I whisper it aloud, just enough that Julia can hear.
“Oh Blake, my darling football star. I do love you so.”
“You, uh, do? Really? Me?”
“Of course. You are the computer to my keyboard and shit.”
Julia elbows me in the chest, but not before smiling and laughing. “I’m so happy for them.”
Lexi grabs both of Blake’s hands in hers, and Julia gasps, getting up on her toes and digging her fingernails into my arm. “Oh my God. I think they’re gonna kiss!”
The crowd starts to clap as the national anthem comes to a close, and just on cue, Boden pulls Lexi into his arms, lifts her off the ground, and plants a kiss right on her for all of us to see.
“Hell yes!” I cheer, and Julia jumps up and down beside me, slapping high fives with Finn and Scottie before turning back around to hang off me like a spider monkey, slapping me wildly to look up to the jumbotron. There they are, front and center—our girl Lexi and our boy Boden getting their happily ever after.
I’m happier than I’ve ever been.
And so fucking jealous I can’t see straight at the same time.
I’m happy for Blake, but I want that for me.
The girl. The moment. The dream.
I look over at Julia, take in her smiling face and every facet of her beauty. Her eyes, her hair, her mouth, her entire being.
I love this girl. So fucking much.
And I want to be with her more than I want to be able to breathe.
It’s motherfluffing time to make it happen.
No more fires or bugs or dramatic situations. I’m going to tell Julia how I feel.
I’m going to find the perfect moment to lay it all on the line.
I mean, I have to, before the line strangles me to death.
Tuesday, Sept 2nd
Ace
“Yoko, buddy, don’t jump,” I say, my voice gentle and my hands too full to correct him physically. “Mommy will be home soon, and we need to get this dinner done before she is so it’s a surprise.”
He barks a growing-puppy bark, sounding more and more like a teenager every day, and I move my spaghetti sauce to the back burner and turn the temperature down to low. It’s got ground chicken in it because Julia prefers that over red meat most of the time when she’s not on her period, and I did my best to cook it until it seemed done.
I’ve never browned ground chicken before—truth be told, I’ve never really cooked much that couldn’t just go in the oven before—so I was working strictly off YouTube and hope.
Dropping the noodles in the pot of boiling water on the other side, I slide the tray of garlic bread into the oven and set the bowl of bagged salad on the kitchen island along with the candlesticks I had delivered via Instacart earlier.
Yoko barks again, this time at the sound of the key in the door, and I hold my breath, the nerves over how Julia will react to the whole thing hitting me like a dart between the eyes.
It’s not that we haven’t attempted to cook for each other before—mostly her for me—but the candles and stuff kind of scream romance.
As the door opens, I wipe myhands down the front of her pink apron and head toward her, a glass of iced tea in one hand and a bottle of white wine in the other.
She bends down to give Yoko a scratch, but her eyes are undeniably wide as she takes in the scene. “Ace, what are you doing here? What’s going on?”
I smile. “Sorry for breaking and entering, but I wanted to cook you dinner, and as it turns out, I don’t have all the necessary cookware at my place. Slight oversight, I suppose. Is this okay?”
