“Not without your input. First, I’m here because you’re here. I mean, I never would have learned to curl without you, so I’m here because we’re here together.”
“Yeah, no. I get that.”
“And second, just seeing you out there doing your thing when we’re curling, or practicing, or whatever, has that calming effect on me that I can channel my energy where it needs to go instead of it burning under my skin all the time.”
“Burning under your skin? That does not sound fun.”
“It wasn’t. Isn’t. It happens less than it did.”
“But not out there.”
I shook my head.
“In here?”
“You’ve been wondering why our sex is so… much lately.”
He looked so stricken I almost took it back. But if I was going to get him to open up, I had to be honest first. “I never wanted more than you when more wasn’t a real option. And I’ve come across guys I would have gone for lots of times after we hooked up. But you never wanted any of them.”
“Until Alan.”
I shrugged. “So the idea is in my brain now. Tonight, just making food was… Well, I don’t know exactly, but it felt likesomething. Didn’t it?”
He nodded.
“So, I gotta say, it never occurred to me that you might want to be on the receiving end. I was trying so hard to make sure you were satisfied that it undid all the good, solid work I was doing for myself because I never thought about it from your point of view.”
“You wouldn’t think of it because it isn’t in your nature any more than it would be in a golden retriever’s nature to be a cat.” He tucked the annoying lock of my hair that always fell forward behind my ear. “It didn’t occur to me, either, if I’m honest.”
“Because we don’t work that way.”
“But Alan does.”
“And that’s what you want from him?”
“Not just that. But partly, yeah.”
“I do like that he does for you what you do for me. He settles you. I ramp you up.”
“That’s not a bad thing, Ev.”
“No, I know. Not when you need it. I feel like if I wasn’t around, half the time you’d flatline.” I grinned and his entire face softened. His eyes shone and the flush of his cheeks from the shower deepened.
“I’m not that bad.”
“You gotta admit, though, I’m the battery. You’re the recharger.”
“What does that make Alan?”
I paused, then shrugged. “No idea. My metaphor broke. But whatever it is, it’s something that’s gonna make us all work better together.”
“I think so too. You ready to go back out there?”
“I am. And I call dibs on the middle couch cushion.”
“Baby, I get the feeling that’s gonna be your designated spot, in middle.”
“I fucking hope so.” I grabbed his hand and hauled him out to the main room whereHow to Train Your Dragonwas paused at the opening credits on the huge flat screen.
