Just the two of us.
For the first time in weeks, everything feels… right.
****
London feels like a dream I don’t want to wake up from.
Every morning starts the same way – Lex’s massive, tattooed arm heavy aroundmy waist, his thumb tracing lazy circles into my skin like he needs to remind himself I’m real.
He kisses my shoulder before I even open my eyes, murmuring apologies like prayers he’s still learning how to say.
“I’m sorry I was an asshole.”
“I’m sorry I laughed at you.”
“I;m sorry I didn’t protect you.”
At first, I told him to stop apologizing. Now I let him. It feels like penance. It feels like healing. For both of us.
He holds my hand everywhere. On the Tube. Crossing streets. Wandering through museums where he pretends not to understand the art but listens like it matters anyway becauseIcare.
He buys me coffee exactly the way I like it: always iced, I’m gay, duh, and with 3pumps of vanilla syrup. And he already memorized the order, so now he doesn’t even ask what I want.
He presses kisses to my temple when he thinks no one’s watching – and sometimes when he knows they are.
One night, he surprised me with the London Eye.
Not just tickets.
A private cabin.
I laughed when I realized what he’s done, my reflection shaking in the glass as the city lights stretch beneath us, with Lex wrapping his arms around me from behind, his head laying on my shoulder and him kissing me slowly on my neck.
“You’re ridiculous,” I tell him.
“Yet you still love me,” he says, pulling me closer as the capsule lifts above the Thames.
And I do.
God, I really do.
The next morning, we’re curled together on the hotel bed, sunlight spilling across white sheets, Lex tracing shapes on my stomach absentmindedly.
“I want to do a shopping day for you,” he says casually.
Too casually.
I squint at him.
“A shopping day?”
“Yeah. We’ll go to Harrods,” he continues.
“New phone. Laptop. Clothes. Maybe some new sexy underwear that we both will love. Whatever you want, princess.”
I sit up.
“Lex.”
