Cole and Laila Are Just Friends

Chapter Twenty

Cole

Cole heard the doorknob to Laila’s bedroom jiggle and immediately jumped up from the couch and ran to the kitchen. As he removed the plate from the oven and hurried it over to the marble island, the urgency of the jiggling increased. Then she began pounding on the door.

He chuckled. “Hang on just a second!”

“Cole, I can’t get out!” she yelled in a bit of a panic. “The door’s stuck!”

“It’s fine!” He placed the candles in the chocolate-chip pancakes he’d had warming for the last twenty minutes as Laila slept longer than he had anticipated, quickly lit them, and took one more look around to make sure everything was ready.

“Why did you lock me in my room?” She twisted the knob again. “What are you up to? Are you doing something for my birthday?” Then, silence. “Sorry! I shouldn’t have said anything. If you are doing something for my birthday, I hope I didn’t ruin it!”

He shook his head and rolled his eyes as he began unfastening his belt from around the knob and the sconce beside the door that he had looped it through. He’d planned it as more of an advance warning system than a means of imprisonment—if she’d had the upper-body strength and determination of even a pigeon, she could have opened the door.

“First of all, we both know today’s your birthday, so I don’t think you could have ruined anything, really. And second, I’m not doing anything for your birthday. I was just in the middle of some classified business with the State Department. Needed some privacy. That’s all.” He looped his belt back around his waist and fastened it. Then he stood there and waited, but she didn’t make any other attempts to open the door. “You can come out now, if you want.”

The knob turned and the door cracked open, and she peeked out just enough that Cole could only see one eye behind glasses, along with her nose and half of her mouth. “There aren’t other people here, are there?” she whispered.

“No. The Department of Defense does most of their top-secret stuff on Zoom.”

“Cole!” His name was soft but still emphatic. She poked her head out a little farther. “It’s just if it’s a surprise party or something, I need a minute to get presentable.”

“Laila, you know exactly two people in New York, and they’re both in Germany right now. Who do you imagine I invited over for this surprise party?”

“Oh.” She stepped back and pulled the door open the rest of the way, then inched out slowly, looking around on high alert as if she still suspected that a roomful of people were going to jump out and startle her.

Of course he wouldn’t throw her a surprise party. He had, once, back when she turned twenty-one, and though they hadn’t talked about it since, he’d promised himself he would never do that to her again. Cole would have liked to pride himself on knowing it was one of the few times in their lives he’d let what he thought she needed get in the way of what she clearly communicated she wanted, but there was no pride at all in it for him. Her parents had recently separated, and Laila had insisted that all she wanted for her birthday was a little peace and quiet away from their ongoing battles that she continually found herself in the middle of. He could have taken her hiking or for a long drive up into the mountains, and it could have been just the two of them, just like she wanted.

But what had he given her instead? He’d invited the entire town to Cassidy’s, when it was still just a bar, thinking it would be fun for her to order a drink as a legal adult. Well, he’d invited the entire town apart from either of her parents. Both of whom, of course, knew every other person in town. None of whom ever imagined that the only two people who weren’t invited were the warring Olivets. Both of whom showed up.

It had been a disaster. And the worst part had been the moment when everyone jumped out and yelled surprise and Cole had to watch the happiness vanish from her face, knowing that he had caused that.

He had known better anyway. Even if her parents hadn’t been caught up in themselves and unable at that time to put their hostility aside for the sake of their daughter, he should have known better. Laila had always been someone who loved pulling out all the stops to make the people she loved happy, and she’d never had a shy bone in her body when it came to making Cole laugh or making sure customers had a great time at the Bean or Cassidy’s. But she had no desire to ever stand in the spotlight alone.

Cole stepped behind her so she could see what he had done for her. It wasn’t much. He’d used exactly thirty-nine chocolate chips, but he wasn’t even going to tell her that part. She might have really appreciated the personalization and been extra huggy with him, and obviously that would have been okay. But there was also a chance she would view each chocolate chip, as she ate it, as symbolic of how quickly the years were passing, and that could spiral out of control very quickly. Overall, she hadn’t been too maudlin about this particular birthday so far, but he didn’t want to take any chances.

“Aww!” Her fingers formed a steeple over her mouth and tears sprang to her eyes. Big, magnified tears beneath the lenses. “This is so sweet!”

