Chapter Ten #2
“Oh well.”
“Chuck!”
“I’ll be fine. I’m not worried at all. This is how I felt before the first time I played in the Super Bowl.”
“Jesus.” Rafe sighs deeply. I can picture him pressing his fingers into his eyes, unable to put up with another second of my stupidity. “I cannot tell the world a Super Bowl winner died in a hurricane.”
“You won’t. I’ll call you once the worst of it has passed. Bye, Rafe.”
“Do you have hot sauce?” Tucker calls out from the kitchen, breaking me out of my brief reverie.
Suddenly, I’m very concerned about what he’s getting up to in there.
Tucker’s head is buried in the fridge. When he returned home, he must’ve showered quickly because now he’s wearing black sweatpants and a faded black-and-red hoodie. Oh, I recognize that design.
“Is that a Nolan hoodie?”
Tucker dips around the open door. “Huh?”
I point at his hoodie, barely resisting reaching out to touch. “Is that a Nolan Hastings hoodie?”
“Oh yeah, from the tour I worked on. I have a few spare ones if you want one?”
Tucker goes back to digging through my fridge as if he didn’t just offer me the sweetest thing on earth. The man truly has no idea what he does to me.
“I’ll take one if you have one to spare… in my size, that is.”
Tucker turns around, eggs under his arm, hot sauce in the other, and with a very adorable quirk of his lips. He has some blond scruff today, which kind of works way more than it should. I wonder how it would feel against my cheek as he kissed me.
“I was going to cook,” I say in confusion as Tucker prepares to scramble some eggs.
Tucker points at the thawing pork chops on the counter. “I don’t eat pork.”
Oh. “Can you give me a list of what you can’t eat?”
Tucker sucks on his teeth as he thinks about it. “Gluten and pork, that’s it.”
“Why no pork?”
“When I was little, we had a field trip to this place that showed how people lived in the 1800s or whatever, and they had a petting zoo. The pigs were so smart, and I asked the farmer dude about it, and he told me that pigs are some of the most intelligent creatures on earth. I couldn’t eat them ever again. ”
“So you don’t eat bacon?”
Tucker rolls his eyes as he scrambles the eggs, adding some shredded cheese to them. “You sound like Pop. No, I don’t eat bacon, and I feel just fine missing out on it.”
“Well, I’ll eat your bacon.”
Tucker chuckles and winks at me. “Okay. Want some scrambled eggs?”
“I’m good.”
“More for me.”
Tucker plates his eggs, then takes a seat at the table as if he lives here.
I join him at the table, close enough that I can smell the fresh clean scent of him.
He smells tropical, like coconut and fragrant jasmine.
I liked the smell of him earlier too, with a thin layer of sweat.
I also liked the twinkle in his eyes as we prepared the outside.
He eats in silence, and when he finishes, I take his plate to the sink, handwashing it before putting it in the dishwasher.
When I turn around, Tucker’s standing behind me, hands on his hips.
“You got a spare bedroom for me in this huge fucking place or will I be on the couch?”
You can sleep in my bed.
Nope. I won’t say it.
“There’s a guest room.”
Tucker stares at me until I jump into movement, leading him down the hall, past my own bedroom, to the guest room a few doors down.
It’s a pretty bland room, with dark blue walls, a mahogany bed frame, and a gold-accented mirror in the corner.
Tucker tosses his bag on the bed, then reaches back to scratch his shoulder.
The move is so human, so flawed, that it floors me for a moment that he’s in my house, and he’s going to sleep under my roof tonight as a hurricane moves over us.
“We should try to get some sleep before the hurricane hits. Probably going to get the worst of the weather overnight, and if we’re lucky, we’ll sleep right through it.”
“Right,” I say, because all other words have fled my consciousness.
Tucker stares at me until I back out of the room.
Cupcake doesn’t follow though; she stays behind and climbs onto Tucker’s bed like that’s where she always sleeps.
Which it isn’t. She has a very expensive and nice custom dog bed in my bedroom.
She rests her head on her extended legs, licks her lips, then closes her eyes.
“Oh, is this okay?” Tucker asks curiously, mouth slightly curled up at the corner in the hint of a smirk.
“Yes, she can stay with you.”
“Yay! Sleepover,” Tucker says with what seems like heartfelt sincerity. Cupcake’s tail beats happily against the bed, and my heart does that scary dip and dive again. It’s too soon, I tell my heart, but it’s never been good at listening, and I’m not sure I want it to listen this time.
