“I’m going to take a quick shower,” I say, sitting up, even though my hair is still wet from the day before.
Rowan’s hands linger on me softly, fiddling with my hair, sliding over the curve of my hip, still reaching for me even when I stand up, like he doesn’t want to let go of me. When I stand, I can’t stop myself from turning around, giving his still-sleepy face a quick kiss.
When I close the bathroom door behind me, I’m breathing hard.
What am Idoing? Is this cabin fever?
Deep down, I know it’s not. That, as much as I’m calling this crazy and quick, impulsive, it doesn’t feel that way. I think of Maisie, whose sister moved to France for a year and picked up the language, speaking fluently after just seven months.
“You really have to get immersed in it,” Maisie had said, shrugging and opening a care package of French teas and cookies from her sister.
That’s what this is, I think. A week with nothing else to do but think about Rowan, spend time with him. Adventure with him.
I’ve immersed myself in this life, with him, and now I’m fluent.
And I have the sinking, twisting feeling in my stomach that I don’t want to go back. Before, as a kid, I shuttled between two worlds without a choice. And then my dad died, and that left only the one.
The city, my mom. That life. And I’ve been living it for years. In Seattle, as an influencer, taking shots at the market, attending parties at the Space Needle.
Maybe it never occurred to me that I could have chosen my dad’s life. Or that I could have found a way to balance the two.
Pushing those thoughts out of my head, I step into the shower, letting the hot water run over me. As I do, flashes of the night before come back to me.
Rowan, his mouth on me. Holding me up in this shower, his hair dark, curls pressed down against his head and falling into his eyes. The soft, slippery feeling of our bodies together.
“Shower sex isnotsafe,” I remember Maisie saying once, shaking her head at a rom-com we watched. Maybe she’s right, but Rowan had absolutely no problem holding me up last night, one hand gripping my wet hair, the other tight on my hip.
“Okay,” I whisper under my breath, stepping out of the shower and toweling off. I need to think — need to get myself out of this lusty head space.
We had sex.
And when I woke up this morning, it was with his arm around me.
Can I date a man who lives in the mountains? He won’t even be able to send me goodbye texts. How would content work? I could work extra hard for a week, schedule posts, then come up here. Do a week on, then a week off.
That is, if Rowan is even interested in seeing where this goes. Maybe he doesn’t want a long-term relationship.
No. I saw the way he looked at me last night. I can’t believe that, after all that, he would just clap me on the ass and wish me safe travels.
I realize, as I step into my leggings, that my ankle is nearly completely healed, only the slightest twinge betraying the sprain I had before. Standing up straight, I turn it from side to side, staring down at it.
When I come out of the bathroom, I head straight back to his bedroom, only to find it empty, the bed made, the warmth of the morning gone. The curtains are pulled open, and the sun shines through, too bright, exposing what felt like a personal space before.
“Rowan?” I call as I turn into the hallway. Maybe he’s letting Cheese outside.
But he’s not at the side door. In fact, he’s at the front door, standing with his coat on, my suitcase sitting at his side. I slow my pace as I take in the scene, trying to parse this with the way I felt this morning, waking up in his arms.
“Rowan?” I ask again, the smile still strangely on my face as he turns to me. “What are you doing?”
“The road is clear,” he says, his voice even, his expression flat. “So you should be able to make it back to the city.”
I blink at him, then shift from foot to foot, my heart rising up into my throat. “Okay, I mean, I— uh—” I cut myself off, trying to figure out what I want to say. Up until this moment, I’d thought he would want me to stay.
I’d already been imagining the cute scene in which I insisted I’d have to go back — either today or tomorrow — and he’d beg me to stay, his arms around my waist, until we fell into each other again.
But here he is, my things packed. My hoodie and phone sitting neatly on top of my suitcase.
Something is wrong, but I have no idea what.
