She puts her cheek back down. “I thought maybe I’d broken something by not doing it. By letting it go dark. But it was just waiting.”
I put my hand on the back of her head. “It was waiting.”
She’s quiet for a moment. I can feel the steady thrum of her heart against my ribs.
I look at the ceiling while she draws something with her finger on my chest.
“Griff?”
“Yeah?”
“When we get back,” she says. “What does this look like?”
I’m quiet for a moment. I think about the miles we’ve covered and the miles left to go.
“I don’t know exactly,” I answer. “But I know what I want it to look like.”
She lifts her head again, chin resting on my chest. Her eyes are dark in the low light, steady and looking for something honest.
“I want you,” I tell her. “I’m not interested in being subtle about that anymore. I’m not waiting for the right time, because I’ve been waiting since before I even knew I was.” I hold her gaze. “What I want is for you to go home and deal with what needs dealing with. Take whatever time you need. Know that I’m not going anywhere, and then I want you to come find me.”
She looks at me for a long minute. “Okay. I’ll come find you.”
I put my hand back in her hair.
We lie there in the quiet, on the last night before the road changes direction. I think about a keychain that’s been hanging on my keys since she gave it to me. I think about a bridge in the city and how the wordhomefinally starts to mean something again.
It’s time to be honest with myself.
Home means Piper. I’ve never felt more at home than I have in the last two weeks, and that means something.
She’s asleep before I am.
I stay awake a while longer, just listening to her breathe.
Forty-Five
My phone goes off at seven forty-three.
I hear the vibration against the nightstand before I’m fully awake. My first thought is to throw it out the window. My second is the awareness of exactly where I am and who is asleep against me. That thought is better.
Piper’s skin is soft and warm against mine. Her hair is across my arm. I look at the ceiling. The real world is still there, and apparently, it starts at seven forty-three.
The phone buzzes again, so I reach over carefully and turn the screen toward me.
Noah.
I close my eyes. My best friend for twenty-two years. The person I should have called more over the last two weeks. He’s been patient, sending exactly three texts: “You good?”and “Still alive?”and “Piper okay?”I replied“Yes” to all of them and received nothing back because Noah doesn’t push. He waits until you’re ready. It’s one of his best qualities, even if it’s an inconvenient quality this morning.
I look at Piper. She’s still out. It’s the deep, boneless sleep of someone who played a fiddle set in a festival bar and then spent the rest of the night with me.
I pick up the phone and stare at it. I’m in bed with his little sister. I’ve been with her for the better part of two weeks. I’m going to have to deal with that. Soon, I’ll have to look my best friend in the face and have that conversation.
Fuck.
I press a kiss to Piper’s forehead, light enough not to wake her, and slide out from under her before I take the phone to the window.
“Noah—”