Oh, Laila.She was so easy to please, and that just made him want to work harder to blow her away. Some pancakes, a few candles, and streamers he had brought from home since he hadn’t known what the party-supply situation was like in the Big Apple, and she acted like Oprah had just presented her with a minivan and new house for her and her six kids. “It’s just pancakes. There are other things planned. This is just . . . breakfast.”

He’d always loved going all out for her birthday. There had been a few isolated missteps here and there, like the surprise party, of course, and her thirty-seventh birthday when they’d gone white water rafting and alpine zip-lining even though they both had the flu and weren’t quite sure how they made it out alive. (Literally. The last thing Cole remembered was being strapped into a harness, and then he somehow found himself in a tree that jutted out from the side of a mountain. Poor Laila had maintained consciousness and had the unfortunate memories of projectile vomiting while zipping into the wind at fourteen thousand feet.) But for the most part, her birthday was usually one of his favorite days. He got to pamper her and make her the focus of everything in a way she would never allow the other 364 days of the year.

Strangely, though, he’d never felt any sort of pressure—certainly not from her, but not even self-imposed, which was surprising—to go bigger and better each year. That wasn’t what it was about. He loved to catch her off guard, and every so often the way to do that was with some big gesture. (Their oft-referenced trip to Vegas had been a surprise for her thirty-second, and in 2010 he had taken her to see John Mayer at Red Rocks—a gift he would probably never be able to top in Laila Land, if bigger and better had been the goals.) But it really was just about making her feel special and loved. And though he had attained fluency in her love languages years ago, he tried never to take that for granted. It was all selfish on his part anyway, he knew. He lived for those moments of witnessing pure joy and delight on her face.

“Thank you.” She turned around to face him and wrapped her arms around his neck.

Cole’s breath caught as he enveloped her in his embrace and pulled her against him. Every muscle relaxed and tightened simultaneously. How was that even possible? Physiologically, he knew it probably wasn’t, but if it was impossible, then his body was apparently a scientific marvel.

“You’re welcome,” he breathed into her hair, delicately flowing against his lips.

He hadn’t realized just how little he’d touched her over the course of the past few days, but he knew it now. He began breathing easier, even as the air felt thinner and the oxygen seemed in short supply. He hadn’t known his body temperature had been abnormal, but now, as blood pumped through his veins with the intensity of those Colorado rapids that had become the final resting place of, he was pretty sure, some of their internal organs two years ago, he really couldn’t understand how the coldness hadn’t done him in when he wasn’t holding her.

Snap out of it, Cole. If you don’t let her go soon, you’re going to make things weird, man.

He knew it was true. Very, very wise advice he was attempting to give himself. But as his fingertips twitched against the small of her back and she snuggled in closer in response, wise counsel wasn’t what he wanted.

He wanted her.

He’d felt so confident that it had been a great few days. After fearing that things he’d said or, worse, things he hadn’t said on Monday might have ruined everything, they’d actually had a really great few days. That little talk at Yankee Stadium sure had helped. Of course, there were still more things they were going to need to talk about, but there would be time for that, Cole had figured. At least they were talking. They weren’t avoiding talking about the uncertainty of the future. She’d asked him which New York neighborhoods he might be interested in living in as they rode the Staten Island Ferry. (He genuinely had no idea.) He’d asked her if she was going to keep working at Cassidy’s if she could, with the new owner, while they ate Black White Cookies from William Greenberg, sitting on a bench in front of Belvedere Castle in Central Park. (She genuinely had no idea.) They’d rambled off top ten lists of their experiences together—ten best places they ever camped, ten best meals Cole had ever cooked for her, ten longest-running inside jokes between them—while they frantically searched for an open public restroom in Times Square. (A subject about which not a single person in Manhattan seemed to have any idea.)

But there had still been a little bit of distance between them.

Had Cole been avoiding touching her because he was afraid to conjure up the images in his mind again? The ones that hadn’t gone away by a long shot, but with a little time and a little distance and a whole lot of effort had stopped being all he could see when he closed his eyes? Or had Laila shied away from her usual hugs and affectionate squeezes because she had sensed what he had stopped short of saying at Shake Shack?

