wearing it?” I whisper through tears.
Aiden’s hand rests over mine. “I never took it off.”
I peer up as he bends closer and our noses brush, then our lips. A shower of sparks dances beneath my skin, as Aiden holds me in his arms, as his grip tightens around me and he lets out a slow, ragged breath. I lean in and feel him, so solid and heavy and warm. Cupping his face, I smooth his cheeks with my thumbs.
And then he kisses me.
Our kiss sings in my body, from my lips, through the hum of my throat, to the tender ache that builds in my heart and soars through my veins.
Slow down. Be careful.
I don’t want to. I’m lost in his touch. His taste. In the strength of being held and the thrill of being wanted. Our kiss feels like magic—like shooting stars and blue moons and meteor showers—and I’m enthralled by its power, its rare, blinding beauty. I close my eyes, weightless, lost to something so precious in its familiarity and so exciting because, somehow, it’s new. He tastes like Aiden, and I sigh when he does what he always has, pushes that little bit. His tongue breaches my mouth and coaxes mine, a faint teasing touch that floods my body with warmth.
Aiden groans into my mouth, as I drag his bottom lip softly between my teeth. My hands slide over his shoulders, his strong, thick arms, the breadth of his chest and his heavy muscles tightening as he holds me close.
He feels like the man who climbed up on our roof and patched it for years, when a new roof would have wiped out our savings. He feels like the man who rescued Pickles from the filthy attic even though he hates small, dark spaces, who drove a sick Horseradish to the 24-hour emergency vet clinic like a Formula One racer, even though he’s a firm believer in observing the speed limit. He feels like the man I painted walls with, muscles flexing, shoulders rolling as he worked next to me, then went back and neatly cut in with a hand brush because I was too impatient, too messy to do it well.
Touching him reminds me of the man I married, the man I love. I feel like he’s really here, kissing me, wanting me, and I’m delirious with the satisfaction of it.
“Freya,” he says against my lips.
I’m climbing him, my body ignoring my brain that’s blaring Pump the brakes! I’m getting ahead of myself, and I don’t care. I want this. I want him.
“Baby, slow down,” he whispers. He wraps his arms tight around me, spins and with my hop, lifts me onto the counter, settling between my wide-open thighs. “God, I want you. But we can’t.”