Close enough that I can feel the heat coming off him. Close enough that my whole body wants to lean in.
He feels like home, and I hate how much I missed that.
For a few seconds, I stare at my hands in my lap, trying to figure out how to begin in a way that says everything I mean and nothing I don’t. Then I lift my eyes to his.
“I’m not mad at you, Gray.”
His whole face changes.
Not fully, not all at once—but something in him jolts. His eyes widen slightly, like maybe he wasn’t expecting those words first. Like maybe he wasn’t expecting them at all.
“I was upset,” I continue carefully. “And shocked, I think. But not because of you.” I let out a small breath. “If the roles were reversed, I don’t know that I would’ve handled it any better. I probably would’ve been scared too. Scared to tell you in case it meant losing you.”
His jaw tightens like he’s holding something back, but his eyes give him away.
I already know that fear lived in him too.
“I knew by Wednesday morning that I wasn’t angry with you,” I say. “But knowing that and being ready to talk about it weren’t the same thing. I needed a minute to sit with it and make sure I understood what I was feeling.” My voice softens. “I’m sorry if that hurt you. I’m not sorry I took the time, because I needed it. But I am sorry it hurt.”
Something in his expression eases then. Just a little.
I reach for his hand before I can overthink it, threading my fingers through his.
He looks down at where we’re joined, then back at me, like the contact means more than he knows how to say.
“I cared about you as NumberEleven,” I tell him quietly. “Deeply. I trusted you with things I never even said out loud in therapy. I let you see parts of me I’ve spent years trying to hide.”
His fingers tighten around mine.
“But as Grayson…” I pause because I hear the way he inhales sharply, hear the way he’s still bracing for impact even now. My heart squeezes. “As Grayson, I fell for you.”
His eyes close for half a second.
When they open again, there’s so much raw feeling in them it nearly undoes me.
“In a very non-friend way,” I add, and that earns the smallest, most fragile flicker of a smile from him. It gives me enough courage to keep going.
“You made me feel safe,” I say. “Protected. Seen. And not in a way that made me feel fragile either. Just…like I didn’t have to hold every piece of myself together all the time.” Emotion thickens my throat, but I push through it. “You made me feel bold enough to ask for what I wanted.”
His gaze never leaves mine. I don’t even think he blinks.
“There’s been so much work,” I whisper. “Years of it. Doctors and therapy and hard days and setbacks and trying again. And I’m proud of that. I’m proud of how hard I fought to become this version of myself. But then you came into my life, and it felt like…” I look down at our hands for a second, gathering the words. “Like there was this missing piece I didn’t even know I was still searching for.”
His thumb brushes once over my knuckles.
“You didn’t fix me,” I say, because I need him to understand that too. “That isn’t what this is. But you met me exactly where I was and cared for me there. As yourself. As NumberEleven. As my friend before anything else. And somehow that made it easier to believe the things I’ve been trying to teach myself for years—that I’m enough. That I’ve alwaysbeenenough.”
The tears burn before they fall.
Then I make myself say the most important part.
“I want you, Gray.”
The words land between us like something living.
I stare at our hands because if I look at him too soon, I might lose my nerve.
“I wantus,” I admit. “In whatever way I can have it. I want to be the person you come to on hard days. I want to know the things you don’t say to everyone else. I want to be your best friend and…” My voice catches, but I force myself through it. “More than that, if you still want that too.”