“Yes,” I say before promptly fleeing the room. I close my own bedroom door behind me, lean against it, and take deep breaths.
Bedroom routine done, I throw myself onto the bed.
I wonder what he’s doing in his room. Maybe he’s asleep already with Cupcake curled against him like the oversized blanket she can sometimes be.
Maybe his fingers are wrapped in her plush fur, and maybe he’s wondering if I’m up thinking about him too.
I roll onto my side and imagine him beside me, a crooked smile on his lips.
His smile would be half tease and half disbelieving that I could look at him the way I do.
It takes a long time to fall asleep because I can’t stop thinking about Tucker’s eyes, his easy smile, and the too easy way he fits just perfectly into my life.
A loud bang has me gasping and sitting up in bed. A moment later, my door opens to reveal Tucker with his cell phone flashlight on, eyebrows pinched with worry.
“I think that was a fuse blowing outside,” Tucker whispers without an ounce of sleep coloring his deep voice.
“The generator will turn on, then.”
Tucker stares at me as if he doesn’t believe me, but, sure enough, a moment later the night-light in the corner of my room turns on. He smiles shyly.
“Well, we’re awake now.”
“What time is it?” I rub a tired hand over my face, not feeling like I got any sleep at all.
“Two in the morning,” Tucker answers from the doorway. Cupcake peeks her head through, then pushes in to join me in my bed.
“Blargh.”
“Oh, you’re that type of person.”
“Urgh.”
Tucker laughs, and the sound does something to me that I can’t explain. I cover my head with the blanket, eyes closed tight, wanting to sleep for another few years.
“Get in here,” I say gruffly.
I expect Tucker to argue, give me some reason why he can’t, but all that greets me is blessed silence until the gentle dip of the bed.
Tucker gets under the covers, his face only a foot or so from mine under the shroud of darkness.
Cupcake whines at the end of the bed, and we both fight smiles as we stare at one another in the dark.
“I’m wide awake now,” Tucker admits quietly, voice barely a whisper.
“If you keep talking, I’m gonna be wide awake too.
” I close my eyes, letting sleep slowly tug me down.
I don’t know if it’s instinct or the start of a habit, but I reach out and rest my hand over his hip.
My fingers land on the material of his sweatpants, but my thumb falls against the warmth of his skin.
I feel it in my body, in my heart, and the urge to pull him close almost makes me dizzy.
I don’t think my heart has ever beat so fast in my life just at the proximity of another person.
I’ve had my fair share of one-night stands, even some brief relationships, but no one’s nearness has ever had this effect on me before.
I want to know him, and be known by him, both equally dangerous and frightening.
“Go back to sleep, Tucker,” I whisper into the darkness.
“I can’t.”
I grunt and rub my thumb against his warm skin. “Why?”
“’Cause I’m too busy looking at you.”
My eyes snap open to find him in the darkness. Suddenly, the heat under the blankets is too much. The air is warm and humid, his breath minty when it fans across my face. Maybe I’m dreaming.
“I’m awake now.”
Tucker laughs but doesn’t come any closer, but he also doesn’t push my hand away, just lets it rest there. I gather all the courage in my body and move my hand up, letting it rest across the expanse of his ribs. He takes a deep breath, and I feel that too. I feel it in my own lungs.
“When I was a kid, we’d have dance parties during hurricanes so I’d be less afraid.”
“Wanna have a dance party?”
“Sure,” Tucker says softly, scooting slightly closer. “I’m not afraid of the storm though.”
“What are you afraid of?”
“You.”
I close my eyes and hum, moving my hand back and forth over his ribs in what I hope is a very comforting manner. It’s only been a relatively short period of time since we first met on the beach. Every sunrise seems a promise now, every sunrise a reminder of that initial meeting.
“You don’t have to be afraid of me.”
“I know. You’re so perfect, guys like you don’t exist.”
“I’m here under the covers with you as a hurricane rages outside. I think nice guys like me exist, Tuck.”
“Say it again,” Tucker begs, suddenly closer than he was before.
“Tuck?”
“I like it.” Tucker presses his hand against my neck, fingers cold and trembling. I hold my breath as he comes closer, my eyes opening to find him close enough to kiss without leaning that much more forward. “Charlie.”
Just as I think he’s about to lean in and kiss me, a loud bang echoes through the house again, this time very much not a fuse, but something hard and unrelenting.
Cupcake barks and takes off at the speed of light.
We both separate, and I feel the absence of Tucker like a physical weight in my rib cage.