“Doors are very powerful things.”
Remind me to bring you this to read.
He’d replied with a photo from his book, the one I’d kept aside for him at the store.
These small snippets of him, the gestures of poetry every morning, his thoughtfulness, his reaching out to me because I’d told him it wouldn’t go unnoticed, made my heart sing.
Hemade me happy.
And I knew it was different than spending actual time with him. This was easier for both of us, clearly. And I liked him. As in,reallyliked him.
Any man who sent me poetry was always going to win.
Thursday morning,Ro and I were already at the store. I had a delivery coming in first thing and I wanted to run through some stock numbers.
I was watching my phone as it neared eight o’clock when it beeped with a message. I’d sent him a photo of Merry and Bright in their new play pen with the captionIt makes them look so tiny.
Right at eight o’clock came his reply.
I gasped at my phone.
“What is it?” Ro asked.
“Oh, he’s good,” I mumbled. Then I showed her the screen.
“Sometimes the smallest things take up the most room in your heart” by A.A. Milne.
Ro’s excited gaze went from my phone screen to my eyes. “Oh my. Heisgood. And he’s playing to win,” she said.
I sighed happily. “And he’s not even trying. It’s just him. Okay, well, this one may have been prompted. He sent me two unprompted poetry quotes and I told him all future poetry quotes would not go unnoticed, so perhaps he took that as a challenge. I mean, he knows I love them, so...”
“You know what I think?” she asked. “I think for someone who struggles to express himself, what he’s thinking or how he’s feeling, he’s found a way of doing that with you.”
“Aww.”My heart.
“It’s super sweet, Win.”
I held my phone to my chest. “I know.”
“Takiwatanga,” she said gently. “His time and space, Win.”
“I’m seeing him today,” I said quietly. Excitement andanticipation were wreaking havoc on my nervous system. “Well, hopefully. He’s had a busy week as well. Something to do with livestock.”
We both grimaced.
“Better than a hermit crab with dry skin,” I added, still unable to stop thinking about that. I grimaced harder. “We’ll probably just do a quick cup of coffee or something,” I went on. “But then dinner with his parents on Sunday.”
Her facial expressions did a whole performance, but she settled on a twisted pout that was mostly telling me she had opinions.
“Just say it.”
“Well, that’s a big step,” she said. “Dinner with the parents is a big milestone. You were still set on doing the micro-dates so he doesn’t get too overwhelmed or pressured, and the texting seems to be good for both of you, but then you’re having dinner with his parents. That’s not micro, Win. That’s macro.”
“Macro-dates are not a thing,” I said. “And if it were anyone else, I’d probably agree. But Deacon’s... I don’t want to say different because that implies negative things and that’s not what I mean. He’s not like other guys.” That was a better way to say it. “He’s very close with his parents, they’re a very big part of his life, and I’m guessing their opinion and approval of me would be a deciding factor for him.”
Ro frowned. “Win, darling.”
“It’s not a bad thing. I’ve met them before a few times. I don’tneedthem to like me. It’s more that maybe they need to see I have good intentions with him. I’m sure there’d be assholes out there who would want to take advantage of him, or who’d be generally horrible to him. I can’t blame Deacon’s parents for that.” I sighed. “He had that incident in college with a guy that upset him to the point where hewanted to quit school. It was a whole thing. I don’t blame his parents for being cautious.”
