I think about the fact that I get to be here for this version of her.
For this part.
Her mouth curves slowly.
“Come on,” she says, stepping out from under my arm and holding out her hand.
The water is fifty feet down the slope, dark and cold. The fire is right here, warm and bright and easy.
But not everything worth having comes easily.
I look at her hand, then I take it and follow her toward the water.
I’d follow her anywhere.
EPILOGUE
Harlow
Two years later
Harlow
Seattle in October feels like stepping inside a watercolor painting.
Colorful leaves cover the sidewalks and are a stark contrast against the green grass. The air smells like coffee, but the air has a bite to it that I can’t say I’ve missed while living in California.
Maybe because this city already feels a little like him.
Steady. Quiet in some ways, loud in others. Beautiful without trying too hard.
“Already regretting your decision?”
I turn at the sound of Grayson’s voice and find him halfway out of the building’s front door, one hand braced against the frame, the other holding a cardboard box labeledBOOKSin my handwriting.
He’s grinning.
That grin still does something unfair to me, even now. Almost two years in, and my body still reacts to him like it doesn’t know how to be normal about it. Maybe it never will.
He’s in a dark Storm Breakers hoodie with the sleeves shoved up to his forearms, black joggers, and the backward cap he wears on off days. There’s a smear of dust on his wrist from carrying boxes, and his hair is curling slightly at the edges from the misty air.
He looks like home.
I shift the strap higher on my shoulder. “I was having a moment.”
He steps fully onto the sidewalk, box still in his arms. “A dramatic one?”
“An observant one.”
His mouth twitches. “Ah. Very different.”
“Completely.”
He glances up at the building, then back at me. “So what did your observation tell you?”
I look past him to the windows on the fourth floor, where his—our—apartment sits with the curtains open and one lamp already on. It’s weird, seeing the space that’s existed for the last year as his and realizing that by tonight, it won’t just be his anymore.
It’ll be ours.
