17. Soren
Soren
Ikeep reaching for Keats.
I reach into my drawstring pouch, searching for her. But Keats isn’t there tonight. She’s perched on a branch of Wren’s tree, turning slowly under the fairy lights with “First Flight” hanging below her on copper wire.
They’re all up there, sitting on the tree Wren carved, with my words hanging below. My pouch feels strangely empty without its usual companion.
One strand of fairy lights hangs crooked, the left side about three inches lower than the right.
I’ve been staring at it instead of the crowd, the judges with their clipboards, or the fact that I’m about to stand in front of everyone and read a poem called “Keep My Alpha” with all my feelings exposed.
“Stop staring at the lights,” Wren says beside me, low and warm in my ear.
“They’re uneven.”
“They’re fine.”
“No, the left side is definitely—“
He puts his hand on the small of my back, broad and steady, his thumb tracing a slow circle through my shirt. The warm pressure calms my nerves. My breathing slows, and my hands relax.
“Better?” he asks.
“Shut up.”
He almost smiles. I can feel the shift of his jaw near my temple, and the pine-and-sawdust scent of him stands out against the gallery’s mix of cheap wine, floor polish, and too many people.
Our installation looks amazing. Every time I see it, I get a little thrill—oh, we made that.
Wren’s tree stands at the end of the gallery, spotlit, its carved branches reaching up just like in his workshop.
Now the branches are full. He worked until his fingers bled, adding shelves and hooks so every bird has a perch and every perch has a poem.
Stumble sits on the lowest branch, her crooked wing angled at the audience like a shrug.
Above her, Button the chickadee and Bronte the bluebird share a forked limb, Button leaning as if she’s sharing a secret.
Heathcliff the house finch perches higher, chest puffed and bossy, which always makes me laugh.
Near the top, Keats the cedar waxwing, tiny upside-down Fig the nuthatch, and Snowdrop the junco watch over everyone.
My stanzas hang from thin copper wire under each bird, printed on heavy cream paper that Benji helped me set up. The words turn slowly in the air, catching the light.
At the very top, hanging from the highest branch by a single wire, is the newest bird.
She’s bigger than the others, wings spread wide as if she’s about to fly into the room, carved from pale maple with the grain showing like tiny veins.
I call her Stay. Beneath her is the poem I wrote after seeing his workshop, the one that changed everything.
Keep My Alpha.
“Soren.” Kendra appears at my elbow, clipboard in one hand, mic in the other. Her hair’s in a severe bun and she’s wearing lipstick the color of a fire truck, which feels right. She’s been running this festival like a five-alarm emergency. “You’re up in eight. How are we feeling?”
“Like I might throw up.”
“Perfect. Audiences love vulnerability.” She glances at our installation, and for a second her expression softens from publicist to actual person. “For what it’s worth, this is the best piece in the show. My publicist brain knows how it looks, but I actually mean it.”
She clicks away into the crowd.
Wren’s hand stays on my back. I lean into it a little, and his fingers spread wider.
The gallery keeps filling up around us. Jude and Rhys stand by the wine table, Jude waving his arms so much he almost hits a judge.
Milo and Callum are near the door, Callum’s arm around Milo while Milo holds a Tupperware he brought from home because he doesn’t trust the gallery food.
Benji and Knox are already at our piece, Benji tilting his head to read the poems while Knox studies the branch joinery with real focus.
Shay and Declan come in last—Shay scanning the room like he’s checking for fire code violations, Declan guiding him toward our corner.
Aaron is here too, squeezed between Ava and a sculpture I think is an abstract pelican, already making jokes. His laugh echoes across the whole room.
“Your brother is loud,” I tell Wren.
“Yep.”
“Like, really loud.”
“I know.” His voice turns soft and warm, and he watches Aaron with that open look he gets when he can’t believe he has friends now.
Wren would still be leaving anonymous birds in the dark if Aaron hadn’t barged into his workshop and told him to talk to people.
I owe that kid a fruit basket. Or maybe a hug that nearly breaks ribs. But first, the poem.
It’s time.
Kendra takes the mic, introduces the piece as a collaboration “about being seen fully,” and steps aside. I walk to the little lectern next to the tree. My hands are shaking. The poem is on a single sheet of paper I’ve folded and unfolded so many times the creases are almost transparent.
I look at Wren.
He’s standing just off to the side, arms loose, watching me. His expression is the one I’ve seen exactly once before, in his workshop, right after I told him I loved all of him. Like he dreamed me up and I walked right off his workbench.
I unfold the paper.
I could read something else. I have three safer poems, pretty ones with enough metaphor to hide behind. For a moment, I think about it. I could read something lovely and distant, and no one here would know.
Except Wren would. And I would.
And I’m so goddamn tired of choosing the safer thing because wanting it too much might jinx it. I already said yes. I already have him.
I choose the real one.
“This poem is called ‘Keep My Alpha,’” I say into the mic. My voice is steadier than I thought it would be. “It’s about a boy who wanted a fairy tale so much he almost missed the real thing. And it’s for the man who carved me a forest because he was too scared to say hello.”
