At the time, my seven-year-old brain only comprehended about a third of what she was trying to tell me, but as I got older, I remembered those words again and again when I found myself in situations where I was hurt or upset.
It was the same now.
I couldn't control J.J.'s thoughts, emotions, or actions. Only my own. I could choose to work myself up into a frenzy by worrying about it or I could accept what was happening at this moment.
Tonight, at this moment, I wanted to enjoy the afterglow with my husband.
The conversation about what had just happened could wait.
Keeping that thought in the forefront of my mind, I washed my face, brushed and flossed my teeth, and used the toilet while I still had some privacy. With all the water Cam had been pushing on me at work tonight, I felt like I needed to pee every five minutes.
I grabbed my nightgown off the back of the bathroom door and slipped it over my head. When I came out of the bathroom, I almost ran into J.J.
"Oh!" I pressed a hand to my chest. "You scared me."
"Sorry. I waited for a few minutes but you were in there a while."
"Just washing up before bed," I said, skirting around him to the dresser. I opened the top drawer and pulled out a pair of panties.
I could feel him watching me as I slid one leg at a time into them and tugged them up under my nightgown. I yawned again as I tugged the hem down to cover me completely.
"Are you ready for bed?" I asked.
He nodded and went around the bed to the side I didn't sleep on. I was about to climb in when I realized my phone wasn't lying on the nightstand.
"Darn. I need to charge my phone."
"I'll get it," J.J. said, climbing to his feet. "Is it in your bag?"
"On the kitchen table," I answered as I tugged back the blankets and settled beneath them.
I glanced over at the nightstand on the other side of the bed and blinked. His phone was there, the charger already plugged in. I must have been in the bathroom longer than I thought if he had time to bring his charger in here, shimmy the nightstand out to plug it in, and then put the table back where it was.
J.J. returned with my phone and bent to pick up the charging cable from the floor where it had fallen. He plugged it into my phone, leaving the device on the nightstand.
"Thanks."
He came around the bed and climbed in before he answered, "No problem."
Unsure of what else to do, I turned out the light. Once the room was dark, I became very aware of how close his body was to mine in the bed. We were less than a foot apart, but we weren't touching.
"You okay?" J.J. asked in the darkness.
"Yeah. Why?"
"You were holding your breath."
I released the air in a swift gust. "Uh, I'm okay, just...not sure what to do. I mean, I don't know if you're a cuddler or if you prefer to sleep without touching someone and..." I trailed off. I had no clue what to say next.
"I sleep like the dead so it doesn't really matter," he answered. His voice was soft and a little groggy as if he were minutes away from drifting off again.
I didn't say anything, not wanting to wake him up if he was about to fall asleep. I gasped when he reached out and pulled me into his side.
"You were holding your breath again," he murmured against my temple.
We were facing each other, his arm around my waist. My arms were between us with my hands pressed against his bare chest. I shifted my right thigh so that it rested between his and he sighed.
"This is nice," he whispered.
