Epilogue Kimberly
One year later…
“Good morning!”
I groaned at Gina’s bright tone. It was too early to be cheerful. From somewhere near my feet Vader made a sound that sounded like a sigh, as if he agreed.
“I want to die.”
Gina laughed. “I told you to stop sucking down those special wedding drinks.”
Gina’s friend Kyle married his boyfriend Steve yesterday with a lavish party that lasted long into the night. I’d never seen so much fancy food in my life. Those two really knew how to throw a party. Of course, it helped that Steve was a venture capitalist who had more money than God.
I’d been having such a fun time – and enjoying those ‘Stevetinis’ – that I didn’t realize how drunk I was until I nearly passed out in the Uber on the way home.
Fortunately I’d avoided puking until I got home.
My girlfriend either had a better tolerance, or she’d stopped drinking without me noticing because she seemed perfectly fine this morning.
“Come on, let’s go get ourselves some greasy breakfast food and waffles to absorb all the alcohol in our system.”
“Fine,” I grumbled.
After quick showers, we wandered out into the sunshine, both of us wearing sunglasses. We didn’t need them a lot living in Seattle, but when it was sunny, they made a difference. Especially when a person was hung over.
“What are you doing today?” Gina asked while we waited for our food to arrive.
“If I live through breakfast, I need to do some laundry today. What about you?”
“I’m going to head home and catch up on some stuff after we eat.”
“Or you could start packing,” I suggested.
“Packing?” she asked in confusion. “For what?”
We’d been dating for over a year now. It had been thirteen months of scheduling date nights and meeting for lunch and switching off between houses when we spent the night together.
Last night I’d watched two people who were obviously in love get married, and suddenly I was done with the idea of just dating.
I was tired of needing to pack a bag every time I spent the night with my girlfriend.
I wanted to wake up with Gina every morning just like I did today, even if she was annoyingly cheerful in the morning.
Part of me was surprised that she didn’t mention us moving in together after our self-imposed one year deadline. But part of me wasn’t. Gina really had changed since our first time around, and she continued to go to therapy to make sure she processed any challenges that came up.
But she wasn’t the only one. I’d also done a lot of work on myself over the past eighteen months since I audited her program.
We’d both grown a lot over the last year, and I was glad we’d grown together instead of apart. We’d been working hard on our communication, learning to have honest conversations and share our feelings. We were in a good place now, better than ever.
Even my cat had grudgingly accepted Gina’s presence in our life. It helped that she’d started bringing him some fancy fish cat treats that she picked up at the natural grocery store. Vader was nothing if not a kitty snob.
I set my coffee cup down carefully and leaned forward so I could watch Gina’s reaction.
“I want you to move in with me.”
Her head shot up, a shocked expression on her face.
“Are you serious right now?”
“Deadly serious,” I said firmly.
“Do you think we’re ready?”
I nodded. “We are. We’ve been dating for well over a year, and I can honestly say you’re my best friend. I want to spend every day and every night with my best friend.”
“We still need to keep our own lives and our own friends,” she said. “We’ve done a good job of ensuring that we’re not too enmeshed. I don’t want that to change.”
“I don’t think that’s likely after all this time,” I reassured her. “But yes, we definitely need to maintain our own interests and friends. I want to merge our lives, not obliterate them.”
Gina was quiet for so long I started to get nervous.
“We can wait. If you aren’t ready or you have doubts or whatever, we don’t have to do this now. Or ever,” I babbled. “But I hope we move in together eventually. I know you want to have a family someday and I do too and that’ll be easier if we’re not living across town from each other.”
Gina smiled, and just like always, the sight of it made my breath hitch a little. Finally she nodded.
“My lease is expiring in two months. How about if I move in some stuff and we do a trial run, and if things continue to go well, I’ll move the rest of the way in when my lease is up.”
It was a sensible response, but I must have made a pouting face because Gina laughed.
“Don’t worry, I have full confidence our trial run will work just fine,” she said. “We have a good record with trial runs. I’ll move in after a few months and then you won’t be able to get rid of me.”
“I never want to get rid of you,” I said. “I love you. You’re the woman I was meant to spend the rest of my life with.”
Just then the server came with our food, dropping the plates on the table.
“You ladies want anything else?” she asked, seemingly unaware that she’d interrupted a special moment.
Gina’s eyes stayed fixed on me. “No, we’re good thank you.”
As soon as the server left she reached across the table and picked up my hand, bringing it to her lips and kissing my knuckles.
“I want to spend the rest of my life with you too, Kimberly,” she said sweetly. “Now let’s eat our breakfast and go back to bed to celebrate moving to the next step in our relationship.”
“Great idea.”
***
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