My chest gets so tight I forget how to breathe for a second.
This. This is what I want. Not just the sex, though that’s spectacular. But this easy domesticity, coming home to someone who thought to make dinner for me just because.
He looks up when I close the door, his face splitting into that smile that makes me forget about defensive driving and scarred faces and definitely makes me forget the fact that we’re supposed to be keeping this casual.
“Hey,” he says, pulling out his earbuds and crossing to me in three strides. He kisses my cheek like it’s the most natural thing in the world. Like we’re an actual couple. “How did everything go with Annie?”
“Good. I’m probably slightly less crazy now, but no promises. It’s a sliding scale.”
He laughs, that rumbling sound that turns my insides to honey. “I’ll take whatever level of crazy you’re offering.”
I try to calm my heart’s reaction to that idea.
“That’s a big commitment,” I say casually as I lean against the counter. “My crazy comes with a loyalty card. Ten episodes and you get a free emotional breakdown.”
“Do I get to pick the flavor of breakdown?”
“Today’s special is existential crisis with a side of inappropriate laughter.”
“My favorite combination.”
I love that I can be completely honest with him that I’m seeing a therapist. That I can joke with him about my mental health because I know, as a medical professional, he’s probably seen it all. I also know he’s been to therapy himself to deal with the death of his mum and to cope with the emotional demands of his job.
We’re grinning at each other like idiots, and Patches chooses that moment to weave between our legs, meowing dramatically like she hasn’t been fed in years instead of approximately three hours ago.
“I made that pasta dish you like,” Jared says, heading back to the stove. “The one with the suspicious amount of cheese.”
“All the best foods have suspicious amounts of cheese.”
I watch him serve up two plates, adding fresh basil with a flourish. He’s always like this, taking care of everyone around him without making a big deal about it. Last week, he fixed my leaky tap without me asking. The week before that, he noticed I was almost out of the good coffee and just replaced it.
“Are you free Saturday afternoon?” he asks as we sit at the table.
“Sure. Why?”
“Sophie wants to do something for my birthday. She’s insisting on making a big deal about it even though twenty-eight isn’t exactly a milestone.”
“Oh…okay.” My stomach hollows slightly. I love hanging out with Emmy, but I still get the impression that Sophie doesn’t like me very much. She gets this tight look around her mouth when she sees me, like she’s biting back words. Last week, when I ran into her in the hallway, she seemed desperate to escape into Jared’s apartment rather than make small talk with me.
“Are you sure she wants me there? I don’t want to intrude on a family thing.”
“Of course we want you there,” he says, but there’s something in his voice—a tiny hesitation maybe, or is it just my paranoia inventing problems where there aren’t any? It wouldn’t be the first time someone’s family found me difficult to be around. Carlos’s sister used to call me “that pretty boy,” like it was an insult, and couldn’t even look at me after my accident.
But it’s just me focusing on the worst-case scenario, right? Annie’s voice is in my head, reminding me not to write other people’s stories for them before they’ve even opened their mouths.
And Jared’s looking at me with sincerity in his eyes.
My heart does this painful squeeze thing. Jared wants me there for his birthday celebration with his family. Nothing else should matter but making this amazing man happy.
“Saturday should work for me,” I manage around the lump in my throat.
“Fair warning, Emmy’s decided I need twenty-eight individual candles on my cake, not those efficient number ones. She’s going to put them all on herself because, apparently, she can count to twenty-eight now.”
“Smart kid.”
“Too smart. Yesterday, she asked me why people say ‘sleeping like a baby’ when babies wake up crying all the time. I had no answer. She’s four. How does she even know about idioms?”
We eat and talk about nothing important. About how there’s this one particular German Shepherd that’s developed a personal vendetta against Aroha at the clinic and growls when it hears her voice, even if she’s not in the room. About the woman who insisted on FaceTiming her psychic during the ambulance ride to verify the paramedics’ aura colors were trustworthy. About how feasible the plot lines forGetting the Goonsactually are.
