Chapter Three #2
I kept walking. The closer I got to the house, the more my body wanted to pick up the pace, like I could close the distance just by will alone. I made myself slow down, even as my heart tried to race ahead.
I paused at the edge of the porch. From inside, I could hear laughter and the clatter of dishes. I waited a second, hands in my pockets, forcing myself to breathe slow. The door swung open, and I stepped inside, letting the warmth and noise wash over me.
Levi waited at the farmhouse door, backlit by the honey glow of kitchen lamps and the flurry of breakfast behind him.
He wore a threadbare t-shirt, the hem twisted from where he’d probably yanked it off the floor, and his hair stuck out at every compass point.
It shouldn’t have been a good look, but on him it was perfect—like he’d rolled out of bed and dared the world to find fault.
He was there, right where I’d pictured him. Levi. He looked up, caught my eye, and grinned so wide I felt it in my chest.
I let myself have that second, let it settle in my bones, before I went to him. That’s how I knew it was real—because every part of me, the parts that survived war and worse, still remembered how to want.
When he spotted me, something in his posture shifted, his whole body straightening. He hovered for half a second, then all but collided with me on the porch. The coffee in his hand sloshed dangerously close to the rim.
“Hey,” he said, and his voice came out weirdly soft, like a note held on a string just about to snap.
I didn’t answer right away. I took inventory: his pupils blown wide, shirt still rumpled from sleep, the thin band of leather at his wrist almost shining in the angle of morning light. I wanted to run my thumb over it, but I waited.
Instead, I said, “Morning, Sunshine.” He’d always hated the nickname—called it embarrassing, begged me not to use it. But now he smiled, big and full, and shook his head.
“Quiad,” he breathed out, my name like a secret between us.
He didn’t waste time. He all but fell against my chest, cheek pressed to the curve of my shoulder. His coffee mug clattered on the porch rail and he looped both arms around my waist, fingers digging in. I could feel the tremor running through him, half nerves, half relief.
“I missed you,” he said, as if we hadn’t just seen each other yesterday.
It was the kind of confession that would’ve embarrassed most people, but he was never one to ration out his feelings. He said the thing and then looked up, waiting to see if I’d flinch.
I didn’t. I wrapped one hand around the back of his head and let my fingers tangle in his hair—soft, barely dry from his rushed morning shower—and pulled him closer.
I bent down and kissed the crown of his head.
He made a sound, something between a sigh and a hum, and the rest of the tension melted out of his shoulders.
The world could’ve burned down around us and he wouldn’t have noticed.
He tilted his chin and blinked up at me, eyes half-closed like he was fighting off sleep or a trance. “That’s it?” he teased, but the edge was gone from his voice, replaced by something like awe.
“Thought you’d want to eat first,” I said, because I couldn’t risk saying the real thing: I want to keep you right here until we run out of breath.
He let out a huff and buried his face against my chest again. I held him for a few more seconds, letting his body heat sink through the denim and cotton to the skin beneath. My hand found his wrist and thumbed the edge of the bracelet, felt the slight pulse fluttering under it.
He was mine, and I didn’t need words to say it. He already knew.
The kitchen noise behind us swelled: Bodean yelling for more eggs, Harlow’s deep laughter shaking the rafters, someone slamming the fridge a little too hard.
I knew the second we walked in, the eyes would be on us.
Levi would go red, but he’d sit close anyway, shoulders glued to mine, and act like nothing had changed.
I liked that about him—the way he never apologized for wanting.
“Ready?” I asked.
He nodded, still pressed to my shirt, then stepped back and grabbed my hand. His palm was clammy with nerves, but his grip was steady.
We went in together, Levi leading the way, and for the first time in years, I let myself feel the pull. It wasn’t gravity, exactly. It was something stronger.
Breakfast at the McKenzie place was less a meal and more an event—a controlled riot of elbows, opinions, and strategically deployed napkins. The kitchen was already at max capacity, every surface burdened with food, condiments, or at least a stray elbow.
The table was long enough to seat a small army, but the benches forced everyone into proximity whether they liked it or not.
I’d refinished the top last year, sanding out most of the ancient Sharpie graffiti and burn marks, but the deeper scars remained, evidence of a thousand arguments and five generations of McKenzies.
Levi and I squeezed in on the end, right up against the window. Sunlight streamed through the gingham curtains and painted him gold, picking out every angle of his face and the ghost-fine hairs on his arm. I could smell him, even over the chaos—soap and something citrusy, new from the bottle.
Across the table, Knox and Newt were hunched together over a bowl of fruit, heads so close they may as well have been plotting to overthrow the government. Knox caught my eye and did a quick chin-jut in Levi’s direction, followed by the faintest smirk.
I ignored him.
Ma was on the opposite side, running breakfast like it was a military operation.
She kept sending plates down the line, but every time her gaze landed on me and Levi, she got glassy-eyed and fumbled the serving spoon.
She dabbed at her nose with a napkin, then shot me a look that hovered between pride and worry.
