“Oh, hey, you got more apples!” he said, spying my fruit bowl on the counter. He backed me against the door frame. “Want me to bake an apple crisp fordessert?”
I coasted my hands down his back and over the curve of his ass. “I thought I was showing you mygame,” I teased. “You’d rather have baked goods?” Honest to God, I didn’t care. I liked the easy domesticity almost as much as I liked thesex.
Yeah,Isaid that. Silas Sloane, the formerly commitment-cautious.
“I mean, I’d rather have both,” Ev said. His gaze heated as he lifted on his tiptoes to brush a kiss over my lips, letting every part of him rub against every part of me. “I could make this first and then let it bake, and we could havesustenancewhen we were done. For roundtwo.”
I snorted. “Fine. I can bepatient.”
Ev’s smile dimmed slightly. “Yeah. I know youcan.”
He grabbed a bowl down from the shelf above the sink and that tiny action tightened my chest. I liked that he knew his way around my kitchen as well as I did, that he felt at homehere.
And I fucking hated thistensionstill between us, like we were both trying to avoid touching abruise.
“So it turns out you were right about Rena Cobb,” I offered. “And the rest of us are seeing phalluses where noneexist.”
“Because I’m alwaysright.”
I rolled my eyes. “God, this will make you insufferable forever, won’t it? Ten years from now, it’ll be, ‘Remember how you were wrong about Rena Cobb’s penissculptures?’”
Ev giggled. “You and the whole rest of the damn town. That’s one thatdeservesto live in the O’Leary memory banks forever and ever. The time you all took some perfectly innocent cylinders and imagined it was afield ofcocks.”
“I’ll say you were right if you promise me you’ll never sayfield of cocksagain.”
Hegrinned.
“You know,” I said, hefting myself onto the counter as he grabbed a knife and cutting board. “I’ve been thinking about what to do with that apartment over the garage. I always imagined I’d fix the place up and make it a rental unit. I’m not too far from the center of O’Leary and it might bring in some money. But now I’m thinking maybe the loss of privacy isn’t worthit.”
He glanced over at me. “What do youmean?”
“Just having someone around all the time.” I shrugged. “I mean, what if I want to kiss you out in the backyard or have sex first thing in the morning with the curtainsopen?”
“Well, I mean, you can’t make decisions based onthat,” he said reasonably, turning the apple in his fingers as he cut off a long, spiralpeel.
“Based on what? Wanting to have sex with you without giving a potential tenant an eyeful?” I leered at him. “Do you have some exhibitionist kink I don’t knowabout?”
“I mean, based on me and you,” he began. He paused. “I mean, me and you having sex in every room orwhatever.”
My stomach dipped and my smile died. “That’s not what you were going tosay.”
He lifted the hand holding the knife and rubbed the back of his hand against his forehead. “Please, can we not do this again? Can’t we just… enjoy the afternoon? Please, Si?” His voice was pleading, a littlepanicky.
I shook my head slowly and felt about six times my age. “No, Ev. I don’t think wecan.”
He slammed the knife and the apple down on the counter. “What happened to everything not being a battle? What happened to letting things go, Si? What happened toslow?” His eyes were dry, but there were tears in his voice, and it almost made mehesitate.
But this had gone on too long. Three weeks too long. Things needed to be said if we were going to move past this or… not. And I was accusing Ev of holding back and not talking to me about important shit, but here I was, doing the samething.
Choices, Silas, I reminded myself. Choose to move forward or you’ll have no one but yourself to blame for beingmiserable.
“Maybe thisismy fault,” I told him, looking at the dark stone tile a foot below my feet. “Maybe… maybe I’m changing the rules here. I’ve never done commitment before. I don’t know how you’re supposed to define the parameters of it. But when I talk about you bitching at me in ten years, I mean, I want you to do that over breakfast, right here in this kitchen. And when I want your opinion on whether to rent out the apartment, I’m asking you as a boyfriend, and someone who might have a stake in the matter. I’m asking because maybe you want to turn that into an art studio, and you should be able to do that because… because this is your home. With me. If you want it tobe.”
I chanced a glance up at him and the sadness on his face made me want to cry,myself.
“I’m guessing… you don’t want it to be.” I sucked in my lips and nodded. “Looks like we were dealing with different definitions ofnot-just-friendship,huh?”
He stared at me, wide-eyed and horrified. “You don’t know what you’re saying,” he whispered. “Commitment isn’t somethingyoudo. You don’t even know what it is. You’re Mr. Commitment-Cautious. You… you’ve never had a relationship in yourlife. You have half a car sitting in your damn garage because you can’t even commit to fixingit.”
