Chapter 29
twenty-nine
ROSIE
I’m only aware of the most familiar things when I wake up. The distinct sliver of sunlight that makes its way through Locke’s curtains and onto the white wall in front of his bed. The feeling of his too-comfortable silk sheets that make it harder and harder every time to get out of.
Pancakes. I always know the smell of pancakes.
It’s different waking up to them, rather than be the one cooking them on a Saturday morning. Unless Ghost has somehow become the smartest cat in the world overnight, there’s only one explanation for the scent of warm batter wafting from the hallway.
I pull Locke’s oversized sweater over my body when I get out of bed.
I make sure to tip toe into the bathroom to brush my teeth, and then just as silently creep back into bed, like I never left.
I’ll pretend I didn’t hear Locke humming away in the kitchen as he meticulously made my favorite breakfast. This would’ve been the fourth dish he’s tried to whip up himself; I won’t spoil the gesture.
My attention finds the few social media notifications and emails that have gone unanswered. I scroll through feeds and, ten minutes in, get shown a video of three boys with microphones talking around a table.
It happens a lot. Being on the finance side of the internet means I constantly get fed big microphones and even bigger egos. Usually, I scroll.
Something compels me to watch.
While I sit through the hot takes that aren’t actually hot takes—but rather, broken justifications for their shitty behavior—my anger bubbles.
One of them says they think women should go through emotional evaluations before getting hired in senior-level positions.
I bite the inside of my cheek hard enough to taste iron.
My reaction is the same as always, but my thoughts go a different path.
Before this, I’d wonder what I needed to do to change their minds. What sequence of events would have to happen, where they shift their tone from criticizing women, to praising them.
I think about Dr. Adebayo’s words. I let them sink into the nonsense opinions being spoken, and I remind myself that people like this don’t change. It’s not about respect with them. It’s about power.
Power isn’t why I pursue what I love. I’m good at what I do, and I enjoy the mix of math and strategy. I was asking for respect from people who don’t understand the meaning of it.
But I do. It’s me who can grasp the hard work, talent, and skill it takes to get to the top. The only words of respect I need to worry about, are my own.
When I scroll past the video, I’m smiling. Letting the epiphany set into my brain and my heart. They don’t get what respect really means, and who really matters, but I do. Finally, I do.
The sweet scent of breakfast starts to grow, so strong it’s hard to focus on anything but freshly griddled batter.
When my mouth begins to water, Locke’s shirtless frame appears in the doorway, holding a tray of pancakes.
His messy blonde hair makes my chest tighten, and his lazy grin has me wondering what I did in my last life to deserve this—to deserve him.
“Good morning, Princess.”
My phone is tossed away onto his comforter. I throw away any thoughts of negative opinions and harsh words. They don’t cling to me anymore.
Instead, all my focus goes to the man who calls me a princess and makes me feel like one.
“Good morning, love.” He leans down to kiss me quickly, and I smile against his lips. I hope he feels like his nickname, too. “Pancakes in bed?”
Locke waits for me to cross my legs, then sets the tray in front of me. There’s a stack of pancakes, cut into squares just how I like them, and two mugs of steaming coffee. One is the exact brown color I like.
I don’t think Locke realizes, in the time that he’s settling into his spot on the other side of the bed, I’ve fallen in love with him all over again.
“It’s Saturday.” He responds. “I wanted you to sleep in, so I tried to make your Saturday pancakes.”
He scratches the back of his head, blush flooding his face. My emotions go haywire. I want to cry and laugh and jump his bones. I didn’t know love like this existed. I’m tempted to throw everything off the bed and spend the entire day naked and tired.
Ghost jumps onto the comforter then. He walks around the edge for a bit before pressing his paws adorably into the fabric and curling up into himself.
He’s so essential to the little world we’ve built together within this dorm and the Saturdays I love spending in it.
It adds another layer of here feeling like home.
I’m fully overcome with emotions of love and tenderness when I bite into the pancake. It’s so perfectly cooked, I don’t register what I say.
“I can’t wait to marry you and have this every day.”
The pancakes are too good. That’s what I blame them on. That’s why I pretend not to realize what I just said, and continue digging into them, instead of facing the wide green eyes staring at me.
I’ve thought of married life with Locke before. Too often, probably. Too quickly, some might say. We haven’t defined what we are. I don’t feel the need for it to be defined.
I love love. The deep emotions of it. The uncontrollable whirlwind of having it, overtaking your mind and body when you find someone who just seems to complete you.
Whatever I thought I had in the past wasn’t anywhere near love.
Any situation where I have to ask to feel beautiful, or request for mutual understanding and respect, is far from love. Locke taught me that.
I don’t need a label for love, either. I just like imagining the wedding Locke and I could have one day. With oranges and browns that remind me of the season we came into each other’s lives and the warmth we injected into it. There’d be little accents of green everywhere, too.
When I think of my life, and my future, that’s what I always see. Little spots of green wherever I go.
I’m drinking my first sip of coffee—that’s perfect, too—when Locke’s hand finds my hip under his sweatshirt.
“You want to marry me?” He’s staring at me with the largest grin I’ve ever seen.
I laugh and feed him a piece of pancake. “One day, yes. When I have the time to plan everything I want for us.”
My mind jumps to what I have planned for my future. If everything goes as expected, I’ll be busy for the next few years.
“I’m projecting myself with a quant analyst role and PhD before I’m thirty-five. We’ll see where in the next ten years we can squeeze in wedding planning.”
Behind the lip of his cup, Locke frowns. “I can’t wait that long to marry you.”
