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“‘—slowly—’”
“I hate you—”
“—one careful revelation at a time.”
I keep going until he’s laughing so hard he can’t breathe. I grin down at him. He punches me weakly in the ribs. I pick another book and open it to a chapter I’d marked earlier. His shoulders shake against my chest.
When I deepen my voice during a particularly heated moment in the story, he takes the book out of my hands and threatens to burn it. He gives up after that and leans his head against my shoulder and closes his eyes.
I keep talking, softer now, until his breathing evens out.
The candles are still burning on the table.
I don’t want to move to blow them out. So I don’t.
At some point, I fall asleep too.
I wake at three a.m. The candles have burned themselves out. The apartment is dark except for a streetlight leaking through the curtains, and Finn is tucked against my chest, one hand curled loosely in the fabric of my sweater. His breathing is slow and deep.
I look down at him.
His hair is falling across his forehead and his mouth is slightly open. He looks younger than he is, and the weird pressure in my chest that I felt before I left California returns, but this time, it’s different.
Maybe Nina is right, I think. Maybe I do love him.
I close my eyes, press my face into Griffin’s hair, and feel the quiet weight of him against me.
I don’t move him. I don’t wake him. I don’t go anywhere.
I stay still until morning, awake in the dark, with a thought I can’t unthink pressing against the inside of my ribs.
CHAPTER SEVEN
FINN
I’m reading the same email for the fourth time when my phone buzzes.
I’ve never had a problem focusing at work. Quite the opposite. Often Emmett has to drag me out of my desk and send me on a coffee quest with the excuse that it’s not healthy to sit down for so long. I need to move regularly, or I’ll die young, or something like that.
The problem is that every time I try to make my eyes track from one line to the next, my brain drifts sideways and I end up thinking about the way Fox looked when I left my apartment this morning: shirtless in the kitchen, drinking coffee, half-asleep, with his hair sticking up on one side.
I’ve been at my desk for forty minutes, and I have accomplished nothing.
My phone buzzes again.
I grab it before I can pretend I’m not desperate for a distraction.
Fox:
This mug is defective.
Attached is a photo of my favorite mug. The one with the chip in the handle. He’s holding it up to the light like he’s inspecting evidence.
Finn:
That mug has served me faithfully for six years.
Fox:
