36. Mess – Riggins
Her car in the drive signals her coming home, but so does Gracie’s head popping up, ears perking.
Staring at her, I decide Gracie needs a sister. Stella missed most of her puppy years, and I know that has to hurt. My mind runs through options, such as what kind we should get if she should come with me to get it, or if it should be a surprise again. The last time was me being a manipulative shit, me trying to make up for mistakes without doing a damn thing to actually change.
Would it be a red flag to her if I bought another and surprised her with it? Would it bring up bad memories, remind her once again of what a fuck up I was? I am?
I shake my head at the thoughts, instead picking up the glass of orange juice I poured and taking a sip.
She hates orange juice, always has, but she’s been stocking it for me. Whether she’s doing it consciously or not, it’s another sign she’s slowly accepting that we are on our way to being something now.
“What are you doing here?” she asks as she walks into the kitchen, where I’m leaning against the countertops that need replacing. The entire kitchen is a country style that doesn’t fit my girl one bit, but we’ll get to it once we make the upstairs livable.
I set down the glass I’m pretty sure she bought at the thrift store in town. None of her plates, cups, or utensils are the same, yet they all match in a strange way, a skill she had even when we were living together, when we were living off the dregs of my minimal advance and then royalties that took forever to start trickling in.
She’d go into the thrift store in town and leave with an entire set of dishware. None matched, but they were all in the same color family or with the same decoration, so somehow, they worked together.
I reach an arm out as she moves to walk past me and stop her, tugging her close so her front is against mine, my body at ease now that the steady rhythm of her pulse is under my hand.
“Kiss,” I whisper, and her eyes go soft even though she fights it.
I used to do that every time she walked in the door, refusing to say a single word to her unless she gave me a kiss. Sometimes just to be a brat, she’d avoid me and give me the silent treatment back, not saying a word, the only clue that she wasn’t actually pissed at me being the way the corners of her lips would tip up.
Sometimes, it would go so far that I’d grab her, toss her onto our bed, and plant kisses everywhere but her lips until she was squirming and whining beneath me, finally reaching for my jaw and pressing a kiss to my lips.
Then, of course, I’d finish the job, but I’d do it whispering all of the sweet nothings and dirty promises I’d held at bay until then.
But it doesn’t have to go there this time, her chin tipping up, her arm moving behind my neck, pulling my face to hers and pressing a sweet, soft kiss to my lips.
It’s shit like this, the simpleness of a hello kiss and having her in my arms, of being here when she came back from running errands that I tend to miss most of all.
The casual, warm love of being with Stella.
“Hey,” she whispers against my lips with a dreamy look in her eye when the kiss breaks, and I know she feels it, too. The comfort of us, how easily we’ve already shifted back into it, into the way we always were and always were supposed to be.
There’s a fuck ton for us to work through before we can move forward, but for the first time since I found out what really happened in Las Vegas, I feel like there’s hope. A cloud has parted, letting the stars shine through in the dark night sky.
“Hey,” I whisper back, my lips brushing hers with the words. “How were your errands?” I asked as her head moves back a bit, so she can look at me.
“Fine. What are you doing here?” Her small hand reaches up and brushes my hair back. I have it in a small bun at the top of my head, but I’ve never mastered the ability to tie it up and get it all in the bun. Right now, I think I never want to learn. I want to always keep it this length just so she has to repeat that move over and over again.
“I was working on the floors upstairs, then I ran out to get stuff for dinner. I was gonna go back to working on the floors, but then I heard you pulling in.”
Her brows furrow. “You’re working on my floors?”
“Yeah, well, a bit. I ripped up the carpet. Got a guy coming early tomorrow to drop off a dumpster for all the shit. Some of the old floors underneath are salvageable, but most need removing and replacing.” She’s staring at me, her mouth open a bit, but I keep going, explaining my thought process. “Baseboards are shot, so I ripped those out, fixed anything that needed patching. Luckily, most of everything is in okay condition, just ugly. Eventually, we’ll need to replace the windows since they’re drafty and old, but they work for now. Next summer, most likely.”
I don’t add how I was thinking of having someone come next summer while we’re on tour to build an extension or maybe an additional house out on her land, a small recording studio for when the muse hits. If we’re going to be staying in Ashford forever, I need a way to record without having to go to the city regularly.
But even I, in my optimistic delusion, can see that would scare Stella off.
A long beat passes as she lets my words digest, and then finally, she asks, “Why?”
“What?”
“Why are you doing this?” A moment passes as I try to think of the honest way to answer, how to tell her what I’m thinking and feeling.
But I decide this is safe to admit.
“This was always your dream house, Stell. I told you when we were kids I’d fix it up for you. I haven’t always kept my word, but I’m trying to change that.” Her eyes glaze over, unshed tears shining, but she nods all the same like that’s the reasonable, acceptable answer, as if it’s not impacting her at all.
“Okay,” she says, continuing to nod, then putting her stuff down on the counter, moving her hands to her hair and pulling her hair into a ponytail at the top of head. For a moment I think about how funny we must look together, my bun and her ponytail, but it’s gone when she speaks again. “How can I help?”
