She could feel the press room like it was under her shoes now. The hum of microphones. The bright white of lights that always felt clinical, never warm. Tilly at the back, camera on their shoulder, eyes on her. The day after she stopped answering calls, after she refused to show up at their door, after she placed her phone face down while it buzzed. The day she took a question from a stranger and ignored Tilly’s hand in the air.
“I looked right through them,” Erin said. The words tasted like metal. “They asked a question and I took another instead. They saw me do it. I saw them see it.”
The guilt that followed had been a companion she kept in a pocket. She took it out at night and looked at it and then folded it up again because she didn’t know how to hold it without bleeding.
“It wasn’t just personal,” she said. “It hurt them professionally. I know that. A PIO who used to answer their calls suddenly wouldn’t. That changes the map inside any newsroom. It makes you look unreliable. It was my fault. I told myself I was protecting my job and my life and them, but the truth is that I was protecting myself. I didn’t know how to say, I’m afraid and I’m not ready and I want you anyway. So I chose silence. I have regretted thatchoice for years.”
A child yelled from the swings on the far side of the park, a bright sound that made the moment bearable again by simply existing. Erin looked at Jamie and waited for the verdict.
Jamie didn’t deliver one. She stood there with the leash in her hand and the softest expression Erin had ever seen on her face.
“Thank you for telling me,” Jamie said. No judgment. Just the fact of gratitude. “I’m not going to pretend it wasn’t painful for them. It was. I can see how it would be. But the Erin I know is the one who stands when I walk into a room. The one who listens more than she talks and who makes sure my car door is locked before she waves me off. The one who brings me ice cream and steals my best lines. I see growth. I think Tilly could too, if you said this to them instead of carrying it alone.”
“You think I should apologize,” Erin said.
“I think you want to,” Jamie said. “And I think it matters. For them. For you. For us.”
The last word landed with a soft certainty that Erin felt down her back.Us. Not a hypothetical. A plan.
Leo huffed as if to remind them that time moved forward whether people did or not. They finished the loop in companionable quiet. When they reached the building again, Jamie unclipped Leo and he trotted inside like a host who had decided his guests needed a treat. Erin laughed and followed.
* * *
Back in the kitchen, Erin let the routine steady her hands. She salted the salmon and set it into a skillet that hissed at once, the sound filling the room with intention. She tossed the asparagus with lemon and oil, slid them onto a sheet pan, and tucked them into the oven. A small salad waited in a wooden bowl. This wasn’t impressing anyone with technique. It was feeding someone she wanted to keep close.
Jamie sat at the counter with her chin in her hand and watched her with affection that felt like a physical heat. “So this is your ideaof casual,” she said, and her tone turned light again.
“It’s edible,” Erin said, plating with a care she couldn’t help.
They ate without hurry. Jamie told a story about a producer who once accidentally ran a lower third that called a city councilmemberCity Counselorand how the man had demanded a real apology for the insult to his legal background. Erin told a softer story about a recruit who had nearly fainted at his first press line because he hadn’t understood that the flash of cameras could feel like a wall. They laughed the way people do when they are learning each other’s corners, when surprise turns into relief and relief turns into delight.
After the dishes found their way into the sink, they carried their wine to the couch. Leo claimed his spot at Erin’s feet with a contented grunt. Jamie tucked one leg under herself and turned on the cushion so she could face Erin fully. The distance between them was just enough to feel like a dare.
Erin answered it first with a touch. She brushed a strand of hair from Jamie’s cheek and let her fingers linger. Jamie leaned in, and the kiss that followed wasn’t cautious.
It started slow, then gathered heat like it had been waiting days. Jamie’s hand slid along Erin’s shoulder and down her arm, fingers curling until they caught at her wrist. Erin deepened the kiss, her free hand pulling Jamie closer by the waist until Jamie was half pressed against her side.
The wine sat forgotten on the table. The world thinned to the sound of their breathing, quickening, syncing. Jamie’s mouth was soft and insistent, her lips parting, and Erin felt the floor tilt beneath her. She let her hand slide higher along Jamie’s back, felt the tremor of her laugh against her mouth, and it was too much and not nearly enough.
Heat coiled low in her stomach. She wanted to lose herself here, to let the momentum carry them straight past conversation and into something that had been building since the night outside the restaurant. She kissed Jamie harder, and Jamie answered in kind, her fingers curling into Erin’s shirt, tugging her closer until there was no space left to cover.
When Erin shifted, Jamie followed, and for one dizzy second Erin thought the night was going to break open completely.
Then Jamie pressed a palm to her chest, holding her there. Breathless, eyes wide, lips swollen, she whispered, “Wait.”
The single word cut through the rush, and Erin froze. Her stomach dropped like stone. “Is this about Tilly? Because if you’re thinking I’ll do to you what I did to them…”
Jamie shook her head quickly, cupping Erin’s face before she could pull away. Her voice was gentle but firm. “No. That’s not it. I want this. I want you. I just… before we go further, we need to talk about what this is.”
The phrase had the power to crack a room open or shut it. Erin felt herself brace without meaning to. Then she made herself unclench, because she had promised honesty when she stepped into the park and she had meant it.
“What do you want it to be?” she asked.
Jamie’s eyes were bright and steady. “I want us. I want to keep choosing this. I don’t want something casual I cannot explain to myself. I also don’t want to rush into a label because labels make me feel like I owe an explanation to everyone else. I want to know that when I reach for you, you will reach back. I want to know that if one of us gets spooked, we say so. That we don’t disappear. I want clear. I want kind. I want honest.”
Erin let out a breath she hadn’t known she was holding. “I don’t want casual either. I’m afraid sometimes of what I want. That’s not a secret. But I want you. I want to be chosen by you and to choose you back. I want to be the person who tells you the truth even when it’s ugly, and I want to be the person who hears it from you and stays.”
Jamie’s smile came in a slow curve that Erin felt in her throat. “So we are on the same page.”
