Epilogue – One year later
Theo
The collar of my shirt was too tight.
I desperately sucked in another breath, but it felt like nothing reached my lungs. No oxygen to fuel my body. Panic took hold of me as I clutched the hem of my sweater and pulled it off my neck.
The offending piece of fabric was gone, several inches away from my skin, but I still couldn’t fridging breathe.
Was it hot in here?
Was the thermostat broken?
Maybe that’s what was going on.
Wiping my forehead, I checked for sweat, but there was none.
One moment, everything was hot, and the next, I felt like someone had doused me in ice water, and I still couldn’t breathe right.
It took me two steps to reach the living room window, and about thirty seconds to get the dalmatian thing to open.
The air was so cold and frigid that I felt it all the way into my lungs.
Which meant it was actually reaching them.
Sucking in another big gulp of air, I traced its way into my body.
Oxygen. Wrapped in ice, but it was oxygen, and it was helping me breathe.
My phone buzzed on the kitchen counter, and I jerked violently, hitting my head on the open window.
Fridging fridge.
Maybe I was a tad bit nervous.
Okay, so maybe I was really, really nervous.
Today was a big day. The biggest.
I was gonna ask Luci if he wanted to move in with us. Officially. I was pretty sure he was technically already living with us, but it was going to be different. Official.
“Daddy, we’re here!” Hazel shouted just as the apartment door hit the wall with a loud bang.
I was incredibly lucky that my landlords were her grandparents.
The way she carelessly smashed doors into walls in excitement, I’d never see my security deposit again.
Not that I’d paid one. Oh, I’d tried to, but…
“Son, are you here?” I swallowed the lump in my throat. The air was gone from the room again, and my eyes burned. The endearment was a recent development, and I still wasn’t sure how to handle it.
“Living room,” I shouted back, but my voice was all hoarse and scratchy. I sounded like I was on the verge of tears, and, yeah, maybe that was more accurate than I wanted it to be.
I barely managed to turn around in time to catch Hazel, who came at me at full speed.
“We made the most incredible gift, Daddy. You’re gonna love it. And Luci is going to love it. He won’t be able to say no because if he says no, he can’t have the keychain. Meanies don’t get keychains, do they, Daddy?”
Blinking, I wrapped my arms around my daughter, my mind working hard on catching up with her words.
“No, sweetheart, meanies don’t get keychains,” I agreed, though maybe I shouldn’t.
Luci was no meanie, and making him decline our offer to move in wouldn’t make him one.
“I’m sure Luci is going to love the keychain you… made? Did I get that right?”
“Yes. Grandma, Grandpa, and me. We did a fun craft session. I’m gonna show you. We made five keychains, so now everyone gets to have one, and I decide who gets which one.”
“Okay, that’s great, sweetie.” She grinned up at me, her eyes filled with so much excitement and joy that something inside of me unwound.
There was no doubt in her eyes, none of the worries that filled me to the brim and kept bubbling over.
She was certain he was going to accept our proposal.
And she was probably right. No, she was right.
Luci would say yes because, again, while not official, he was basically already living with us.
His coat hung next to our front door, his shoes were standing right beside Hazel’s and mine, and his clothes lived in my closet.
Hell—ooo kitty, his artwork hung on the walls, his dresser had found its way into our hallway, and we had swapped our coffee table for his.
We had our bathrooms stocked with his fancy soaps, the ones Hazel had loved so much the first time we’d visited Luci at his apartment.
Still… there was a chance he was going to say no.
It was his right. Standing up for himself wouldn’t make him a meanie, even if it would break my heart.
“Can I show you?”
I nodded, and Hazel was off again, sprinting to the hallway and back, followed by Joseph and Linda.
They both looked a bit stunned as they took in our open-plan living room and kitchen, and I took a moment to see it through their eyes.
They hadn’t been here for a couple of weeks, and yeah… I guess things looked different.
“The kitchen towels are new,” Linda said with a smile, pointing at bright turquoise towels adorned with white ornaments.
Joseph let out a rumbling laugh. “The boy changes up half the apartment, and you notice the kitchen towels? What about the big dresser in the hallway? The pottery bowls for the keys?”
Linda shrugged, her eyes alit with mirth. “I like the towels.”
Hazel watched our conversation for a moment, obviously waiting for a chance to budge in, and now she had it.