“What?”
“We always said we’d do it together. What can I do? It was your dream, too, Riggs.”
And a part of me thinks this might be it, the small bit of acceptance and acknowledgment of the fact that we have a potential future together.
It’s fucking beautiful.
But it makes me want to do other things than work on fixing floorboards.
“You can help by getting your ass into your bed right now,” I say, dipping my mouth to her neck as I press my hips to hers. She giggles in a way that heals something in me.
“What?”
“And as much as I like you in my hoodie, take it off. The rest of it, too.”
“Riggins!” she says in a squeal as my hand snakes up her shirt, my lips sucking on the spot beneath her ear.
“Got a lot of dreams to make happen, but we’ve got even more time to make up for.”
“It’s…. boring,” she says, looking around the room we just finished to her exact specifications.
I laugh, the sound deep and echoing around the empty room. God, it feels good, laughing from my soul, the way I always did with her.
“Well, little star, it’s exactly how you wanted it.” And it is. Dark, thick hardwood planks for the floors, basic, clean baseboards, white walls, and gold hardware on the doors. Nothing special, nothing like Stella or what I would have picked for my bright, colorful girl, but it is what she picked out for herself. After a lifetime of someone else choosing things for her, deciding what she could and should wear or decorate or listen to, she needed the ability to choose for herself even if I knew it wasn’t her.
“It’s just so…” She walks out of arms reach to the center of the room, and I watch her as she walks in circles, looking around with a confused look. I lean in the doorway, crossing my ankles and my arms on my chest, watching her mull it over, trying to find the right words. “Boring. Plain.”
“Well, still, it is white walls,” I say with a smirk, and I have to fight it so as not to spread into a grin when she sends a glare in my direction.
God, I missed this so much.Missed Stella being herself around me and so unafraid to give me shit. I missed having her as a friend, but when she suggested being friends, I think I knew that would never be enough for me.
“I know, you ass. I just… I don’t know. It’s not me.”
“No, it’s not.” She keeps looking around, screwing up her face like she’s trying to decide what’s wrong, what’s missing. “What are you thinking, little star?”
“Color,” she says instantly, a distracted tone in her words. “Lots of it.”
“Then let’s go get some color,” I say, stepping out of the door frame and moving until she’s in front of me. I pull her into my arms. “Let’s go get some color, baby.”
Her body softens in my hands, her arms moving and draping around my shoulders, a small smile playing on her lips. I kiss her, pressing my lips to hers in a way that once felt expected, natural, normal.
I used to take her kisses for granted, take the way she felt in my arms for granted, because it was all I ever knew. She was all I ever knew, and I had never even thought about a life without her.
Then I lost her.
So, as I kiss her, I make sure to file this and every other kiss she gives me away.
I’m watching her race up and down the aisles of the home improvement store we’re in, a pep in her step I haven’t seen since she was a kid, long before the tour. It makes me wonder just how long it’s been like this, how I missed how much she’s been suffering even when she was mine, even before I fell into the depths of alcoholism.
“Look at this one!” she says with a smile, holding up a pink swatch. “It would be so cute with this one.” She lifts a bright yellow and then a deeper, darker green. “Flowers!”
“Flowers?”
“Along the baseboards. A little field of flowers. Like the ones that grow in the clearing in the spring and summer.” Stella smiles at me, adding moments of our life, our secrets and the bones of who we are into a room in her house.
“Whatever you want, Stell,” I say, crossing my arms over the handle of the orange cart filled with painting supplies as she grabs more swatches, excitement, and happiness on her face.
A few minutes pass, and I stay there, watching her, a peace I haven’t felt in too long running through me as she grabs colors and puts them together, occasionally shaking or nodding her head.
I missed Stella being Stella, not anxious to plan the future, not lost in the past. It’s something I know I’ll need to fight to keep, but for now, I’m happy to just live here, bask in the warmth of her happiness.
We’re waiting for the paint to be mixed and looking at brushes when familiar notes come through the speakers. I reach forward, grabbing her wrist, her head moving to look at me, a small curious smile on her lips.
“Do you hear it?” I ask, my chin tipping to the open ceiling of the home improvement store.
“Hear wh—” she starts but stops when the noise coming from the speakers hits her ears. One of those top 40 hits stations is on, and right now, our first big hit is playing. My hand moves, and I wrap an arm around her waist, tugging her close, slowly swaying our bodies to the love song we wrote together.
A song about laying under the stars, deciding we were it for each other even though we were young and stupid. A song about finding your person and knowing you’ll spend eternity with them.
We sway like that in the paint aisle for a few moments before she speaks.
“I missed you, Riggins,” she says, so low I almost don’t hear it.
“I promise I missed you more,” I tell her, moving to spin her out, watching a smile break over her face, a small giggle leave her lips. She spins back into my arms, and we start swaying again.
“Come on. Let’s go paint our house,” she says when the song ends, her palms framing my face before she presses a kiss to my lips.
I don’t correct her when she calls it our house.
I fully plan on making everything ours.