Chapter 17
Exactly Enough
Maisie
After the kiss in the gazebo, with the town activity fading behind us, I follow Beau through the door of his house, my heart still pounding.
He silently takes my apron, hangs it carefully, and stands with one hand on the back of his neck, fingers absently working circles into the muscles, coaxing courage to surface.
“I still can’t believe you kissed me in front of the entire town,” I say teasingly.
“I couldn’t have stopped myself if I wanted to,” he elbows me in the ribs gently, then reaches out, fingers twitching playfully toward my side.
Wait. Beau’s a tickler?
He grins, hesitates, fingers hovering mid-air before retreating, then lowers his hand and shrugs with a playful withdrawal. “I’m not really into tickling,” he says, a little sheepish. “I was just being goofy.”
Despite his attempt at silliness, the tension still crackles between us, grows even. I laugh once, soft and breathy, but even I can hear the way it fades too fast. We’re standing on the edge of something, and everything in me is ready to jump and have Beau catch me.
The chemistry between us hangs, taut and stretched between the canyon of what is and what could be, a rickety bridge already straining under the weight of what we want and the fear of rushing things.
My heart pounds, my chest tightening directly above my sternum, and the question slips out before I can stop it, leaving me feeling almost nakedly vulnerable: “Would you still have kissed me if the whole town hadn’t been watching?”
I brace myself, almost wishing I could take it back—but it’s out there now, teetering in the atmosphere between us—too big to ignore, too full of risk to hurry.
Beau doesn’t respond immediately. His gaze is deep and searching.
He holds mine, as if trying to decipher the unspoken fears and doubts still flickering beneath my question.
The sensations of that very public kiss are fresh in my mind.
But what if it was merely an impulsive reaction to the attention of the crowd, or a way to get back at me for my dare?
In this, a rare moment alone in tiny Sweetpines, I need to know if it was really more than a performance. And I need reassurance that the gazebo kiss wasn’t just emotional spillover from the music hall. That it meant something on its own.
His eyes never wavering from mine, Beau lifts his hand, every movement deliberate, each action carrying the truth of his answer.
His knuckles brush against my cheek, warm enough to ripple through me and chase the air from my lungs.
Something twisted tight inside me gives way, eased by the contact of his skin.
Then, he cups my face, his thumb grazing my cheekbone—a gesture so intimate it feels as though he’s seeing every layer of who I am. I let my lashes fall.
He leans in, his nearness skimming past my cheek, close enough to stir the tiny hairs along my jaw, and brushes butterfly-soft kisses on each eyelid.
Then he presses a kiss to my forehead. It’s not only tender.
It feels like a reverent oath. His nearness is intoxicating as I let the warmth of his lips soak into me, calming the flutter still stirring inside.
Next, he moves his lips to the bridge of my nose, a gentle nuzzle that sends tremors down my spine, as if it were a seed nestling into the soil.
His kisses are silently tiptoeing across my face, a space sacred to him.
My temple. The corner of my mouth. My chin.
Each place he finds feels known and important, as if he’s honoring the parts of me no one else has ever truly acknowledged.
Where I’ve smiled, cried, held back, each kiss a promise that he sees it all and still wants more.
When he finally finds my mouth, he kisses me fully.
This kiss doesn’t ask or perform. It affirms, boldly.
There’s no question in his kiss. No hesitation. It deepens with the kind of certainty that strips thought away, leaving only response. I sink into it, into him, my hand finding his hair, weaving through the long strands until his breath hitches.
Not from surprise, but from something that sounds close to surrender.
His arms wrap around me, drawing me close, closer, until there’s no air between us. This is his answer, and I relish the thrum of being wanted along with the bone-deep relief of being chosen.
The rest of it—the town, the festival, the dare, the pretending—fades into nothingness, and we begin to sway to a rhythm that belongs only to us.
He rests his cheek against the top of my head, giving me access to draw in the unique scent of his chest. The moment settles around us like a secret we both know by heart.
I don’t know how long we stay there, wrapped up in each other. But when we finally part, unstrung and dazed, he rests his forehead on mine. My eyes stay closed. I don’t need to see him to know that he’s here. That he’s mine.
His hand moves to the small of my back, still wanting to keep me in this space of togetherness, grounded by the connection we’ve found.
