Chapter Thirty-Six
Micah pulled her car into the first street parking spot she found near her apartment, but she didn’t immediately get out.
She pulled out her phone, checking for a text message like she’d compulsively been doing for the past couple hours, but there was still nothing.
It wasn’t like John to go half a day without texting her back, but he was probably just busy.
The last message from him had come at an ungodly hour of the morning his time, which meant that she’d been asleep.
He’d asked what she had going on that day, and she’d told him the boring answer—cleaning her apartment, grocery shopping—and then asked what his plans were.
That had been six hours ago, and he’d never responded.
It had only been a week since she’d sent him her EP, and they’d had a really good conversation afterward.
He’d told her how much it had meant to him and had said very kind things about her songs, which she still felt weird and prickly even talking about, although it was getting easier.
She was gratified that he seemed to notice all the subtle details in the production she’d tucked in there just for him, that he was obviously still listening to the songs and thinking about them when he’d text questions about the choices she’d made.
Music was always one language she’d shared with John, and it felt good to have that back.
But she knew there was more they still needed to discuss, including the fact that even her saying she was “cleaning” her apartment was a little disingenuous. She just didn’t want to jinx anything before it was final, wanted to get a sense of the timeline before she brought her idea to John.
Micah must’ve had John so much on her mind that she was seeing things, because as she walked up to her apartment with her groceries she could’ve sworn she saw him, talking to Mr. Li downstairs.
There was his distinctive curly dark hair, a bit of scruff on his chin, the muscles of his back moving under his black T-shirt as he gestured toward her apartment.
“The one with the hair,” he was saying, bringing his hands up to his own as if to demonstrate. And that was what really did it—the sound of his voice, so dear and familiar, so much of a relief , like she’d been waiting to hear it for a hundred years.
“John?” she said, setting her groceries down on the sidewalk. “How did you—”
She wanted to go to him, wanted to fly at him and wrap her arms around him so hard she knocked him over, but she felt rooted to the spot.
Luckily, he seemed to have no such issue, and he said something else to Mr. Li that she couldn’t hear before he headed toward her, stopping when they were toe-to-toe on the sidewalk.
“I took a flight from Orlando,” he said. “With a connection in Phoenix.”
She laughed, the sound bubbling out of her almost hysterically. Obviously she didn’t mean literally how —she knew how air travel worked. She just couldn’t believe he was here, like this, standing in front of her.
“I was in the mood to be a bit presumptuous,” he said. “Like I didn’t bother booking a hotel, so I was hoping your offer to stay with you was still open.”
“Yes,” Micah said, hiccuping a little. She hadn’t known she was crying until John’s hands came up to her face, wiping at the dampness on her cheeks. “Yes, of course. For how long?”
“How long will you have me?”
“Forever,” she said, and then she did wrap her arms around him, her hands clenching at his back, his shoulders, any part of him she could touch. “I love you, John. God, I love you so much, and I’m sorry I couldn’t see it for so many years, I’m sorry I couldn’t say it—”
He leaned back to look at her, his hands on her face again, holding her so gently she thought she might really lose it.
“I realized I knew you did,” he said. “Even before your song, although that was the biggest gift. I’ve always felt your love, Micah, in every form it’s taken. I don’t take it for granted.”
She appreciated that, but she was still going to get all the words out, because she’d thought about them so much in the last couple weeks and she wanted to make sure she actually said them.
“I think when things seem too easy, I don’t trust them.
Even our song—‘If Only’—for years I’ve felt like it was too easy.
Do you know what I mean? The way it came together, the way it blew up like it did.
I didn’t feel like I deserved it, I didn’t feel like I’d earned it. ”
John started to say something, probably to assure her that of course she’d earned it, to remind her of how hard they’d worked at every part of their early career. But she was worried she was going off track already, and she didn’t want to get any further derailed.
“When you told me you loved me, it just seemed like…fuck, it can’t be this easy , can it? There has to be some catch, some pitfall that I’m just not seeing. Maybe I’m the pitfall. It can’t be as easy as just…being with you.”
“Micah,” John said, giving her a crooked smile. “You have to know that, when it comes to you, I’m incredibly easy.”
It was obviously meant as a joke, something lighthearted, but she shook her head because that was exactly what she wanted him to see.
“That’s the thing,” she said. “My whole life, everything has felt like…I don’t know.
A closed fist. Like I’m trying to hold on so tight, like I’m on the defensive, ready to throw a punch.
But you , you’ve always made me feel like I can just…
let go. Uncurl my fingers. Open up my hand. Does any of this make sense?”
His eyes were a little shiny, and he had to swallow before answering when it was clear she was waiting for him to. “It makes sense.”
“You’re the best person I know,” she said. “You’re kind and thoughtful and funny and warm and honest, you’re a great friend, you’re so talented—I love every part of you, John, and I want every part of you that you’ll give me.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Especially my—”
She reached up to tickle his neck right under his ear, where she knew she could get him to squirm. “The twenty-four hour rule is still in place,” she said. “And I really want to take you upstairs and have my way with you, so please don’t ruin it.”