He had no idea, but neither of them seemed to be concerned about any of that now. Her arms, which had been looped around his neck, lowered in front of her, her hands resting on his chest. Though who was he kidding? Her trembling fingers, drumming and flexing against him, weren’t resting any more than his own hands, which had morphed from their casual, friendly position at her lower back into a desperate, hungry grasp at her hips. He lowered his eyes to look down at her. To gauge her emotions. He knew her better than anyone, but this—this . . . whatever this was—wasn’t accompanied by any muscle memory or prior experience to draw from. If he got this wrong, he would ruin everything. He would ruin them.

“Hey, Lai?”

Her forehead was pressed against his collar, just above her hands. Still drumming. Still flexing. Occasionally curling his T-shirt into her fists in a way that made him more certain than he’d ever been about anything that he wasn’t misreading a thing.

“Hm?” she asked. One syllable. Not even a word so much as a sound. But in it, Cole heard her staggered breath and her fear. Fear. They were each other’s safety and each other’s security. Laila’s fear had always been a foe for him to vanquish. But this fear was exhilarating. It was theirs. Together. And the fact that she was just as afraid as he was, and yet she stood here . . . in his arms . . . attempting to pull him closer even though they were centimeters away from crossing lines they’d never even realized existed.

If he got this wrong, he would ruin them. But what if he got it right?

Cole tightened his grip on her pajama pants–clad hip with one hand while the other joined hers between their bodies, for just an instant, before brushing against her chin and tilting it upward. Her eyes rose slowly to meet his, heavy with all sorts of things he’d never seen there before. Fear, sure. Anticipation, maybe? Longing? Desire? If so, what did his eyes look like to her?

“Happy birthday, Lai.”

He said it, and then he hated so much that he had said it. So much so that he had to close his eyes and imagine, for just a moment, that he hadn’t said it.

He’d been preparing to kiss her. For the first time in the history of a friendship that was older than their memories, he’d been just about to kiss her. There were so many things he could have said.

“Is this okay?”

“You’re the most important person in the world to me.”

“I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you.”

As he stood there with his eyes closed, they all sounded stupid in his mind. But still. Any of them would have been better than “Happy birthday.” What was that supposed to mean? What was she supposed to think he meant? Was that her gift? He’d promised her there was more in store than just pancakes. Was that what he’d planned for her? Chocolate chips and a little bit of lovin’?

“You okay?” she asked.

Okay . . . now his eyes were closed, and he was laughing. Smooth, Kimball. Real smooth.

His eyes shot open as he felt her posture change. He was horrified to think of what he would find in her expression when he looked at her looking at him, but much, much more horrified by the thought of standing there even one moment more, probably making her wonder if he was actually in the middle of a psychotic meltdown.

“Sorry.” He laughed again and stepped back from her. It was the only natural thing to do since her hands had dropped to her sides and the moment was clearly so far beyond ruined.

She was staring at him, all longing or desire or whatever had been in her expression having been replaced by the look that accompanies mental recitation of the list of actions to take if someone in your presence has a stroke.

“For what? What’s so funny? I . . .” She looked behind her and then took another step back as she pushed her glasses up higher on the bridge of her nose and then crossed her hands over her stomach. “I guess I don’t understand what’s happening.” She fiddled with her glasses again and then returned her hands to her abdomen as she took yet another step back. “I’m sorry if I did something . . . or said something . . .”

Now this fear of Laila’s Cole recognized. This was his foe. His adversary that he would march into battle against again and again, as many times as necessary, to keep her from ever feeling uncertain or unprotected or vulnerable. And he was the cause of the fear. He’d made her feel uncertain and unprotected and vulnerable.

Well, that’s that, then, isn’t it?

“I was about to kiss you, Laila.”

She flinched, and then her eyes grew wide. Cole braced himself for whatever was to come. All he knew was he was so tired of skirting around things with her. It had been one week out of . . . how many? A couple thousand? A couple thousand weeks of not keeping things from each other. Of not shying away from the tough conversations. Of knowing there was nothing—nothing—that would ever be too much for them to overcome. And then not even seven full days of acting like he didn’t know if that was true. But it was true. And he was exhausted from trying to sort it out without her help.

She had flinched, and her eyes had grown wide, but she was still looking at him. She hadn’t run away. And if he’d read things wrong or had been about to make a mistake or whatever, they’d sort it out together. It wasn’t a mistake to talk with her about it.

