I haven’t felt nervous like this in years.
Not first-date nervous. Not presentation-at-work nervous. This is something else. Something heavier. Something that feels like it matters in a way I can’t quite explain.
When Hannah leaves and the front door clicks shut, the house goes quiet in that rare, sacred way it only does when the kids are fully asleep and someone else is temporarily responsible for the universe.
Emma stands at the bottom of the stairs smoothing down her dress.
And I forget how to breathe.
She looks different tonight. Not because of the dress, though the dress is doing things to me I’m trying very hard not to show too obviously, but because she’s looking at me.
Really looking at me.
Not as the man who forgot PE kit. Not as the guy who takes too long in the loo. Not as Dad Dan.
As me.
I swallow.
“Ready?” she asks, voice soft.
I nod like an idiot.
I’ve missed this. Not just the sex. Not just the idea of it. I’ve missed the anticipation. The charge. The quiet build before anything even happens.
On the walk home, when I took her hand, she didn’t hesitate. She laced her fingers through mine like it was instinct. And when she leaned into me, I felt it everywhere. That shift. That spark.
I haven’t touched her properly in so long.
Not like this. Not without exhaustion hovering over us like a referee.
When we get into the bedroom, there’s a second, a strange, suspended second, where we both just stand there.
I clear my throat.
“So… you wanna…?”
Smooth. Incredibly smooth.
She says yes, and I think my heart actually stutters.
And then the dress incident happens.
For half a second, I panic when I hear the fabric rip. But when she whimpers about liking the dress and then threatens me if I laugh, I lose it.
Not because it’s funny at her expense.
Because it’s us.
Because this isn’t staged. This isn’t perfect. This isn’t some polished fantasy version of us.
It’s real.
When I tackle her onto the bed and she hits me with a pillow, something inside me loosens. The tension we’ve both been carrying dissolves into laughter and tangled sheets.
And then it shifts.
The laughter softens.