“Maisie,” he whispers, voice rough, “every kiss, every touch, every moment—it’s all for you. Not for them. Not for anyone else. Just you.”
I open my eyes, and everything in his face tells me he means it. Every doubt that’s been coiled in me unspools. I smile, soft and shaky, while my heart dances.
“Stay,” he says. “Just for a little while. Be with me.” His voice is barely more than a murmur, warm from our kisses, thick with wanting, like he’s offering more than he dares name.
I nod, my voice too thick to speak.
He leads me to the couch where his guitar rests and pushes it gently aside.
We sit together for what must be hours, telling stories from our childhoods, laughing, crying, continuing our journey towards fully knowing and choosing each other.
As we talk, our fingers explore the shape of each other’s hands, backs, and shoulders while our hearts do their own silent roaming.
At some point as it’s getting late, I realize that I never told him what I intended to if I had run into him the night I overheard him playing and singing at the music hall.
I could have shared my feelings that evening, but I was so swept away by the music and emotion brought on by it that I left without saying what I needed to say.
I inhale deeply, willing my voice to work as I reach inside myself and pull out the places that have hurt the most for so long. “Beau, can I tell you something?”
“Anything, sweetheart. Always.”
Tugging on one of my curls, I begin timidly. “Since I was a young girl, I’ve been told I’m too much. Too loud. Too intense. Too emotional. Too…big.”
I sigh and pause. Beau tilts his head letting me know he’s listening.
“I’ve spent years trying to take up less space so that people want me around.
So I don’t embarrass them. I believed the lie that I need to earn the space allotted to me, and if I couldn’t do that…
” I bite my lower lip. “If I wasn’t good enough to earn that, then I needed to be smaller… take up less space.”
“I’ve noticed,” he offers softly.
“You have?” A soft heat unfurls behind my ribs. “It’s just that…now that I’m with you, and I want that more than anything, I keep waiting for the moment you’ll feel it too—that I’m... too much. And you’ll want out also.”
Beau’s reply isn’t poetry, but it’s no less truthful. “Maisie, you’re the first person I’ve met who feels like more in the best way. You don’t take up too much space. You fill it beautifully and uniquely.” He reaches for my hand, caressing my skin, centering me.
But my voice still quivers as I continue, “Gray trained me to be less. To blend in.”
Stroking my hair now, Beau is silent, giving me time to find the right words.
“I learned to fill only the exact space he created for me, to be who he wanted. To fit his mold. I thought that was what love required.”
“Oh, my Maisie, I’m sorry you went through that. Gray was so wrong. You’re vivid. You’re present. You’re full of life. That’s not something to fix—it’s something to show off.”
He squeezes my hand. “You are you, and I want that from you.”
“That’s it, Beau. You give me room to be all of me. And I can’t tell you what that means, because I feel as though most people…want me smaller.”
He gives me a reassuring smile as I continue, “With you, I don’t feel small, and I don’t feel the need to be. You see me, all of me, and I can breathe. Expand. Be as bubbly and boisterous and silly as I want to be at any moment.”
“Maisie…it’s your bigness, the radiance you wear like a crown, that I fell in love with.”
I lift my palm to my chest and inhale quickly.
Did he just say the “L” word?
But he’s moving on already as if it was completely natural to mention that he loves me.
“The way you feel everything. Say the hard things. Laugh as if the world’s still worth celebrating. You’re not too much—you’re exactly enough.”
He takes my face between his warm palms and meets my eyes.
“Don’t ever shrink for me. Promise me that.”
I can’t answer. My voice is clogged with gratitude and relief that he understands, sees me, and wants the real me.
He kisses me then, again and again, achingly slow, composing a tender, true melody with each unhurried touch, not rushing a single note.
My heart pumps madly. He pulls away, keeping his eyes closed.
When he stands, offering me his hand, I take it.
But he doesn’t lead me down the hallway toward the bedroom, where I expected him to.
Instead, he stands in place, right there in front of the couch, not moving anywhere, and catches my other hand with his.
Then he weaves all our fingers together, forming the single, interlocked shape of one fist between us.
Everything in his touch says he wants to savor each second and treasure each touch.
He lifts our bundle of fingers until they rest directly over his heart, then presses them together flat against his chest. I can see them rise and fall with each inhale and exhale.