Isaac sat there at the breakfast bar with an empty plate as he slurped on a Capri-Sun.
“I need to talk to you,” I told him. “And I need to say this before I lose my gumption, so please just sit and look all broody and cute, okay?”
His crystal blue eyes sparkled with interest. “Whatever you say, Sunny Palmer.”
Here went nothing. “No more dates,” I said.
He sighed and his shoulders melted like every stress had just fallen away. “Perfect. That’s all I’ve wanted, sunshine.” He started to reach for me.
I took a quick step back. If he touched me, I wouldn’t be able to think. “That’s not all,” I said, something clenching my sternum. “This is so hard to do without them here and I didn’t think it would be.”
“Without who?” His voice was full of concern.
“My parents. I... I left home at eighteen, and for the first time I didn’t see reminders of them at every turn, and it was such a goddamn relief. So I started moving, never standing still or in one place for too long. Living with Bee for a few years was honestly the closest I’ve ever come to settling down. But I never wanted to buy a house—like I could in LA on a makeup-artist, adult-film-mistress-of-all-trades budget. But I couldn’t stomach the thought of finding my own place to call home or even settle into one specific career. Or even find my person, because all ofthose milestones felt too huge to do without my parents or even Charlie around.”
Isaac’s full mouth pulled to the side—rueful, sad, empathetic. He nodded at me. Of course he knew exactly what I meant.
“If I had a housewarming party, or celebrated a career win, or God, got married, and none of them were there, that would mean that I really did have to move on. Not only would my parents be missing all the moments I had always imagined them in, but Charlie would be too.”
“Okay,” Isaac said. “I hear you, Sunny.”
He didn’t say it, but I could see him trying to find my point and my brain was basically doing wobbly pirouettes right now. And I wanted to say how scared I was not just to start things without my parents, but how terrified I was of the inescapable tragedy of things ending. But right now an ending felt so far away, like it didn’t matter, like it might not happen at all.
Come on, Sunny. Bring it home.
“What I’m saying is, I was scared, Isaac. I am scared. I’m fucking terrified, because I want to be the person you go to when you’re happy or sad or creatively stuck or hungry for eggs at two in the morning. And I want you to be that person for me too.”
He stood, grinning from ear to ear in a way I didn’t even think that Isaac’s face was anatomically capable of. The vein in his arm twitched like he was itching to just touch me for God’s sake.
But I had to say it out loud. I had to leave every last fucking thing on the table. “I love you. I love you so much, Isaac Kelly, that it aches. I love you big.” They were the words Ruth had said to me growing up, the ones tattooed on my rib cage.
His smile faltered, and when it returned, it wasn’t that genuine, uncontainable grin he’d worn just a moment ago. “Oh.”
“Oh,” I repeated.Ohwas something that could be great or could be terrible, and I wasn’t sure where we were going with this.
“Sunny,” he said carefully. His eyebrows were now pulled together in an expression of pure concern and feeling. “You mean so much to me. You have to know that. And I want to be with you too, if that hasn’t been glaringly obvious.”
I felt myself nodding. I wanted to just download everything in his brain to mine so we could be done with the talking and make out. The making-out part was so much easier than the talking part.
“But Sunny, you know all about me and Brooklyn.” He drew in a breath. “Love... I can’t give you that. What I had before—it was a once-in-a-lifetime thing, I think. I don’t know.”
Something in my body language must have made him think I was a flight risk, because he rushed forward and cradled me in his arms.
“That doesn’t mean we can’t have something all our own though,” he said quickly, his lips near my ear. “We can make our own rules. The first one being that this is your home. You live here. And you can keep your room if you want or we can share one. Everything can stay just the way it is.”
“So you want to be fuck buddies?” I asked into his shoulder, my chest heavy not just with disappointment but anger too.
“I love fucking you, of course, but I don’t want to be the fuck buddy who has to date other people anymore. And I never want you to leave. You’ve become my best friend, and when I’m with you, I’m the happiest I’ve been in... in so long.”
I didn’t move to hug him back. I stood with my arms dangling at my sides, my stomach somewhere several stories below my feet, feeling stupider than I’d ever felt.
“That is what I can give you,” he explained, like he was being perfectly reasonable. “I don’t want this to end, sunshine, and I know you don’t want it to end either. So let’s do this for real. Permanent roommates with bennies. What do you say?”
I had done the brave thing. I had been vulnerable and I’d said the hard words and now I was being punished for it.
But I was not letting this go without a fight.
“Isaac Kelly, your offer is bullshit.”