“I won’t,” he said, still laughing. “I’ll be good. Fuck, I just really love you, Micah. I have for so long.”
She pressed a kiss to the corner of his mouth. “Then it’s a good thing you’re here,” she said. “Because I really fucking love you, and I plan on loving you for a very long time.”
“Speaking of a long time,” John said, gesturing down to the grocery bags at her feet. “Is that ice cream? We should put it away before it melts.”
She liked the way he already said that— we . He ended up grabbing his luggage while she handled the groceries, and she led him up the steps to her apartment, balancing one of the bags against her leg while she dug through her purse.
“Oh, one more thing,” she said as she finally got her key out and inserted it into the lock. “I should probably warn you—”
When she pushed the door open, it was to reveal the disarray she’d left her living room in, piles of stuff everywhere, stacks of boxes in one corner.
She still had her couch and TV, but she’d already given away her dining table and chairs, so there was a conspicuously empty space where they used to be.
He set his luggage down, seeming to take it all in. “You’re moving?”
“I fell for a guy who lived across the country,” she said. “California seemed too far away.”
John ran a hand over his face, giving a little laugh. “I guess this is what we get for both wanting to surprise each other, huh? A real ‘Gift of the Magi’ situation.”
“Don’t even bring that up,” Micah said. “Why did Mrs. Allen always assign the most traumatizing stuff?”
“She was an emotional sadist,” John said, but he already sounded distracted, looking around at the remnants of her life from the past decade.
There was a shelf filled with records, a picture of her and Hailey propped on top of it.
She’d painted the walls a warm pink, and she had a row of her most sun-needy plants lined up on the south-facing windowsill.
She’d spent so long thinking of this apartment as some kind of tower room, where she could isolate from the outside world, that she sometimes forgot that it had also been a haven.
It had been what she’d needed it to be, a safe space that was hers alone. She was proud of the home she’d made.
John reached down to pick up the grocery bags at her feet and took them into the kitchen, where he started unpacking everything on the stovetop.
“So when do you have to be out?”
“End of the month,” she said, automatically grabbing each item to put it away where it belonged. “Mr. Li actually bought the apartment for his son and his family. They just had their first baby, so Mr. Li will get to see his grandkid every day. I know he’s really excited about it.”
She glanced over to give him a sideways smile, but he’d moved to stand in front of the fridge, still holding the pint of ice cream in his hand like he’d already forgotten why he was there.
He was looking at the picture of them she’d stuck to the front of the fridge with a magnet, and he touched his finger to where her teen self sat cross-legged in the grass, then to his own laughing face.
“I wonder what we were talking about,” he said.
“What were we ever talking about,” she said, reaching around him to grab two spoons out of the drawer, then taking the ice cream from his hand. “Probably music.”
“Always music,” he said. “Speaking of which, I had an idea for that first track on your EP—a way we could get a little cheeky with some pop production stuff. If you were open to it. Obviously it’s your song.”
She opened the ice cream and handed him a spoon, leaning back against the counter as she took her first bite.
“I intended them to be our songs,” she said.
“And I would love to work with you on them, and write more together. Once we, you know, figure out where we’re going to live.
Is your room back in Orlando still available? ”
John dipped his own spoon into the ice cream, which was the perfect level of softness to let him easily scoop a generous amount. “I’m pretty sure Asa was measuring it to put a drafting table in there by the time I was at the airport.”
“Well, I wouldn’t have just invited myself into that situation anyway,” Micah said. “I’d always intended to get my own place. We can still do that in Orlando, or stay in L.A. if you’d rather. What do you think?”
But John just pressed his spoon to her lower lip, leaving a dab of ice cream there. “Oh,” he said. “You have a little—here, let me get it.”
He touched his warm tongue to the cold spot on her mouth, licking the ice cream off her.
“There,” he said. “That’s better.”
She rolled her eyes, although she was smiling. “Now that that’s settled, we should—”
John pressed his spoon to her lip again, leaving even more ice cream smeared there. “You just can’t seem to get it in your mouth, huh?” he said. “Don’t worry, I’ve got you.”
He started kissing her, but she was too busy laughing, her open mouth against his. “John,” she said in between kisses. “I’m trying to be serious here.”
He took the pint out of her hands, setting it next to them on the counter. With his arms bracketed around her, he leaned in, his gaze dropping to her mouth before lifting again to her eyes. “I’m always serious,” he said.
Of course she’d seen John’s goofy side, she loved seeing that side—but she knew that he typically had been the serious one, when they were kids and then later in the band. He was steady and strong and true, and that was what she saw in his eyes now when he looked at her.
“What are we going to do?” she whispered. She hated to think she’d already messed something up in their brand-new relationship, created a stressful situation with their living arrangements.
John nudged his nose against her cheek, pressing a kiss to her temple that she worried gave him more a mouthful of hair than anything else, but he didn’t seem to mind. “Whatever we want, Micah,” he said. “We’ll do whatever we want.”