This can't be real.
I can't stop looking at her, so I smirk, wink so she'll look away and I can watch her again in peace. I've never known anything like this, never known anyone like her. Everything is different now because of her.
I'm different.
I don't want to go back. I can't go back to the lonely life I had, the lonely man I was before her. Now knowing that this exists, Molly in the morning light with the scent of coffee in the air and her in my shirt. The terrifying possibility of thiseverymorning. Her, always and forever.
I can't imagine my life without her in it anymore.
Distantly, I understand what's happening--the feeling is pressing, insistent. The word hovering, unspoken between us.
I feel it in every moment like a physical presence. Last night, it was on my lips, waiting to be spoken into existence. It's not just the sex--though,fuck, the sex--it's how she trusted me completely, without hesitation. How she looked at me like I was everything. It's in everything I do, every move I make from the whisk in my hand to the way I touch her, as if my fingertips could whisper it to her skin, my lips sigh it into her mouth.
This morning, I woke up to her again, her body soft and small and warm against mine. Lost myself in her again. Found myself in her again.
For the next eleven days, I hope I never have to come up for air.
As she passes, I grab her around the waist and pull her into me, leaning to press my lips to hers for a long, lazy kiss. She melts into me, her arms winding around my neck until we part.
"What was that for?" She asks, smiling.
"Just…you."
She beams. "I likejust youkisses."
I steal one more and let her go. "Good. You're gonna get a lot of them."
"I'm the luckiest girl," she says, meaning it. She heads for the eggs and starts to crack them into a bowl.
"You've got that backward, peaches. It's me who's lucky you'll put up with a grumpy old asshole like me."
"Well, that's easy since you're not grumpy with me."
"Maybe not anymore, but I used to be."
"And why was that?" She asks knowingly.
"'Cause I wasn't allowed to have you."
"I always thought that was a dumb, self-imposed rule designed to torture us both."
I snort a laugh.
"Hard to be happy when you've always got yourself restrained."
"You've seen what happens when I'm off the leash."
She pins me with a look. "Are you kidding? Off the leash Grey is myfavorite."
Chuckling, I lean over to kiss her again. "I can see you appreciate him now, but I woulda scared the shit out of you a couple of months ago."
"Maybe, but I wasn't going anywhere."
"No, you sure fucking weren't," I tease.
"Hey,youwere the one who was likeSigh, I'll teach you baseball. Sigh, I'll fix your house. Sigh, I'll sleep over." She says it in that low pitched, dumb boy voice. I can't stop smiling.
"Well,youwere all,Oh, coach--teach me how to drink. Oh, coach--teach me how to play baseball. Oh, coach--teach me how to kiss," I say in my high pitched, girly voice.
