Thatcher lets out a strangled sound. I snort. “Yeah. That. Subtle, right?”
I slide my hand under the quilt to find Thatcher’s. “So we wanted to talk to you. About us.”
Thatcher takes it from there, as though I’d passed him the puck on smooth ice, his voice steady. “We’re seeing each other.”
Jamie blinks once. “You’re dating?”
“Yep.”
“Okay.”
“Just okay?” I ask, shooting a look at Thatcher who looks much more relieved than his death grip on my hand would suggest.
“I mean, yeah. I figured. Riley’s basically been narrating your slow-burn romance for weeks.”
Thatcher groans.
Jamie grins. “He posted that picture from the game—caption was ‘No-personal-space November came early.’”
“Christ,” Thatcher mutters. “I told you not to read that garbage.”
“It’s not garbage,” I say. “It’s community journalism.”
Jamie shrugs. “Whatever it is, he’s not wrong. You two have been giving off vibes.” He leans back on his elbows. “Honestly, I think it’s cool. You make him less grumpy, and he makes you, like, five percent more tolerable.”
I glance at Thatcher, who just shakes his head, trying not to smile.
“I’m still your coach,” I remind Jamie, who gives me a smirk that I’m pretty sure I’ve seen in the mirror before.
“You okay with it?” Thatcher asks Jamie. “Just to be clear, you don’t get to vote on it, but I do want to know how you feel.”
I smile at Thatcher, because he’s always quick to manage expectations.
“I know,” Jamie says, and his voice softens a little. “I kind of knew already. I just didn’t want to bring it up first. And yeah—it’s weird, I guess. You don’t really date. At least not seriously.”
There’s a pause. I feel the weight of that, but I also feel my chest puff out.Thatcher’s mine, a voice in my head likes to say, and that voice is pretty damn smug that of all the guys who could want Gabe Thatcher, I’m the guy sitting next to him on his custom porch swing.Mine.
“You’re a good kid,” I say.
“I know,” Jamie says, and just like that it’s back to normal.
He heads back into the yard, and I turn to Thatcher, who’s still watching him go with that quiet, serious face he gets when he’s pretending not to be emotional.
I lean over and kiss him, and just like always, he melts into it like it’s second nature.
“Easy, peasy, lemon squeezy,” I say, just so Thatcher can roll his eyes, which he does.
We don’t tell anyone else, but Fox River Falls doesn’t need announcements to get the news.
Two days later, we’re at The Blue Line, standing a little too close at the counter while Thatcher mutters about how Riley always overcharges him for oat milk. Riley doesn’t even ask what we want—just makes our drinks and slides them across with a look I’d call smug if it weren’t somehow affectionate.
“Cute,” he says. “You’ve got matching caffeine dependencies.”
Thatcher frowns. “That’s not a thing.”
“It is now.” He raises his voice. “Y’all owe me ten bucks! I called it first!”
My chest tightens as I realize half the café is watching us. I look down to where my hand is too close to Thatcher’s, with mypinkie reaching out to smooth the back of his hand. I snatch it back.
