The question is casual, but her eyes are serious, searching.
I nod. “I’m good, but I’m ready to get out of here.”
Despite our height difference, Kennedy fits against me perfectly. My chest to her back, my arm heavy across her waist, hand spayed over her stomach so I can feel each breath she takes. The room’s dark except for a slice of pale orange light from somewhere outside that cuts across my bedroom ceiling.
“You’re being quiet,” I murmur, my voice rough in the quiet.
She’s barely said a word since we got here. Not when I made dinner, not when we watched TV, and not now, lying in bed, spooning under the covers.
She doesn’t answer right away, her fingers curling into the comforter. “I’m trying not to bother you.”
It takes me a beat to realize she’s serious, and when I do, a chuckle rolls through my chest. “Kennedy, sweetheart, never once has a concern that you’re bothering me stopped you from actually bothering me.”
“I’m okay with silence, Cameron. I don’t need to fill every moment with conversation.”
“You certainly did at the Copper Lantern,” I point out. “Any time it was quiet, you asked a random question.”
“They weren’t random. I was genuinely curious,” she argues. “And I was filling the silence because I was trying to distract you.”
I tighten my arm around her waist, pulling her in tighter, the curve of her spine aligning with my chest. “From what?”
“Plotting my demise,” she says with complete seriousness.
I press my face into her hair as I laugh. It smells like her shampoo, a clean, simple scent that could never be replicated. I’ve used the same stuff in her shower, but it never smells likethis on me. Like fresh flowers mixed with the first snow of winter.
“I never disliked you.” A sigh escapes me. “I just didn’t want to like you, and I knew I would if I spent time with you. Big difference.”
“Hmm.”
“You’ve never asked about my tattoos again,” I comment.
I know she wants to. I catch her studying them, but she never does, always choosing to trace or lick over them instead.
“You get this look on your face,” she admits with a small shrug against me. “I figured if you wanted to tell me about them, you would. I’m nosy, but I can respect boundaries.”
I huff. Most people would consider searching through someone’s toiletry bag and suitcase an invasion of privacy and boundary-crossing, but not my girl.
“They’re my mom’s designs.” I find the soft skin just above her hip, tracing small circles with my thumb.
“She was talented,” she hums, voice quiet like she’s trying not to spook me.
We lie in silence, but it’s not awkward or uncomfortable. In fact, it’s peaceful and quiet in a way that feels easy.
“When I was a kid, I didn’t like typical bedtime stories,” I say after several minutes. “My mom had this notebook she always doodled in to keep her hands busy, and every night before bed, she’d let me pick one, and we’d come up with a story for it ourselves. Now they’re my tattoos.”
Kennedy shifts slightly and covers my hand with hers, threading our fingers together against her stomach. Without prompting, I take her on a tour of my tattoos, sharing the stories my mom would craft, breathing life and memories into static marks on paper. The sailboat, made by a young boy out of comic books. He sailed it down the street after a rainstorm and found himself in an alternate universe with his favorite superheroes.The compass, where a lonely old man went on to discover the lost City of Atlantis.
Kennedy’s breathing has gone soft and steady, measured and careful, like she’s worried that even the sound of air leaving her lungs might disturb me. I can’t see her face, but I feel her smiling at the stories. It’s in the way she shifts slightly and the quiet huff of air through her nose here and there that she finally gets brave enough to let out, almost like a laugh. She listens intently, making room for all of it: the good memories and the grief tangled up with them.
“The tulip was my first tattoo.” I pause, my chest tightening. “It’s how she told me she was sick. She said tulips come back every spring no matter what, even when you think they’re gone.”
She doesn’t speak right away, as if she’s giving me space to continue if that’s what I want. When I don’t, she eventually brings our joined hands up to her chest, holding them there over her heart. “Thank you for telling me.”
Somehow, in the dark, with her pressed against me like this, the grief doesn’t feel quite so heavy. I want to respond, but I can’t, so I simply release her hands and tilt her head back so I can kiss her. I pour all the words I can’t verbalize into it—my longing, my relief, my fear, my anxiety, my grief.
The taste of her is familiar and perfect. I can’t imagine not having it on my tongue nearly every day. I tip her chin back, deepening the kiss, each stroke full and deliberate.
She moans into my mouth, and I swallow the sound, greedy for the way it vibrates against my lips.
