Chapter 37
Only If I Want To Is a Psychologically Dangerous Sentence
Calder texts me just after midnight. Not come over, not we need to talk. Just an address I already know by heart and:
"Only if you want to."
The simplicity of it sits heavily in my chest for almost ten full minutes before I answer. Then somehow I'm standing outside his apartment building with my pulse hammering so hard it feels visible beneath my skin.
The city is quieter this late. Rain earlier left the sidewalks shining beneath streetlights while traffic hums softly several blocks away.
I stare up at Calder's building and exhale slowly through my nose.
This matters. The understanding settles heavily and completely through me now.
Not because tonight determines whether we love each other, that part has honestly never been the question.
We survived the breakup still loving each other.
Survived distance. Anger. Fear. Watching each other rebuild separately.
Love stayed anyway. What changed is everything surrounding it.
I tighten my grip slightly around the sleeves of my coat.
This is no longer about chemistry or missing him or wanting him badly enough to ignore what hurt me.
It's about whether we can actually build something safe enough to live inside long term.
The thought terrifies me more than the breakup ever did.
I walk through the lobby slowly while nerves twist tightly beneath my ribs.
Every floor of the elevator drags old memories back through me, sleeping in Calder's bed after late practices, fighting with him in this exact building, laughing in his kitchen while he made protein pancakes badly enough to offend me personally.
My chest aches with all of it at once. By the time the elevator doors slide open onto Calder's floor, my hands are cold despite the warm hallway air.
For one dangerous second I almost turn around. It isn't distance I want.
Vulnerability at this level still feels emotionally catastrophic sometimes. The terrifying thing about Calder has never been that he could hurt me. It's that I would still walk toward him knowing he could. That realization follows me all the way to his apartment door.
I stop outside it and stare at the dark wood for a second longer than necessary. Then lift my hand and knock softly.
The door opens almost immediately.
And there he is.
Grey sweatpants, black T-shirt, hair still damp from a shower. Completely unguarded. The sight of him hits so hard my body physically sways toward him before I can stop it.
Calder's expression changes the second he sees me. Relief first. Then something softer. Deeper. No hesitation anywhere inside it.
"You came," he says quietly.
He sounds like he genuinely wasn't certain I would. Not manipulative. Not fishing for reassurance. Just honest.
"I did."
For one suspended second neither of us moves. The air between us feels full, history, love, fear, hope, everything still alive between us after all this time.
Calder steps back first and opens the door wider.
"Come in."
Simple. No emotional pressure attached to it. No urgency. No visible attempt to pull me emotionally closer before I'm ready. That matters.
I walk into the apartment slowly while warmth rolls across my skin from the heating vents.
The space looks exactly the same and completely different all at once.
My eyes catch automatically on familiar things, his skates near the entry bench, protein powder shoved badly into the pantry cabinet, the blanket I bought him still draped across the couch.
My chest tightens painfully. This place used to hold both the safest and most painful parts of us simultaneously.
Calder closes the door quietly behind me.
Then stops. Not crowding me. Not reaching.
Just giving me room to exist inside the moment fully.
The restraint feels almost unbearably intimate now because I understand what it costs him.
Calder has always loved physically. Instinctively.
With his entire body. Still he waits. Not because he wants distance.
Because now he understands I deserve the space to choose closeness freely instead of being emotionally swept into it before I'm ready.
Calder leans lightly against the kitchen counter across from me while quiet city light spills through the apartment windows behind him.
The apartment feels quieter than I remember.
Not empty, Calder still exists too loudly inside spaces for that.
His presence sits everywhere automatically, faint cedar and soap woven through the air, hockey tape abandoned near the counter, laundry folded badly across the armchair.
Calder moves around the kitchen quietly while giving me space to settle without hovering.
"Tea?" he asks.
The normalness of the question nearly undoes me.
"Please."
He nods once and reaches automatically for the kettle. No pressure to fill silence. No emotional intensity weaponized against me the second the door closed behind us. Just steadiness.