“Sorry,” he finally got out after a couple of stammered attempts. “I’m not trying to freak you out. I’m not trying anything. I just . . .” He ran his hands through his hair, and then his arms landed crossed on his abdomen, mirroring Laila. “So, here’s the thing. At Shake Shack, when I asked you if you’d ever thought of us . . . you know . . . like that . . .” Stop talking in code. Just say the words. “When I asked you if you’d ever thought about the two of us together romantically, it was because I never had, Laila. Never. Not once in our entire lives.”

She cleared her throat and looked down at her bare toes peeking out from under her long, blue-striped pajama pants. “I know. You told me that.”

“Yeah. But I didn’t finish the thought.”

Her head snapped up so quickly that her glasses bounced on the bridge of her nose before landing crooked, and she had to straighten them. “Then finish the thought.”

Cole exhaled slowly. “I never had. And then I did. I . . . had a dream about you. Sort of a . . . romantic one.”

Her shoulders fell. “Oh. Well, that’s not really a big deal, is it? I don’t think that counts as thinking about it.” She chuckled and began fiddling with the strands of hair near her face. She watched him for a moment and then cleared her throat. “Must have been some dream, though, to rattle you like this.”

It was one thing to be open and honest with her. He was relieved to finally be doing that, no matter how awkward it was. But as memories of the dream—memories that were every bit as seared into his brain now as a lifetime of things they had actually done together—appeared before his eyes again and his pulse began to quicken, he knew that certain things were still better for him to keep to himself.

“It was. But that’s not really the point. The dream isn’t the point. The point is everything—every thought—has sort of been going through a different filter since then. I mean, you said you’d already thought about the possibility of us, over time, but I’ve sort of had all the thoughts in the last, like, five days or whatever. But it was still just thoughts.” He took a step toward her and then wondered, for a moment, if that was a mistake. But she didn’t step back or even seem to register the closer proximity. “And then I hugged you, like I’ve hugged you ten million times before . . . except . . .”

“Except it didn’t feel like the last ten million?”

Cole shook his head gently. “No. It didn’t.”

They stood in silence, and the only thing awkward about it was that it wasn’t awkward in the least. And it got even less awkward when she looked behind her at her melted candles that had long ago extinguished themselves and left wax across the surface of the pancake on the top of the stack. Then she did such a Laila thing that he couldn’t help but smile. Without any pomp or circumstance or even a whisper of ruined birthday disgruntlement, she grabbed the second pancake from the stack and began tearing pieces apart and stuffing them in her mouth.

It was right then that he understood, for the very first time, that if she was any other woman in the world, he would be wildly, madly in love with her. If only she wasn’t already the person he loved most.

“So why didn’t you?” she finally asked, her mouth full of pancake.

He resisted the urge to laugh as he wondered how many of their most serious, life-altering conversations had taken place while Laila had a mouthful of pancake. “Why didn’t I what?”

She shrugged. “Kiss me.”

It was Cole’s turn to flinch. And as for wide eyes . . . he was pretty sure he had become the personification of a shocked goldfish who had just had its eyes dilated at the optometrist.

In a Tim Burton cartoon.

“Um . . . because it’s us, Laila. How could I—”

“No.” She shook a strip of pancake at him before taking a bite of it. “I’m not asking the big, philosophical question. Not right now. Something happened and your mood shifted—”

“Oh.” He chuckled and took a step over to the island and leaned against it. “I said, ‘Happy birthday.’ And I felt like such a dork. I don’t know why I said it right then, but it got me all in my head. Like . . .” He adopted a deep Barry White sort of voice, except sleazier and with flashy finger guns to match. “Hey, baby, what are you wishing for when you blow out the candles this year?”

A half-chewed bite of pancake escaped from her mouth as a guffaw erupted from her. That, of course, made Cole lose it, and by the time she was leaning over to try to find the spit-out food, she couldn’t see anything because she was laughing so hard she was crying. She finally just gave up and collapsed onto the floor, curled up on her side, holding her stomach as she tried to catch her breath between gasping laughs. Cole slid down against the island until he was sitting on the floor and scooted over until his leg was by her head. Without a word or another look at each other, she rested the back of her head on his thigh and he began stroking her hair. Well, stroking her hair, wiping away the tears that were still streaming down her face, and occasionally picking off pieces of pancake and chocolate chips from various locations on each of them.

She stared up at him and he stared down at her, smiles on their faces, and finally Cole sighed and softly said, “You’re just my favorite, Laila Olivet. I don’t ever want to do anything to mess us up.”

