“Thank you,” she says even though I’m the one who should be thanking her. “For last night, I mean. The leftovers, the way you cleaned up after us, and the way you fixed April’s shirt.” She pauses, and I can see a flush rising in her cheeks. “And especially for the bath. That was so unbelievably thoughtful.”
“It wasn’t a problem.”
I don’t know why my first impulse is to deflect her obviously genuine praise and thanks, but I do. And I instantly feel like a jackass when I see her expression harden just a little in response.
“I should apologize,” she says as the color in her cheeks deepens. “For kissing you like that.”
This isn’t what I want. The last thing I need right now is an apology for something that didn’t feel wrong. That still doesn’t feel wrong.
“Heather, wait.”
“No, I need to say this.” She looks down at her fidgeting hands, probably too embarrassed to keep up the eye contact. “I feel a little pathetic, honestly. I’m just not used to having someone take care of me like that. I guess I got swept up in the moment and I wasn’t thinking.”
I need to say something, anything to make her feel better. I’m useless when it comes to shit like this.
“It wasn’t just you. I wasn’t thinking, either.”
The part I don’t say out loud is that I’m not sorry. I won’t take that moment back or pretend to regret it, not even for a second.
“Right. Exactly.” She nods. “It shouldn’t have happened. You’ve already done so much for me and April, and I didn’t mean to make things weird or cross a line.”
I should tell her how I haven’t been able to stop thinking about that kiss since it happened. It felt so damn right even though it probably shouldn’t have.
But I don’t know how to say those things without making everything more complicated than it already is.
Instead, I clear my throat and say, “It’s fine.”
Her entire body seems to slump a little, but only for a split second. So fast that I would’ve missed the tiny flicker of disappointment if I hadn’t been looking directly at her.
“Okay,” she says. “Great. So we’ll just pretend last night never happened?”
This feels all wrong even though the rational part of my brain—the part that loves schedules and routines and predictability—is telling me that’s exactly what we should do.
“Right.” I speak slowly, as if the word is being dragged out of me. “Let’s… pretend it never happened.”
“We’re good, then?”
I nod. “We’re good.”
The sound of a familiar whistled tune makes me instinctively take a step back, and Heather nearly jumps out of her skin as Colin rounds the corner into the kitchen.
I’ve been so caught up in our awkward conversation and my internal back and forth that I must have missed the front door opening and closing. Judging by the startled look on Heather’s face, she completely missed it too.
“Hey, there,” he says, his eyes bouncing back and forth between us. “I hope I’m not interrupting anything.”
“Not at all.” I shake my head, knowing he can see right through the lie. “We were just, uh…”
“Talking,” Heather offers, covering my ass. “While I bandaged Grant’s thumb.”
“Right. That’s what we were doing.”
I’ve never wanted to be good at lying, but damn. Maybe being able to tell a little fib here and there without feeling mortified and self-conscious wouldn’t be the worst skill to have.
The worst part is, her explanation was technically the truth. We were talking while she bandaged my thumb. It’s just the parts she left out that are making me feel guilty.
Regardless, there’s not much more we can say with Colin here, so I go back to my meal prep while Heather starts her own morning routine.
A few minutes later, footsteps are thundering down the stairs and the kitchen fills with April’s infectiously chaotic energy.
