“Boring. Made me appreciate being home.”
“This is home now?” His expression opened. Vulnerability. Hope.
I realized what I’d said. Called his place home. Not “your place” or “the house.” Home.
“Yeah,” I said, meaning it. “This is home.”
He kissed me then, right there in the doorway where any neighbor could see. Ben Goas walking his dog. Jessica Bonnefield, who’d shown up with a chicken casserole that first day. But I didn’t care. Didn’t care about anything except the fact that I was here with him, and I didn’t have to pretend anymore.
At least not when we were home.
Eventually, I grabbed my bag from the porch and closed the door. I helped Marco back to the couch, even though he insisted he could manage fine.
“About my apartment.” I settled beside him. “My landlord called yesterday. Maybe another month. Six weeks at most.”
A month. Six weeks. And then I’d go back to my place.
“What if it takes longer?” I found myself saying. “What if they find more damage or whatever?”
He studied my face. “Are you hoping your apartment stays damaged?”
“Maybe.”
“Étienne—”
“I don’t want to leave.” The words came out more honest than I’d intended. “I know that’s selfish. I know you need your own space. But I don’t want this to end.”
“This?” He gestured between us. “Or living together?”
“Both. Either. I don’t know.” I ran my hand through my hair, frustrated with my inability to articulate what I was feeling. “I just know I don’t want to go back to how things were before.”
He was quiet for a moment, his thumb rubbing small circles on my knee. “Your apartment getting fixed doesn’t mean we have to stop… this. Us. We’ll just have to figure out how to do it with more distance.”
“I don’t want distance.”
“Neither do I. But we can’t stay in this bubble forever.” His expression was gentle but serious. “Eventually, we have to figure out how to be together in the real world. With games, practices, separate spaces, and people watching.”
I knew he was right.
But I didn’t want to think about eventually. Didn’t want to think about Boucher’s suspicions or my father’s homophobia or all the complications waiting outside these walls.
Right now, I just wanted him. I wanted to pretend we could have this without consequence.
“One month,” I said. “At least one more month of me being here.”
“At least,” he agreed. “Maybe six weeks if we’re lucky.”
“I’ll take it.”
He leaned in and kissed me, slow and sweet, and I let myself believe—just for a moment—that maybe we could make this work.
That maybe home wasn’t a place but a person.
And I’d found mine.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Marco