I laugh, but his expression doesn’t budge. “It’ll be worth it. I’ll have a six-figure career and we’ll be so well off, we can have whatever we want for the wedding.”
He waves his hand like what he’s about to say is nothing. “Money isn’t the issue. We’ll just use my savings.”
“We can both equally provide for our wedding.”
His forehead creases. “No, no. Your money is for you to spend, and my money is also for you to spend. So, let’s just spend mine.”
I shake my head and chuckle. His expression is so stern and serious. I think to some extent, he really means what he says.
Still joking, I hum into another bite of breakfast.
“One day we’ll just randomly tell our friends we’re engaged. They’ll be half-confused because we never even said we were dating, but not confused at all, because of course we’re engaged.”
I’m laughing under my breath at the hypothetical look on Lil’s face, when Locke shifts. A deep red hue has blossomed onto his cheeks, and he’s leaning back, hand reaching for the drawer of his nightstand.
“Talking about that…” I feel heat everywhere. My cheeks must turn a similar shade as his when he pulls a small jewelry box out of the nightstand.
Now? I haven’t even combed my hair.
Locke seems to have registered my expression. He starts shaking his head rapidly, glasses going crooked on his face. “I’m not proposing yet, I swear.”
I release a long breath from my chest. My hand is held to my heart working overtime, and my lips pull into a half-hearted smile. I’m glad I’m not being proposed to with syrup on the corners of my mouth, but part of me is a little disappointed. Just a tad.
If he did propose right now, I would’ve said yes. I think, no matter the circumstances, if Locke asked me to be his for a lifetime, the answer would always be yes.
The man of my dreams fixes his glasses before saying, “I know we’re basically together, and honestly, I don’t think there’s a label that encompasses how I feel about us.
I know I’m yours, and you’re mine, and that’s more than enough.
” My heart warms. He sums up my own thoughts into words, soft touches of his hand on my thigh, and shy smiles.
“But we can have that understanding of our relationship for us. Just us. Other people can call it whatever they want. I couldn’t care less about what someone else thinks we are. I’ll be whatever you want me to be, Rosalie. As long as I’m yours.”
Partners. Lovers. Soulmates.
Every one of them feels right, but still, somehow, not enough. Not nearly enough to express what Locke is to me.
Slowly, his hand leaves my skin to pull the jewelry box open.
A line of diamonds trace the gold L pendant. Small, and subtle, but unforgettable once you notice them. The necklace isn’t exactly like the one we saw during that autumn romance film when we admitted our feelings. It’s close, but this one is gold—the exact metal I like.
I turn the jewelry around my fingertips. On the back, in a font so tiny I might’ve missed it, the words “Yours, always.” are engraved at the bottom.
I turn it over again. Lightly brush over the jewels while my mind processes that, once again, Locke McCarthy shows me he hears me in silence.
“Do you like it?” He asks, whispering.
In a shaky voice of disbelief, I confess.
“I love you so much, Locke.”
It’s confirmed for me, that truly, I’ve never known what love is. Nothing has ever felt like this. When I speak my feelings into the air, my soul goes with it. Floating around our bodies with our bond keeping it tethered to this moment.
Just so he doesn’t second-guess my appreciation of the gesture, I smile and answer, “The necklace, too. I love it all. I just… love you.”
His hands take the necklace out of my grasp, removing it from the box and shifting behind me to secure it around my neck. When the weight of our love is pressing onto my chest in a way only we can understand, he kisses my temple and whispers.
“I love you endlessly, Rosalie.”
I could cry. I may cry. And if I do, I won’t feel the need to hide it from him, or anyone else, ever again.
One arm wraps around my stomach, holding me close to his chest. The other comes around my body. Locke’s left wrist twists in my field of view.
“I wanted something too. So you’re always with me.
” He shakes his arm once, twice, before the sunlight hits the metal of his watch just right.
At the exact angle where I can see the letter “R” engraved into the silver.
“I hope people see it. I hope they ask about it, and I get to tell everyone that my life only started when I met you.”
I can’t take my eyes off the letter that brandishes him as mine. There won’t be a moment in my life where I feel more cherished than this. I don’t think it’s possible. His love for me makes the world melt away. I lean back into his chest and melt with it.
“Are you sure you don’t want to propose right now?”
His chest vibrates against my back, and I laugh with him, but it was genuine question.
I want to say yes.
“I have ideas for your proposal. It has to be the perfect proposal for my perfect girl.” He brings my left hand up to his mouth, kissing the empty space of my ring finger. “Sitting in bed eating pancakes isn’t it, unfortunately.”
I don’t know how anything could get more perfect than this. Locke has rewritten the world for me. When I thought no one would take me seriously, he did. When I wanted a friend, he was one. When my mind couldn’t let go of the skewed sense of romance I’d experienced, he erased it for me.
Without asking, Locke McCarthy has become the prince charming a younger me saw in romance movies. I have no doubt he’d kiss me in the rain and chase me through an airport if given the chance.
How lucky I am, to experience a love I thought only existed in fairy tales.
Humming, I lace our fingers together and close my eyes. I try to imagine crazy romance fantasies. Something, anything that feels too outlandish to be real. Anything to give me that sense of dreadful longing I endured my entire life.
Nothing comes. I can’t think of anything. Everything I want, and everything I imagine, feels in reach. Locke said he would give me anything I desired. Like he believes in me, I believe in him.
I mumble through my smile, “I don’t know. I can’t imagine a more perfect moment than this.”
There’s a flurry of kisses across my cheek, down my neck, and around my shoulders. I’m giggling in Locke’s arms when he says, “With you, Rosie, every day is perfect. One way or another.”