Somewhere in the crowd, Jude whispers, “I’m going to die,“ loud enough for half the room. Rhys shushes him.
My hands stop shaking somewhere between the first word and saying Wren’s name. The panic fades into something quieter and stronger.
I read.
The words come out just as I wrote them: honest, a little awkward, not perfect.
They’re about finding carved birds on benches and making up stories about hands I’d never held.
About being so scared of wanting something that even hoping for it felt risky.
About the night everything changed and the fantasy and the man turned out to be the same person.
The last stanza was the hardest to write. I wrote it at three in the morning, sitting on the floor of Wren’s workshop with sawdust on my jeans, while he slept at his worktable behind me.
I lower the paper. My throat feels raw, my eyes burn, and I’ve never felt this exposed in front of other people.
Silence. Heavy and complete.
Then the room erupts in applause, loud and sudden. For a moment, everything blurs. I blink and spot Wren in the crowd, one hand over his mouth, eyes red.
Jude jumps to his feet, of course. Milo is crying into Callum’s shoulder. Benji claps slowly and deliberately, which means he’s really moved but would never say so.
I step away from the lectern and Wren is there, pulling me close. His mouth is warm against my temple, then the corner of my eye where a tear slips free.
“You wrote that,” he says. His voice is completely wrecked.
“I wrote that.”
“About me.”
“About you.” I press my forehead against his jaw. “Every word.”
He holds me tight, not gently but possessively, his hands pressed flat against my back like he’s trying to hold all of me.
One hand cups the back of my head, fingers in my hair, and he keeps me close like he never wants to let go.
His heart beats fast against my chest. I press my face into his neck and breathe him in because he is mine and I said so in front of everyone and the universe didn’t take him away.
Under my cheek, his pulse races with mine.
The judges talk in their corner, but I don’t watch. I’m too busy being held by an alpha whose hands are shaking because of a poem.
When they announce the awards, it feels almost anticlimactic, but in a good way.
Wren gets a special mention for “Craft and Narrative Integration,” which makes him blush and mutter that it’s not a real category.
I win the audience-choice award for poetry, and Jude reacts like I’ve won Olympic gold.
He lifts me off the ground, and Rhys has to pull him off me.
“That was Bronte-level poetry,” Jude says to no one in particular. It’s the highest compliment he can give and proof that my bird-naming habit has spread to everyone.
But what I’ll remember long after the certificates are forgotten is how everyone talks to us like we’re a team.
“You two are incredible.”
“Your work together...”
“The way the poems and the birds talk to each other...”
Benji comes over while Wren is stuck talking to a judge about commissions.
“So,” he says. “Long-term siege. Told you.”
“You told me.”
“I’m always right. It’s my worst quality.” He takes a sip. “Best in Show, though? That’s Soren’s mate.” He says it louder than he needs to, making sure the whole room hears. “Best in Show: Soren’s mate. Calling it now.”
Across the gallery, Wren blushes again. Knox laughs so hard he spills his drink.
Later, after the crowd thins and the judges leave, I lean against a wall with Wren beside me, the tree glowing behind us. My birds turn gently on their wires, and Stay catches the fairy light on her wings.
The lights are still crooked. They’ve been that way all night and nobody noticed but me. It’s probably a metaphor I’ll use later.
He shifts his weight. There’s about two inches between our shoulders, and every bit of space feels electric. If I leaned left, my arm would touch his. But I stay where I am, letting the wanting linger, slow and sweet.
“More shows?”
“If you want.”
“I want to. Maybe sell some birds? Not mine—new ones. Custom orders.”
“I could do that.” He goes quiet for a moment. “Aaron already made me an Etsy account. I have no idea how to use it.”
I laughI laugh. “We’ll figure it out. And I was thinking—Professor Hannover mentioned a chapbook program through the English department. Small press, limited run.”
“A whole book of your poems?”
“Maybe. If they’re good enough.”
“They’re good enough.” He doesn’t hesitate. No question, just fact—the way Wren always says things.
He takes my hand, turns it over, and presses his mouth to the center of my palm. It’s slow and deliberate, like he’s sealing a promise. My knees go weak.
“Ready to go home?” he asks, his voice close to my skin.
Home. He means my apartment, where our nest is finished and waiting.
I lean up and kiss the side of his jaw, right where his pulse still races.
“Yeah,” I say. “Take me home.”
We leave the gallery hand in hand, awards tucked under Wren’s arm, the tree glowing behind us like a beacon. We’ll come back for the birds tomorrow; Kendra wanted the installation to stay up through the weekend. For one more night, Keats sleeps on her branch instead of in my pouch.
Outside, the night air is warm and smells like cut grass and summer. Behind us, Aaron shouts something about Wren owing him a thank-you card, and Ava’s laugh echoes off the buildings.
I don’t look back. I don’t need to. I squeeze Wren’s hand, and he squeezes back, firm and sure—a promise made with his fingers before he can say it out loud. We walk into the warm night together.