“And you think kissing me would mess us up?”

His cheeks puffed up with air and he shrugged as he let the air out. “I think there’d be no turning back.”

“And you’re sure you’d want to turn back?”

Cole opened his mouth but no sound came out, and she sat up beside him. He tilted his head so he could study her.

“Listen, all I’m saying is . . .” She lowered her eyes and began clasping the corner of her bottom lip between her teeth. “I was right there with you. I wanted you to kiss me, Cole.” Her eyes met his again, and whatever had been there before—anticipation . . . longing . . . desire—seemed to be back. “And to even be thinking about this, much less talking about it, is terrifying. But what if it’s something we need to think about? To talk about? And not just so we can deal with it and not have to worry about it anymore. What if . . .”

Laila rose up onto her knees, then grabbed his hands and used them to pull herself closer to him. In one deft move—so natural and seemingly practiced, as everything between them seemed to be, whether it had ever happened before or not—her left leg, bent at the knee, was resting on his thigh, and they were face to face. Eye to eye. “What if we’re so afraid to mess up what we have that we’re actually messing up the best stuff?? The stuff we haven’t even seen yet.”

Cole leaned his head forward as she inched closer to him still. He could smell the sweetness of the chocolate chips on her breath, and he could see every dried, salty tear spot on those awful, enormous glasses that he loved so much. Laila seemed to become aware of her Sophia Lorens in the same instant he did, and she untangled one hand from his and raised her fingers to remove them. He reached up and caught her hand.

“Don’t you dare.”

She smiled at him in response, and he twisted his wrist to run his thumb along her jawline. She adjusted her grip to the top of his hand as his fingers fanned out across her neck before tangling in her loose waves.

And then his phone began vibrating in his left pocket, against her leg.

Of course it did.

“They’ll go away,” she whispered. “Ignore it.”

She just about had him convinced—as if that took any effort at all—when they heard the ding of Brynn and Sebastian’s penthouse elevator. They pulled apart and jumped up in instinctive panic, and when the elevator door opened and some black-haired woman in a red pantsuit, red heels, and red lipstick neither of them had ever seen before stepped into the foyer, Cole was reaching for the coffeepot to clean it and Laila was on her hands and knees looking for pancake chunks.

“Oh, sorry. I didn’t realize you were still here. Brynn said the coast should be clear about now. You’re Cole, I assume? I tried to call you.”

His eyes flew open. “Oh! I’m so sorry. Drea?” Cole asked, rushing over to her with his hand extended.

“Drea.” She said it in a way that sounded like she was correcting him, but he was pretty sure she was saying it exactly like he had just said it.

She did shake his hand, so he decided to take the win and just say, “Ah.” As if he understood the difference. He dared not try again. “Yeah, I’m Cole. This is Laila.”

Laila jumped up and shook Drea’s hand. “Nice to meet you.” Then she looked to Cole with a friendly and strained smile that he easily interpreted as “Who is this stranger who has a key to our friends’ apartment, whom you apparently know and I do not? Also, are we cool? And where do we go from here? Are we going to go on as if we weren’t very much on the verge of making out just now?”

It was entirely possible he was projecting some of his own concerns into his interpretation of her smile.

“Drea—”

“Drea,” Drea interrupted him.

Seriously!They were saying the exact same thing!

“Right.” Cole cleared his throat. “She’s Brynn’s personal assistant. She’s helping me with . . . well, birthday stuff. For you.”

“You’re the birthday girl, huh? Nice. He has a pretty sweet day planned for you, so I should probably get out of here and let you get to it. I’ll swing back by in a bit.” Her red stilettos clickety-clacked back to the elevator, and then she turned back to them as she got to it. Drea looked first to Cole. “Between seven thirty and eight, right?”

His eyes darted to Laila and then back to Drea. “Yeah. I think so. If that works for you. I really appreciate your help.”

“My pleasure. With Brynn out of town, I’m bored out of my mind anyway. And Murrow tends to get my seat on flights now.” It sounded like she was making a joke, but her face didn’t seem so sure.

She turned to Laila. “Happy birthday. Have fun, you two.”

After the elevator doors had shut, Laila said, “I don’t even know where to start on any of that.”

Cole chuckled. “Well, let’s start with her name. Am I missing something?”

