32. Roman
Chapter 32
Roman
“Asshole!” Ravyn screams across the pool, pointing at Beck, who’s standing on the deck.
“Woah, what did I do?” he asks, frowning. She rolls her eyes, pointing a finger at the towel wrapped around his waist.
“That’s always my towel,” she says, folding her arms aggressively across her chest.
An entire week of everyone knowing about us. A full eight days of hanging out all together as one group. It’s been amazing. Better than I imagined it could be. In the evenings, when we’re all off work, we’ve been meeting at my house. Me, Audra, Beck, Ares, and Ravyn. We’ve never really hung out all as a group until this. Before now, it was always me and my friends and then Ares and his.
His friends have always been a lot more consistent than mine, except for Beck. He’s always been consistent and for that I’m beyond grateful.
“If I knew it was always your towel, I wouldn’t have taken it,” Beck says, unwrapping it from his waist and setting it on the lounge chair with her belongings on it.
“Be nice,” Audra says, nudging Ravyn’s arm. Ravyn huffs.
“I can’t believe we added two more men to the group. This is like a nightmare. I’ve genuinely had nightmares more pleasant than this.” Audra laughs.
“You’ll be okay. They don’t bite,” she says, rubbing a supportive hand on Ravyn’s arm. I sit at the edge of the pool, dropping my feet in the water.
“Auds,” I call out. A grin creeps up on her sun-kissed cheeks, and she wades through the water to come stand in front of me. She looks up at me, and her already green eyes shimmer with the water reflecting into them and my heart skips a beat.
“Are you getting in?” she asks, sliding her hands across the surface of the water as if to show me how lovely the water is.
“I can. I just wanted to see you,” I admit. She reaches for my hand and yanks me into the water with her. I pop my head back out of the water and shake my hair dry.
“Yeah, I want you to get in,” she says, wearing the cheekiest smile.
“Mmm,” I hum out, leaning in to kiss her. She wraps one lazy arm around the back of my neck and kisses me back.
“Woooo!” Beck cheers, standing above us on the deck. She laughs against my lips, and it might be my favorite feeling in the world. A mix of kissing her and hearing her laugh at the same time.
“Get a room!” Ares calls out from the opposite end of the pool, laughing.
“I’d love to,” I add, winking at Audra.
“Gross,” Ares and Ravyn say in unison. Audra and I just laugh again.
* * *
“Where are you taking me?” I ask, following behind her like a dog on a leash as she drags me by my hand down the street.
“Away from all of our nosey friends so I can talk to you,” she says, looking back at me with a cheek-splitting smile. Her hand is tightly knit with mine as she pulls me along. We pass people by as we make our way down the road. Teenagers on penny boards and parents lugging their kids down to the beach in wagons. Still, my attention is all on the pretty girl walking me down the road.
We’re a few doors down from my house, and she finally stops and turns to me, dropping my hand.
“You’re not breaking up with me, are you?” I ask, jokingly. Mostly anyways. I can’t lie, though, the serious talk always feels a little like you’re about to be broken up with.
“What?” She barks out a laugh, confusion plastered on her pretty face. “No. Why would I be breaking up with you?”
“I don’t know. Serious talks just always feel that way. I was mostly kidding.” She squints at me.
“Well, no, that’s not what I wanted to talk to you about.” She pauses, taking a moment to pick her next words. “The opposite, really,” she adds. Now I’m fucking listening. Not that I wasn’t before. For most of my life, if Audra Hart was speaking, I was paying attention. My heart jogs to a new, faster pace.
“Opposite of breaking up?” I ask. I flip through a million possibilities in my head. All equally great and exciting as long as they’re with her. My pulse thuds faster and faster until it’s burning in my chest.
“Yeah,” she says, looking down and picking at the already chipped black nail polish on her hands. She’s nervous. I reach for her hand, squeezing it three times with my own. She takes one thick swallow before looking back up at me.
“No pressure, Auds. It’s just you and me,” I say just above a whisper. She nods.
“I’m ready to look at places for us to live together,” she says quickly, like she’s worried if she doesn’t get the words out, she might never say them. My entire body buzzes with excitement. I could cry I’m so happy. Somehow, I find it within myself to bite that feeling back long enough to check in with her, though.
“You don’t have to if you’re not ready, baby. When we get a place together, I want it to be because we’re both ready. Not because I’m ready, and you want to make me happy.” She shakes her head, her smile slowly growing.
“No. I’m sure. There’s nothing I’m more sure of than you. Every hesitation I’ve had the whole time has been what I thought other people might think of us for going too fast. I don’t care anymore what they think. A wise man once said to be selfish and make this about us. That’s what I’m doing.” I can’t bite back the smile anymore—or the tears. I know I look like a freak, smiling like an idiot, and tears streaming down my cheeks.
I don’t know what feels better. Audra finally putting what she wants first or knowing she’s as all in on this as I am. It feels like my heart is in my throat.
“I know I’ve said it before, but I’m so damn proud of you, baby,” I say, pulling her into my chest and planting a kiss on her forehead. “Every day for these past few months, you’ve picked yourself up off the ground and brushed yourself off. You had to relearn love, trust, friendship, and even yourself. You never backed down, though. On good days, you stood tall and did it with no problem. On bad days, though, you did it with tears in your eyes, but, Auds, you did it. You just keep doing it,” I say, tears still flowing. I’m not even fighting it anymore. I’ll gladly look like an idiot crying on the sidewalk of a main road if it means telling her what I know she needs to hear.
