In the now painful silence of the cabin, he turns the wheel, gripping it so tightly that his knuckles are white, and the skin of his fingers has turned red. The truck slows to a stop at the shoulder of the road. My hand stays on the back of his neck, massaging it while we sit in silence, his eyes not moving from their distant stare ahead of us. I can see his heart slamming like a hammer against his shirt, and I wish with everything in me that I could reach inside of him and calm it.
Right now, he’s seven years old again. He’s trapped inside of that house, watching his friends get dragged away into cages, and I have to pull him out of there.
My free hand reaches for my seatbelt, pressing the button to release the latch, and I pull it away from my body. I climb over the center console and into Eric’s lap, pressing my chest against his while I straddle him. His hands settle onto my lower back as his cheek rests against my head and I wrap my arms tightly around his shoulders, squeezing his body with mine.
“You think that what happened to them was your fault, but you saved them.”
“Sophia—”
“It wasn’t your fault, Eric.” I move my hands to his shoulders to that I can look him in the eye. He’s not far away anymore, he’s here; back in front of me. “What you did was brave. And scary. And—”
“Pickleback.” The word is little more than a whisper that hangs between us, but it fills the cab all the same, weighing a thousand pounds.
Eric’s jaw clenches, the muscles flexing over the bone while his molars grind against one another, and his throat bobs with the pain that he swallows down.
“I love you,” I tell him, kissing his cheek. “I love you.” I move to the other side of his face and kiss him there, too. I bring my hands to his face, cupping his jaw on either side, and I stare into his beautiful, icy blue eyes. A thick layer of glass coats them, and his body tenses under mine. “I love you,” I tell him one more time as I press my lips to his.
“Sugar, I...”
“I know that you can’t say it back. That’s okay. Even if you never can, it’s okay, because I know. And I can say it enough for the both of us.” I press my lips to his, feeling a tight breath leave his body, taking some of the tension with it. “I love you.”
One of his hands climbs up my back until it tangles into my hair, the other following the curve of my ass, and he pulls me closer to him, tucking my head into the crook of his neck. I don’t have to wonder what he’s saying to me.
I haven’t had to wonder since the moment I watched him scribble out those stupid menus.
“We don’t have to go tonight,” I tell him, sitting up to face him. “We can just go back to your apartment and watch a movie or something. Or I can go home if you need to—”
His lips meet mine mid-sentence, slow and gentle. “It’s alright, Sugar. Don’t you worry about me.” He flashes me a winning smile, a direct contrast to the tears lining his eyes, and he lifts his thumb to his mouth, wetting it against his tongue, gently swiping it just beneath my eye to clear away the mascara that my own tears smudged.
I take my time climbing back into the passenger seat, not really wanting to separate from him. Reaching forward, I turn the volume control knob and crank his music back up for him while we ride.
•
His friend’s house is huge; marbled flooring that seems too clean for a house with two young kids, expensive-looking art is hung on the walls and sculptures of different shape and style sit on most of the surfaces inside the main space, shelves included. Roughly four hundred thousand family photos are distributed among the art pieces.
“Come on,” Eric tells me as he drapes his hand around my waist, resting it at my hip. “You got more Fowlers to meet.”
As we move into the living room, we’re met with the sounds of laughter. Colt and his wife come into view, along with a little girl, a young man who looks about Rowan’s age, and a baby on the floor, sitting up and cooing at the people around her.
“Uncle Davis!” The little girl shouts, running toward him with her arms outstretched. Eric squats down to catch her as she slams into him, lifted into the air in his arms as he stands. “You’re late.”
Pressing a kiss to the side of her head, he tells her, “I know, Macie darlin’, I’m sorry. We got caught up.” He gently sets her back onto the ground and ruffles his fingers through her hair, then he places his hand between my shoulder blades.
After saying a quick hello to Colt and Rowan, complete with a big bear hug from the latter, the baby is placed into my arms. She coos and squeals her own little greeting while Eric brings the younger man over. I could swear that I’ve seen him somewhere before, and the wide-eyed expression on his face tells me that he’s thinking the same thing about me.
Eric drops his hand to the small of my back, rubbing the tips of his fingers over the fabric of my shirt. “This is my...Sophia.”
“Emmett,” the guy says, extending his hand to me with a smile plastered onto his face. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“You too,” I tell him, matching his smile.
He and Eric exchange a hug, clapping their hands against each other’s backs. All of us move to the kitchen to make up plates from the spread of food along the counters; there’s pizza, wings, salad, decadent desserts – there’s enough food here to feed a small army, set up buffet style.
Taking our plates back to the living room – which makes me exceedingly nervous, because this house is spotless and the furniture looksreallyfucking expensive – we settle into the seating. Eric cozies right up next to me, his thigh pressed against mine, and he rests one hand high at my inner thigh. Showing me off, but making sure that everyone – me, included – knows who I belong to.
The conversation flows freely between all of them, and it sends warmth spreading across my chest to watch Eric with his friends. No, they’re more than just his friends. He has parents, but these people, sitting around this coffee table, are the most important people in his life.Thisis his family.
He brought me to meet his family. To his real home.