Pa didn’t say much. He sat at the head of the table, king of his battered domain, a mug of black coffee in one fist and the morning paper in the other. Every so often he grunted approval when someone passed him a dish, but he didn’t look up.
Bo—Baby Bo, even though he was pushing twenty-three—was already on his third helping of eggs. He regarded us with a shit-eating grin, one eyebrow cocked in a way that said, I know a secret and it’s killing me not to say it. I gave him a stare that should’ve shut him up. He grinned harder.
The only open seat left was to my right.
As soon as I slid onto the bench, Levi followed.
He pressed his thigh against mine, like he’d forgotten there was any other way to sit.
It felt good, solid. I dropped my hand to the table and curled my pinky around his, an anchor in the flood of morning noise.
Nobody said anything about the bracelet, not yet. But everyone noticed. The first time Levi reached for the jam, the band flashed in the sunlight, and Bo made a choking noise. Levi went red, but didn’t hide it.
I watched the rest of the family try to act normal, try to make small talk.
Harlow described in detail the new foal born overnight.
Ma asked if I’d fixed the tractor’s oil leak.
Knox and Newt started a debate about the best way to build a fence, voices rising until Pa thumped the table and told them to “let the damn horses build their own if it matters that much.” Levi laughed, quick and sharp, and the sound loosened something in my chest.
Through it all, I kept an eye on him. He kept looking at me, then away, like he was worried he’d get caught wanting more. Each time, I nudged his leg or tapped his shoe under the table, until finally he just leaned into me and stopped pretending.
It wasn’t lost on anyone. Even Pa, under all his bluster, watched us from the corner of his eye.
Toward the end of the meal, Ma set down her fork and cleared her throat. “Quiad,” she said, voice louder than necessary. “You boys have plans for the day?”
I shrugged. “Shop’s quiet. Might take Sunshine for a walk.”
Levi ducked his head, face blooming red at the nickname, but he was grinning.
Bo howled, “Sunshine? Really? You’re never living that down.”
Ma shot him a death glare, but it only egged him on. Harlow cracked up, Newt snickered, and even Knox let a real smile through.
Levi took it in stride. “I don’t mind,” he said, voice steadier than I expected. “Could be worse.”
“Damn right it could,” Pa muttered, then reached for more bacon.
I caught Ma watching us, her eyes going wet again. She smiled, shaky but genuine, and for a second the whole table went quiet.
That was all the blessing I needed.
I loaded my plate, ate my fill, and let myself enjoy the noise for once. Levi’s hand stayed hooked to mine under the table, his thumb rubbing the leather band slow and absent. I didn’t say anything about it, but I felt every brush of his skin.
When breakfast ended, I stood and pulled him with me. The others watched, curious but not unkind, and I could feel the question floating in the air: How far would we go with this?
Far enough, I thought.
I looked at Levi, who met my gaze head-on, and nodded. We were done hiding, and the family knew it. In the end, it wasn’t a spectacle or a fight. It was just us, together, shoulder to shoulder.
Sometimes, that was enough.
It was Bo who finally did it. The youngest always broke first. He stabbed his fork in the direction of Levi’s wrist, grin sharp enough to cut. “Nice bracelet you got there, Levi,” he said, dragging the words out so everyone had time to clock the meaning.
The table froze. Even the eggs seemed to stop steaming.
Levi flinched. His eyes darted to me, a silent question telegraphed across two feet of scarred pine and a year’s worth of unsaid things. The heat rushed up his neck, painting his ears a color you didn’t find in the natural world.
I didn’t hesitate. I never did, when it counted.
“He’s mine,” I said. No preamble, no apology. Just fact. My voice came out lower than I meant, and it shook the air like a threat and a promise in one.
The effect was immediate.
Ma let out a ragged little gasp and pressed her napkin to her mouth, tears leaking out even though her smile was so wide it threatened to split her face.
Pa nodded once, slow and solemn, then went back to his coffee like the universe had finally slotted into place.
Knox and Newt both grinned, the kind of grin that said about time, and Bo howled so loud he nearly lost his chair.
Levi just stared at me, like he wasn’t sure if he’d heard right.
I turned his wrist in my hand so the black letters faced up: Quiad, stamped deep. He covered my hand with his own, fingers small but strong, and the blush on his cheek spread all the way to his collarbone. He looked around the table, then back at me, and for the first time, he didn’t look away.
The noise of the kitchen roared back to life—laughter, forks, Ma’s wet sniffling—but it all blurred at the edges. For a long moment, there was only the heat of Levi’s hand, the faint pulse in his wrist, and the band that bound him to me.
We ate the rest of breakfast that way, side by side, not saying much but saying everything.
Afterward, as the others drifted out to chores or errands or just to make noise somewhere else, Levi stayed close. He touched the bracelet every few minutes, like he had to keep checking that it was real. Sometimes he caught me watching and rolled his eyes, but he never let go.
When it was finally quiet, he said, “You really mean it?”
I looked at him, at the freckles on his nose and the stubborn set of his jaw, and nodded. “I’ve always meant it.”
He grinned, soft and bright, and leaned in so our shoulders bumped. That was all the answer either of us needed. Some things, you only had to say once.