“Good morning,” she says.
I turn and tell her good morning, smiling at the way Gus is following her.
She feeds him and then fills his water dish with fresh water.
“That coffee smells amazing,” she says.
“I made a whole pot. Help yourself.”
She’s about to sip from her mug when her smile fades as she looks past my shoulder. I turn and see the red bag from the sex toy shop sitting on the floor, by the door to the garage.
She frowns at it, like she’s upset. “What’s that doing in here?”
“I saw it in the trash can last night when I went to take out the garbage,” I say. “I figured you threw it away by mistake.”
She sets her coffee mug down on the counter and shakes her head. “It wasn’t a mistake,” she says quickly before grabbing Gus’s leash and calling him over. She attaches it to his collar and starts to walk off, but I stop her.
“Wait, Ellie. What do you mean it wasn’t a mistake? Did you throw your brand-new sex toys away on purpose?”
“Yeah,” she mutters, like she’s embarrassed. She won’t look at me. She’s focused on Gus’s collar, fussing with it like it’s broken, when it’s perfectly fine.
“Why?”
She stands up and tugs a hand through her long, blonde hair. “Because I don’t want them.”
“Why didn’t you say that to the girls when they offered to buy them for you?” I’m so confused.
She huffs out a breath, clearly frustrated. “It’s not that simple, Camden. I couldn’t tell them no in the moment. They wanted to get me those things as gifts, and if I had said no, it would have hurt their feelings. It was easier to just go along with it.”
I stare at her and let out a confused laugh. “Ellie, it’s pretty hurtful to throw away their gifts behind their back.”
She shakes her head and looks off to the side before looking back at me. Her eyes flash with shame and pain and something else I can’t put my finger on.
She turns to mess with Gus’s collar yet again.
“You wouldn’t get it. Someone like you wouldn’t understand,” she says in a low voice, almost like her feelings are hurt.
“Ellie, what are you talking about?”
She stands up and looks at me. “Nothing. I just don’t want those toys, okay? So throw them away, give them away, save them for when things between us are over and you can use them on your new lady friends. I don’t care.”
I lean back, feeling like I’ve been punched.
This thing between Ellie and me may be temporary and not at all romantic, but still. I don’t want to think about being with anyone else right now. Not when I’m married to her.
“Ellie, what the hell? Why would you say that?”
Pain flashes in her eyes. She blinks and shakes her head. “I have to go.”
She walks out of the house, leaving me standing in the kitchen, my head spinning. What the hell was that?
The front door opens while I’m loading dishes into the dishwasher.
I didn’t plan on being here when Ellie came back from walking Gus. She was upset and clearly didn’t want to be around me. I was going to just hang out in my room to give her space, but she came back sooner than I expected.
I dry my hands on a dish towel and start to walk off. Gus trots over to me, and I give him a quick scratch behind the ears.
“Camden, what’s this?”
