I could tell her the story we practiced: the coffee shop, the latte, the smile that changed everything. It’s close enough to the truth to be believable, but when I glance at the way Alycia’s lips part on a sigh and the faint pink dusting on her cheeks, something in me rebels against pretending.
“Funny story.” I grin, taking a slow sip of water just to buy myself a second. “There was this elevator…”
“Kyle.” Alycia shoots me a warning look that I ignore.
“An elevator?” Marisol leans forward, elbows on the table. “I need to hear this.”
“Three floors and she already hated me. It was perfect,” I say solemnly.
“Oh my god,” Marisol bursts out laughing.
“That’s not even close to what happened.”
“Sure, it is,” I say, keeping my tone easy, like this isn’t a confession. “You glared at me. I fell in love. Pretty straightforward.”
Marisol claps a hand over her heart like she’s the audience in a telenovela. “How romantic!”
“Please don’t encourage him.” Alycia sighs, cheeks flushed.
But she’s smiling, and I can’t stop looking at her. I don’t know why I said that. Maybe because it felt truer than anything we rehearsed, or maybe because for the first time, I didn’t want this to sound fake.
Marisol sighs dreamily, chin resting on her hand. “Ay… ustedes dos… so cute.”
“Mamá,” Alycia whines as she looks anywhere but at me.
“¿Qué?It’s nice to see you happy.”
“She’s always been like this?” I ask, half grinning, trying to disguise how thrown I am by the wordhappyaimed at Alycia. It sounds like it might be something rare and precious that Marisol doesn’t get to say often enough.
“Worse,” Alycia says. “She once tried to set me up with our mailman.”
“He was handsome!” Marisol insists.
“He wasseventy.”
I laugh, and the sound earns me a fond smile from Marisol that feels too close to approval, like I’ve somehow passed an unspoken test.
“So,” she says, eyes bright with curiosity, “how long have you two been together?”
“Not long,” Alycia answers quickly, but her voice catches just slightly at the end.
“Feels longer,” I say before I can stop myself.
Her gaze snaps to mine. A small flicker of something—warning, heat, both—passes betweenus.
Marisol hums, “Mmm…cuando se sabe, se sabe.”
I don’t know what Marisol just said, but from the way Alycia’s entire face flames, I can guess. She shifts in her seat, her knee brushing mine under the table. I should move, give her space, but I don’t.
Marisol tosses out another soft line in Spanish that I don’t quite catch, and Alycia laughs. The sound slides under my skin, pulling me straight back to the night I first saw her months ago. She isn’t performing now. She’s just… her. And that undoes me faster than anything else ever has.
Alycia reaches for the breadbasket, fingers skimming the rim, then hesitates like she can feel my eyes on her. Her hand hovers, and I reach toward the basket at the same moment she moves again, and our hands collide. It’s barely a touch, but it knocks the air clean out of me. Her fingers twitch like she’s going to pull away… but she doesn’t.
For one suspended heartbeat, we’re both frozen in the space between instinct and want. Then she clears her throat, gently nudges the basket toward me, and the moment snaps. When I look up, Marisol is watching us with that quiet, knowing mom-amusement.
“You adore her, don’t you?”Her voice is soft and unmistakably pointed.
For half a second, I forget how to breathe. I should laugh or say something smooth, but nothing comes out. Not with Alycia sitting right here. Every logical reason I shouldn’t feel this flashes through my head—the fakestory, the short-term deal, the fact that we barely know each other—but none of it sticks.