“I don’t think I had to relearn love. I don’t think I ever knew it before. I knew control, anger, obsession, maybe codependency. Never love, never this,” she says, tipping her chin up to look at me. Her eyes glassy, but a smile still sitting peacefully at each corner of her mouth. My fucking heart.
“I love you,” I mumble against her lips before kissing her. She pulls away from the kiss.
“I love you,” she says. We stay there in our own little bubble for just a couple of minutes before the reality that we’re just standing along the road I live on in front of strangers sets in.
“We should go back to the house,” I suggest. She nods.
“I think we should tell Ares as soon as we get back,” she adds. A glimmer of pride settles in my chest. She’s really come out the other side of everything. The strongest woman I know.
“We can do that.”
The walk back to my house feels like a movie scene. I feel like I might have floated the whole way there. I might have whistled and attracted birds like a fucking Disney princess.
As soon as we walk back into the gate of the pool deck, all eyes pop over to us. Of course, I’m sure everyone thinks we snuck off to go fuck somewhere. This is way better.
“Well, well, well, look what the cat dragged in,” Beck says, jumping his eyebrows up and down. I roll my eyes.
“Don’t be a dick,” I grumble, knocking shoulders with him on purpose as I pass him by. Audra walks over to Ares, who is laid out on a lounge chair, and I follow behind her.
“Can we talk?” she asks, standing over him. He holds a hand up to block the sun out of his eyes and squinting at us.
“Yeah. What’s up?” he asks casually.
“Like somewhere else,” she adds. He looks at me, and I just give him a nod.
“Oh, okay. Sure,” he says, pushing himself up off the chair. The three of us walk out of the gate and under the house to the picnic table that Audra and I had sat at on the Fourth of July. Ares takes a seat on one side, and we sit directly across from him.
“What’s going on?” Ares asks, looking back and forth between the two of us.
“Well, there’s something going on, but we wanted to tell you first,” Audra leads. Ares’ face drains of all its color.
“Oh shit. You’re pregnant,” he says like it’s a fact. Most of all, he says it like it’s a horrifying fact. And holy fuck would it be.
“What?” Audra chokes out. “No! Absolutely not.” She shakes her head quickly. He lets out a loud breath of relief.
“Thank fuck,” Ares says, relaxing his shoulders.
“We’re going to start looking for places together. Like to live together.” Ares gives a slight squint, so slight I’m hoping she didn’t notice.
“Haven’t you been—” I cut him off.
“I’ve been looking at places for me. I’ve been ready to move out for a while,” I add, hoping he’ll read the fine print here. The ‘don’t tell Audra I’ve already been looking at places’ print. But he’s Ares, so he doesn’t.
“But you were—” I cut him off again, kicking him under the table.
“I was looking for me. Now we’re looking together, and it was important to Audra to tell you first,” I say, shooting him daggers. He nods and smiles like a fucking idiot. Way to make it obvious.
“Do you think you’ll stay in Doves Harbor?” he asks her, changing the subject. Pain in my ass, little brother.
“I hope so. That’s always been what I wanted, but I wouldn’t mind being just outside of Doves Harbor,” she says with a shrug.
“Are you going to tell Ravyn? What about Beck? Or mom?” he asks.
“Yeah. We’re not keeping it a secret. We just wanted you to know first. Kinda owed you one,” she says, reaching across the table and giving him a boop on the nose.
“Let’s go then. I can’t wait for Ravyn’s reaction to finding out you’ll be living with a man. She’s going to hate this,” Ares says, laughing. So we all stand up and make our way back to the pool deck. Ravyn is leaning over the wooden railing, looking out at the ocean, and Beck is sitting in a lounger right next to her, looking scared like she might bite his head off if he speaks. I can’t say I blame him.
“Hey, we wanted to talk to you guys about something,” Audra says, standing by Ravyn and Beck.
“Oh God. Are you pregnant?” Ravyn asks. Audra throws two hands up in the air.
“No. What the hell? Why do you all think this is a pregnancy announcement?” she huffs.
“It’s really the way you led the conversation,” Ares says.
“Yeah. That was what did it for me,” Ravyn agrees.
“Yeah, it’s really the delivery,” Beck chimes in. Audra shifts her weight to one leg, throwing her hands to her hips.
“Okay,” she snaps. “I am not pregnant. We just have news… We’re going to start looking at places together,” she explains. Ravyn looks over to Ares, and he gives a discreet shake of the head. This asshole told Ravyn I’ve been looking. Can’t tell your own little brother anything.
At least she can read a room better than my brother because she doesn’t mention it at all.
“Are you thinking of a house or an apartment? Or even a condo?” Beck asks.
“We haven’t really had a chance to think about it yet,” she replies. It isn’t true, though, not for me. I’ve been thinking about this. I mean, on some level, this has always been the dream, so I’ve been thinking about it in that way for years. In a real way, though, I’ve been looking for a couple of months.
“I’d be open to a condo. I don’t know, though I love the idea of our own space.” She shrugs.
“Your own space? As if you’d be able to get rid of any of us. We’re worse than bedbugs,” Ares says with a laugh. Ravyn doubles over, laughing at the joke.
“We’re like bedbugs that eat all your food and talk really loud,” Ravyn adds. When she mentions talking really loud, she looks right at Ares.
“I think the bedbugs might smoke weed in your house,” Beck says, pointing to Ares and Ravyn.
“Well, at least these bed bugs won’t bring strange women to the house,” Ares says, pointing at Beck. He pulls a hand to his chest, doing a dramatic clutch of his heart.
“Speak for yourself,” Ravyn butts in.
“Can we stop talking about our house having bed bugs before we even have one?” Audra shivers as she says it.