Chapter 14 #2
Standing near the stove in one of those oversized sweatshirts she lived in—this one some faded shade of blue that might’ve once belonged to me.
Her hair was pulled into a messy bun with strands falling loose around her face, her posture slightly hunched like she’d been lost in thought.
She was biting her lip as she poured something into a mug, steam rising in curling ribbons from whatever she was making.
Mmm. Hot cocoa. Her favorite comfort drink. Beyond tequila.
Her back was to me, but the sight of her, the soft slope of her shoulders, the quiet in the way she moved…it hit me square in the chest. Every instinct pulled me forward, like my body knew before my brain did that I needed to be closer to her.
I didn’t say anything. Not yet. Just leaned a little against the doorframe and watched her for another beat.
She didn’t notice me right away. Her hands were moving slowly, carefully, as if she were trying to do something—anything—that didn’t require too much thinking. Or too much feeling.
Which meant she was probably doing both.
And then she turned.
Her eyes lifted, soft and startled, but not surprised. As if part of her had expected me to find her.
We just looked at each other for a second. No words. Just the quiet recognition that even with everything messy and unspoken between us, somehow, we’d still found our way to the same place.
And maybe that meant something.
Or maybe it didn’t.
But either way…I stepped fully into the kitchen.
The old floorboards creaked softly under my boots, and Natalie’s gaze dropped for half a second, like she wasn’t sure whether to smile or brace herself.
She didn’t move.
Neither did I.
The warm light overhead cast her in soft amber, catching on the edges of her hair, the curve of her cheek, the faint shadows under her eyes. She looked tired. Beautiful, but tired in that bone-deep way that comes from thinking too much and sleeping too little .
Still, she held my gaze.
“Hey,” I said quietly.
“Hey,” she echoed, equally soft. Her voice wasn’t cold—it was cautious.
That was worse.
I looked at the mug in her hands, filled to the brim with hot chocolate, and then at the second mug on the counter beside it that was empty.
“You making one for me?” I asked, trying to keep it light.
She gave me a shrug, holding up both mugs. “If I drank two, it’d feel sad. But if I held two, it might just look like holiday spirit. Or pathetic…hard to tell, honestly.”
I stepped closer, not touching, but close. Close enough to smell the vanilla in her shampoo. Close enough to feel it again—that pull . Always the pull. “You’ve never looked pathetic in your life.”
Her eyes lifted to mine, and for a moment, we just…stood there. Wrapped in quiet and all the things we weren’t sure how to say.
“Levi kept you out late,” she said eventually, turning back to the stove to stir the cocoa again.
“Yeah,” I muttered. “Apparently, he thought it was a good idea to get lost on purpose and ‘see where the trees took us.’”
She laughed under her breath, and that small sound loosened something in my chest.
“I came back, and you weren’t in our room,” I said, not accusing. Just honest.
“I needed to think,” she replied, just as honest.
“About last night?”
A pause. “About everything.”
I nodded, stepping to the counter beside her, careful not to crowd. I leaned my hands on the edge, facing the opposite wall, breathing in the warm chocolate-sweet air like it might ground me .
“Can I ask what conclusions you came to?” I urged after a beat.
Natalie didn’t answer right away. Instead, she filled the second mug slowly, set the sauce pan aside, and slid the mug toward me.
I took it, my fingers brushing hers.
“I don’t have any conclusions,” she said finally. “Just…feelings. Conflicting ones.”
That hurt more than I wanted it to, but I kept my voice even. “Okay.”
“I wasn’t expecting…anything,” she said, clutching the edge of the counter. “And I definitely wasn’t expecting you to say what you said.”
“That I haven’t been with anyone else?” I asked quietly.
She nodded. “It kind of knocked the wind out of me.”
“I didn’t say it to make you feel guilty.”
“I know.”
Her voice was quiet but steady, like someone walking a tightrope in the dark—careful, measured, trying not to slip.
But I felt it. She wasn’t just talking about what I’d said. She was talking about us . About the weight between us. The ache of time. The fear that maybe too much had happened to go back.
A beat of silence passed—thick, but not cold. Just real.