“Luci’s friend made the towels,” she declared.
“Her name is… Sarah, and she’s an artist, too.
She has an online store, but we visited her last week.
All three of us, and we made tie… tie… what was it, Daddy? ”
“Tie-dye?”
“Yes.” She nodded. “We made tie-dye. It was sooo cool. I made a T-shirt, and it has all the colors of the rainbow. But Sarah is like, really, really good. I’m a beginner, but she said I did a great job. She can do all these patterns, and I can’t. But I can do other things. Like keychains, look!”
She held up an open box for me to look inside.
Five gleaming stainless-steel keychains lay in a tangled mess inside, so I carefully picked one out of the mix and held it up.
The keychain had a teardrop-shaped pendant on it that held an abstract art print that was a wild mix of colors under a protective glass.
My lips tilted into a smile as I looked at the colors and shapes I’d recognize everywhere.
“You turned Luci’s art into a keychain?” I asked, voice still scratchy.
Hazel nodded.
“When he had his exhibition in July, I might have taken a lot of the flyers,” Linda said with a sheepish smile. “I thought I’d use them to brag about Lucian to my friends, but I found an even better use.”
“We cut the pieces for the keychain out of it. Grandma said Luci won’t be mad that we destroyed the flyer.”
I snorted. Luci still had a couple boxes of those flyers in his apartment downstairs and no idea what he was going to do with them now that the exhibition was done.
But even if it was the last of those flyers on earth, he wouldn’t be mad because Hazel had made something for him, and he loved every single one of her gifts.
Hell—ooo kitty, he’d worn the necklace she’d braided for him out of scratchy wool for weeks until I’d told him to stop because it had rubbed his skin raw.
Yet he’d kept it in a box with all his other jewelry.
He was so gone for my daughter.
“He won’t be mad, Sweetie. He’ll love it. It’s beautiful, and such a thoughtful gift.”
Da—lmatian. I’d thought they’d go out and buy a keychain, not make one themselves.
Linda winked at me. “Hazel wanted to make it extra special.”
Joseph nodded. “It was really important to her. She wanted to make sure he’s going to say yes.”
Oh god.
I swallowed my nerves and carefully placed the keychain back in the box with the others, then took Hazel’s hand.
“Honey, I know you want Luci to move in with us,” I began.
She nodded. “I want us to be a real family.”
“I know.” And I wanted that, too, so much that even the thought of him declining was making it hard to breathe. “But even if Lucian says no, that does not mean he doesn’t want to be our family, you know? It doesn’t mean he doesn’t love us. It just means…”
“That he’s not ready yet, and that it’s okay because everyone has their own timeline,” Hazel finished my sentence and rolled her eyes. “I know. But I still want him to say yes. It would fucking suck if he said no.”
I didn’t comment on her choice of words. She was right, anyway. It would f—ridging suck if he said no. But we’d deal.
“Honey, which keychain is for Lucian?” Linda asked, successfully taking Hazel’s mind off the possibility of her beloved Luci not wanting to move in. My daughter turned around in an instant, shouted something about green and orange, and was off again, her grandma in tow.
Joseph cleared his throat as he stepped next to me.
“I have to admit, when Hazel first started talking about her elf and her Luci, I had my doubts. And when you told us you loved him a month later… well, let’s just say if I didn’t have gray hair before, I definitely would now.
But you chose a good one, Theo. He fits you—both of you.
I’ve never seen you this happy and… relaxed.
You’ve always been the serious one, and it fills me and Linda with joy to see you with someone who makes your burden feel lighter. ”
I was lost for words, but Joseph didn’t seem to mind. He patted my shoulder lightly and took a deep breath.
“Thank you for letting us tag along, son.”
I swallowed. “You’re family,” I said, blinking against the tears. “And I know Christmas is important to you guys.”
Joseph chuckled. “That it is. And let me tell you, if Josie were still here, she’d be the first in line to get in on your plan.”
I laughed. “She’d dress up as an elf just to be part of the surprise.”
“Ohh, you know it, son.”
“Look, he’s here!” Hazel shouted and took off without a second thought, running toward Luci as fast as possible, given how crowded the mall was.
For a moment, she disappeared from my sight as a man in a dark jacket stepped in my way, but a second later, I saw her again, embracing Luci like she hadn’t seen him for days instead of mere hours.