And everything will be okay.
Because the alternative isn’t an option.
Axel
Doing normal things with Tay feels abnormal in every way.
Not bad. Just… different.
Maybe it’s because Theo’s not here.
Maybe it’s because this version of us is unfamiliar territory.
Maybe it’s because the boundaries she – or we – laid down weeks ago don’t seem to have a voice any more.
Either way, I don’t hate it.
Hyde Park stretches out around us in the late-afternoon sun: grass rolling in the breeze, oak trees throwing long shadows, families and joggers drifting past like we’re part of the everyday scene. All normal.
We would’ve got here earlier, but shedragged me through a street market first, hopping from stall to stall until she spotted a red-and-cream picnic blanket.
‘Really?’ I’d said, holding it up. ‘This one?’
She’d shrugged, smiling. ‘It’s soft. It’s big. And it won’t ruin that sweet little tush of yours.’
I’d blinked at her. ‘Mysweet little tush?’
She’d laughed, hazel eyes dancing so bright, I would’ve bought her the entire damn stall. ‘Just buy it.’
So here we are. In the shade of a tree, that exact blanket spread beneath us, a feast she curated like it mattered all laid out before us, and all I really care about is her. How she tastes. How she feels. How she sounds.
We eat.
We talk.
She leans into my side without thinking about it. Kisses my cheek just to steal the last grape. Laughs when pigeons swarm like we’re offering up our souls and they ain’t fussy.
She’s different like this. Softer. Warmer. Open in a way I’ve never known her to be. And it hits me clean in the chest: Ireallycould get used to this. All of it.
Waking up with her tangled in my sheets.
Shooting the breeze over coffee.
Cutting through the city with her body locked to mine on the bike.
Even picnics in the park, with her exactly like this.
Her? What about you? It takes two to play the happy little couple…
I sink back against the trunk of the tree, and she shifts with me, her head coming to rest in my lap, her eyes smiling up at me.
And damn if mine ain’t smiling right back.
Yeah, I’m in deep.
Way past the line I swore I wouldn’t cross.
But I’m done running.