And beneath all of it, I felt the sting of what I didn’t ask:
Who held you when I didn’t?
Whose name did you say when I couldn’t hear it?
The pain lodged like a splinter in my chest.
Another beat of silence passed between us.
Then she took a breath—small, steadying—and added, “I just didn’t know how to sit with it. And maybe I still don’t.”
“That’s okay,” I said, and I meant it. “You don’t owe me anything. Not even an explanation.”
She gave me a look at that, one of those sharp, half-skeptical stares she used to give me in high school when I’d say something too profound for someone who’d once used duct tape to fix a broken shoe. “Don’t do that,” she said. “Don’t make it too easy.”
“I’m not,” I said, keeping my voice low and steady. “I’m not trying to get credit for showing up. I’m just…trying to show up. For real. The way I’ve wanted to for a long time.”
Her gaze dropped again, this time to the surface of her cocoa, where she’d started stirring in slow, mindless circles with a spoon, like she was hoping the swirl would sort her thoughts for her.
“Do you ever think about how things might’ve gone if we hadn’t broken up?” she asked, her voice soft but clear.
“All the time,” I said without hesitation.
Her head snapped up, like she hadn’t expected the answer to come so easily, so honestly. Her eyes searched mine like she didn’t want to believe it but also needed to.
I didn’t flinch.
“But that’s not why I’m here,” I added, holding her gaze. “I’m not asking to rewind the clock. I’m not trying to force us back into something we were just because it feels good to remember it.”
She waited, silent, still, but everything about her posture said she was listening with both her ears and every inch of her heart.
“I’m here,” I said simply, “because I still care. Because I want to know the woman you’ve become. Because no matter how much time has passed…being near you still feels like home. Like I’ve been holding my breath for years and only now remember how to breathe.”
Her breath hitched—just a little. She blinked fast, like she was trying to will away the emotion threatening to spill over. “Easton…”
“You don’t have to say anything,” I said gently. “You don’t have to decide anything. I just…needed you to know that.”
She didn’t speak.
Not right away .
She looked down at her mug again, like maybe if she stared long enough the steam would rise and write a clear answer in the air.
I didn’t rush her.
Didn’t fill the silence with anything but my presence.
And finally, after what felt like forever wrapped in one soft, glowing kitchen, she exhaled.
“I’m not ready to jump back into anything,” she said, her voice barely more than a breath. “I don’t even know what I’m ready for.”
“That’s okay,” I said again.
“I’m scared,” she admitted. “Not just of you. Of me. Of falling again and not knowing if I can catch myself this time.”
The honesty in her voice hit like a punch and a prayer all at once. She wasn’t building walls—she was laying herself bare.
My heart ached, not in that teenage-heartbreak way, but in that adult, deep-down, soul-level ache that came from seeing the person you loved trying to protect the most tender parts of themselves.
“I get that,” I said. “You don’t have to fall. Not all at once.”
I took a step closer.
“Just…walk with me. That’s all I’m asking.”
It was a lie.
Because I didn’t just want a walk.
I wanted everything. Her hand in mine, her voice in my ear, her forever folded into mine like it was the only way either of us made sense.
Her eyes lifted to mine again, and something in them softened—not a green light, not a promise. But maybe a chink in the armor. A flicker of warmth in a room that had stayed cold too long.
“Walk?” she repeated, as if testing the word in her mouth.
“Walk,” I said again, quietly.
She hesitated. And then, without a word, she reached out and offered me her hand .
I didn’t hesitate.
I took it.
Warm. Steady. Familiar.
And mine.
Not in the way I wanted—not yet.
Because what I wanted was to kiss her until her knees gave out, to pull her into my chest and never let her go again, to burn down every second we’d lost and start over from the ashes.
But I didn’t do any of that.
We didn’t kiss.
We didn’t say forever.
We didn’t fall into each other like every instinct in my body was screaming to do.
Instead, we walked out of that kitchen side by side, our hands intertwined like a lifeline. Like a promise no one had said aloud yet—but one I already felt sinking into my bones.
And for now?
For this fragile, borrowed second?
That was enough.
But fuck, I wanted more .