“Lily.” Grant sounds tired too, but the heavy-breathing, physical exhaustion sort of tired. Not the words slurring, sleepless-night-of-homework sort of tired. “What time do you need to turn your assignment in?”
“In about…” I double check the time on my phone. “10 minutes.”
I open my mouth to explain I’ve figured it all out, the work and myself, but he speaks quickly. “Fuck. What are the chances you’re already on campus?”
“I’m walking past the science building now.”
“Perfect, stay there.”
I attempt to tell him there’s no need, and I can’t be late to turn in the miracle of an assignment I’ve created, but the line goes dead.
I decide he gets five minutes before I text him an apology and head to class.
Three minutes after making that decision, he runs into my eyesight, sweating and panting.
“Grant?” His cargo pants and thin white t-shirt are wrinkled, wavy brown hair disheveled. I’m surprised by his appearance,but even more shocked by the blonde-haired boy in superhero pajamas trailing him. “Locke?”
Grant holding his arm in the air, smiling wide. “I got it!”
My jaw drops. Seconds later, he reaches me, drops the item in my hand, and throws his head back to breathe. Locke does the same while I turn it over in my grasp like it’s a figment of my imagination.
But it isn’t. The exact shade of pink that made me choose it out at the store, and a nick in the side where I dropped it down a flight of stairs.
“How did you get it back? Was it in your apartment after all?”
Grant shakes his head, throws his arm around Locke, and looks at him with pride. “It was Locke.”
The presence of my boyfriend’s brother, who he’s pushed farther and farther away as long as I’ve known him, sends me for a loop. I reel back further at the revelation that they did, whatever they did, together.
Locke shrugs and waves a hand. “It was nothing.”
“What did you do? How is…” I don’t want to be too optimistic, but my heart springs at the chance that maybe Grant took my advice. That they talked something out and while I was patching the hole in my self-confidence, he was sewing together the pieces of his family.
My boyfriend scans over my face. His eyes glint, and I know he’s read my thoughts.
“I went to Brown and we had a talk.”
“Really?” I bounce on the balls of my feet, my grin stretching as large as it can.
“Yeah. It was a really good talk.” Grant nods to his brother, and he nods back, and it’s all I need to conclude that what I wanted for him is finally in reach. “Locke called Keller’s private jet, and we flew to Pittsburgh. The hours we had to wait at the airport and our delay heading back to Boston made me scaredwe’d miss your class, but it worked out.” Grant pats Locke on the shoulder again before closing the space between him and I, pulling me into his arms and sighing against my hair. “You know I’d never let you down.”
It’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard. The most insane series of events, and all for an assignment. For me.
There wasn’t a second I doubted Grant, his love, or his dedication to me. I believed he would do everything in his power to figure something out for me. Taking a private jet to get the USB back wasn’t on my shortlist of possibilities, but it perfectly encapsulates how he makes me feel.
Worth the crazy sequence of events, the effort, and the trouble. His words of encouragement that echoed in my brain while I was writing were the emotional and mental proof that he shows up for me. This, the physical.
I’m so helplessly in love with him.
I grab onto the back of his neck, stepping on my tippy toes to bring his mouth down onto mine. It’s a sweet, brief kiss, but it says everything I need it to say in this moment.
I love you, Grant McCarthy.
He smiles at me and kisses my forehead. Pointing towards the fine arts building, he says, “You don’t have much time. Go turn in that USB.”
Love is layered with an awkward realization of the news I have to deliver.
“Yeah. About that.” His eyebrows scrunch in confusion. Locke looks between us, bewildered. “Don’t hate me.”