“Yeah, you were butchering it. It’s Drea.”

“Drea?” he repeated, focusing on replicating the sounds exactly. He squinted to watch Laila’s lips as she repeated it and they said it together. “Drea? Drea. Drea. Drea?”

She began giggling and walked the crumbs she had picked up from the floor over to the garbage can. “I’m messing with you. I can’t hear any difference.”

He picked up the dish towel from the island and swatted her with it as she passed. Then, as he tidied up the kitchen, she picked around the wax to eat a little more of the pancakes. He wondered how to proceed with the day he had planned.

The easy silence transformed into a weighty one.

Cole cleared his throat. “So, um . . .”

“Hang on.” She sat on a barstool across from him with the island between them. “Before you say anything, can I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

“Whatever you have planned for my birthday . . . How would it work as a date?”

He swallowed hard. “Oh . . . um . . . yeah, I mean . . . if you want, we could . . . I mean, I guess since we almost . . . you know . . . But at the same time, are we sure that we . . .”

“Hang on, hang on.” She leaned her elbows onto the marble surface and lowered her eyes until she caught his gaze of avoidance. “Don’t self-destruct on me here. Let’s just talk. It’s just you and me, pal. Let’s not freak out. Okay?”

Those warm green eyes of hers that always reminded him of the freshly cut grass of a well-watered lawn certainly helped calm the rising panic. “Okay.” He took a step back and leaned against Seb and Brynn’s giant farmhouse sink so he could put a little space between the two of them but keep looking at her. As long as he was able to see her reassuring smile—which he knew to be genuine because her eyes were crinkled to match—he knew they were okay. And as long as they were okay, he was okay.

“Okay,” Laila echoed and relaxed back into the stool. “So here’s what I’m thinking. I obviously don’t want to spoil whatever you have in store for today—you know I love your birthday surprises—so feel free to veto if this is a bad idea. Because of my birthday or any other reason. But I was just thinking, okay . . .” Her eyes were still warm, and so were her cheeks, if the rapidly spreading pink splotches were any indication. “Obviously something’s happening between us that . . . well . . . hasn’t happened before. And we’re thinking about things we don’t usually think about, I guess. And I understand what you were saying about being afraid to mess us up. I really do. And you know I don’t want that either. So yeah, we need to be . . . cautious, I guess? And let’s face it, it’s probably for the best that Drea—”

“You mean Drea.”

Laila snorted and raised her hand up to cover her nose for a second, causing Cole to relax even more. If she was still comfortable enough to snort in his presence, they were fine.

“Sorry. My bad. It’s probably for the best that Drea came in when she did. Even if . . .” She looked at him for a second and then lifted her shoulders to her ears. “Even if this is maybe something, we probably don’t want to start by kissing and jumping too far ahead. That would make everything super awkward if this isn’t something. Right?”

“I agree that may not be the wisest place to start,” he concurred.

She nodded once, sharply. “Okay, then. So what if, just for one day, we pretend we don’t have a lifetime of history and shared memories?”

He tilted his head in confusion. “How are we supposed to do that?”

“Um . . .” She chewed on her bottom lip and looked upward as she gave it more thought. “First date?” And then, more confidently, “Blind date. Set up by friends. We’ve never met.” Her eyes rolled upward again, and she bobbed her head from shoulder to shoulder as she played it out in her mind. “Yeah. It could be fun. You know . . .” A huge, giddy grin broke free as she looked at him again. “What if you weren’t Fox Books and I wasn’t The Shop Around the Corner?”

It sounded insane to him, but when she was looking at him like that—with happiness that he figured had a tiny bit to do with him, laced with a fair amount of excitement that stemmed from the possibilities of the day but that was overwhelmingly based in thoughts of You’ve Got Mail—what was he supposed to do?

“I don’t know your stories, and you don’t know mine?”

“Right.”

“And I just treat you like a woman I’m trying to impress on a first date?”

“Exactly.”

“And you’ll act like—”

“Okay, Cole, the rules aren’t that difficult.” She smirked at him. “Are you in?”

Either this was going to be a Laila birthday to beat all Laila birthdays, or he was going to be wishing for the good old days of the birthday when he nearly fell into the rapids trying to save her sunglasses after they fell off while she was vomiting over the side of the raft.

He looked at his watch and then back up at her with a matching smirk. “I’ll pick you up in an hour.”