I lean lightly against the opposite side of the counter while the kettle begins heating softly between us.
He looks at me constantly. That part remains impossible to ignore. Not intensely in the old overwhelming way exactly. Just openly. Like he stopped trying to ration how much love is allowed to exist visibly between us at any given moment.
"You played well tonight," I say quietly.
A small surprised huff of laughter leaves him.
"Yeah?"
"Mm."
Calder watches me for another second before looking down briefly at the mug in his hands.
"I almost skated through the boards during warmups when you walked in."
Heat flashes through my chest.
"That was apparently a teamwide observation."
"Traitors."
I laugh softly. The sound settles warm between us.
I'm not waiting for the emotional shift anymore.
Not bracing for him to pull away once closeness deepens too far.
My nervous system still remembers the old Calder.
Still carries the scars of loving someone who instinctively managed vulnerability instead of staying inside it.
But standing here now, something else exists beside the fear.
Evidence.
Calder slides a mug carefully across the counter toward me once the tea finishes steeping.
Our fingers brush lightly in the exchange.
The contact sparks through my entire body.
Calder feels it too, I see it in the sharp flicker low in his expression, the tiny shift in his breathing.
Still he just lets the moment exist. No grabbing for it.
No emotional pulling. The restraint feels almost unbearably intimate because I understand what it costs him now.
"You don't have to decide anything tonight," Calder says quietly after a minute.
The words land directly in the center of my chest. I look up. He's watching me steadily from across the counter. Open. Vulnerable. Terrified somewhere underneath it too. Still calm. No hidden pressure inside the sentence. No please tell me we're okay. No I need to know where we stand. Just truth.
"You know that, right?" he says softly. "I'm not asking for some immediate answer because things are better now."
The ache that moves through me afterward feels almost unbearable.
This is the exact opposite of who he used to be when fear entered the room.
Old Calder treated uncertainty like an emergency.
Something requiring immediate emotional management before it consumed him entirely.
Now he just trusts me enough to let me choose freely.
Even while visibly wanting me. Even while hope and fear exist openly all over his face.
"I know," I say quietly.
And I do. That's the terrifying thing now. I believe him.
Calder leans back slightly against the counter, arms folding loosely across his chest. Not defensive. Just giving himself something to do with his body instead of reaching for me automatically because he wants to.
"I missed you," Calder says quietly.
No manipulation. No expectation attached. Just honesty existing freely between us.
The words hit so hard my throat tightens.
I set my mug carefully onto the counter. Calder's attention sharpens. Not wary. Just present.
"I need you to understand something," I say quietly.
He nods. Not defensive. Not bracing to argue. Just listening. The steadiness of that almost throws me off.
"I can't go back to disappearing inside this relationship."
The words land softly between us. Still enormous.
Calder's expression shifts. Pain flashing openly across his face before settling into something heavier. Understanding.
"I know," he says quietly.
And he actually does now. Fully.
"It wasn't just the public stuff. That hurt, obviously, but…" I shake my head slightly. "It was what happened to me around it."
Calder stays completely still. No interruption. No rushing to defend himself.
"I started adapting around your fear without realizing I was doing it. Making myself easier. Smaller. Less visible whenever hockey got too loud around us."
The ache inside my chest sharpens briefly.
"Eventually I stopped knowing where the line was between respecting your boundaries and abandoning my own."
The silence afterward feels huge. Not hostile. Grieving. Calder drops his gaze briefly toward the counter between us before looking back at me.
"I know," he says again, rougher this time.
No excuses attached. That matters almost more than the apology itself.
"Visibility matters to me," I continue quietly. "Not because I want attention. I don't."
A small humorless laugh escapes me.
"Honestly most of the time I'd prefer people forgot I exist entirely."
That earns the faintest soft curve at the corner of Calder's mouth. Still he says nothing. Still listening.
"But I need public and private Calder to be the same person."
The sentence settles heavily into the room.