35. George
Chapter Thirty-Five
George
I don’t realize I’m in real trouble until she falls asleep on me.
Literally, on me.
We’re on the couch, some movie playing I’m not even pretending to follow.
She insisted on a “low-impact night,” which, in Mia’s terms, means snacks, a blanket, and picking apart plots like we’re on a panel.
I last maybe twenty minutes before my focus abandons any attempt to follow the story and settles on her instead.
She’s in my t-shirt and a pair of shorts, legs curled under the blanket, hair scraped up into some messy knot that keeps leaking strands down her neck. Every time she laughs, she tips forward, touching my arm, like her body doesn’t know how not to reach for me.
I don’t know when that started.
I only know I never want it to stop.
She shifts, yawns, then leans sideways and just… drops her head in my lap. Like it’s the most natural thing in the world. Like we do this all the time. And my body immediately goes rigid.
“Sorry,” she mumbles, already half gone.
“You’re just… comfortable.” Comfortable.
My pulse is trying to punch its way out of my neck, and she calls me comfortable.
I swallow hard and force my hand to stay exactly where it is, resting on the back of the couch, not sliding into her hair, not skimming her shoulder, not doing any of the things I’ve imagined doing a thousand times in the dark.
Her breath evens out.
Her lashes flutter once, twice, and then she’s asleep. On me. Her cheek is warm against my thigh. One of her hands is curled, palm open over my knee like she meant to grab on and missed. She smells like my soap, her shampoo, and something sweet from the snacks we demolished earlier.
I stare at the TV and see absolutely nothing. I should move her. I should wake her up, send her to her own bed, put some distance between us before I do something I can’t take back. I don’t move.
Not an inch.
Because this—this soft weight, this unconscious trust, this unconscious claim—is the closest thing to peace I’ve felt in over a decade. So, I sit there and let my walls come apart.
Every mission, every scar, every letter, every night in that hospital room with her fingers wrapped around mine, all of it unravels in the silence. And underneath it, the truth I’ve been dodging for months lies bare: I am truly in love with her.
I love her in the way that rearranged me.
In a way that makes every day before her feel black-and-white.
I love the way she overthinks everything and still chooses people.
I love the way she laughs like she doesn’t know how beautiful it makes her.
I love the way she looked at me in that hospital bed like I was worth all twenty-seven hours it took to get there.
I love that she came when no one else did.
And yeah, I want her. God, I want her. My body has been very clear about that from the moment I saw her pictures.
But it’s more than wanting to get her into my bed.
I want her in all the quiet, boring, stupid parts of my life too.
I want her burnt dinners, her bad TV recommendations, her ridiculous cereal habits, and her notes stuck to the fridge because she thinks she’ll forget something and never actually does.
I want… everything.
The movie ends. Another starts, and I still don’t move. Her breathing stays soft and steady, and every rise and fall of her chest against my leg dials the ache in my chest tighter.
At some point, the sky outside the window darkens, then lightens again, and I realize I haven’t slept. I’ve just been sitting here, one hand hovering close enough to feel her warmth, not quite brave enough to touch.
By the time the credits roll on whatever’s playing now, my mind feels scraped raw from all the things I’ve admitted to myself with no one else listening.
I’m done lying about it.
She wakes up to the smell of coffee and light.
The sun has made it over the buildings, spilling through the window onto the couch, onto her hair, making the stray strands glow. It’s barely five in the morning.
I coaxed myself out from under her half an hour ago, slowly, carefully, so I wouldn’t wake her. My legs were pins and needles, and my back protested, but none of that mattered. I’d have let my whole body go numb if it meant she slept.
Now she stirs, lashes fluttering, nose scrunching in that way she does when she’s trying to pretend she’s not awake yet.
“Hey there,” I say, leaning on the doorway with two mugs in my hands. “You alive?”
She blinks at me, dazed. “Did I—did I fall asleep here?”
“Yeah.” My mouth tugs. “On me. For hours and hours. Kinda rude, honestly.”
Her eyes widen. Color rushes to her cheeks. “George. Why didn’t you wake me up? Your leg, oh my god, are you—”
“Mia,” I say, handing her a mug, “I’m fine.
” She takes it with both hands, fingers wrapping around the ceramic.
The T-shirt she’s wearing is too big for her, and by now it has slipped off one shoulder, exposing the soft curve where her neck meets her collarbone and the place where her breasts start. I try very hard not to stare.
I fail miserably.
She shifts self-consciously, pulls the fabric up. “You should have shoved me onto the other couch or my bed.”
“That seems like a violation of house rules,” I say. “You were out cold.”
She groans softly. “I drooled, didn’t I?”
“A little,” I say, because she is cute when she’s offended. She gapes at me.
I grin. “I’m kidding. You just talked in your sleep.”
Her eyes go huge. “What did I say?”
“You complained about a burnt toast,” I say. “Which sounded like it happens often.” She throws a cushion at me. I catch it with one hand, my body remembering movements my muscles are still relearning.
I put my mug down on the table, hand suddenly slick with sweat. “I have something for you,” I say.
She freezes. Her eyes narrow, curious. “George, you didn’t have to—”
“It’s just a little something…” That clearly doesn’t reassure her, but she watches as I walk to my room and pull open the drawer; she has opened it half a dozen times without noticing it.
The letter is right where I left it. Every word pressed into the page, as if I were trying to anchor myself with ink.
I carry it back to her, feeling like I’m carrying my own chest cavity around in my hands.
Her gaze flicks from the paper to my face. “What’s that?”
“A letter,” I say.
“I can see that.”
“I wrote it months ago,” I say, ignoring the way my voice roughens. “When I was still deployed. I never sent it.” The air shifts between us. She sets her mug down slowly, both hands now free, as if she knows she’s about to hold something heavy.
She takes it like it might shatter if she handles it wrong. Her thumb traces the fold before she opens it. Her eyes scan the first line, and I watch everything in her face change.
I could recite the letter from memory. I wrote it when I realized this wasn’t just temporary, that I wasn’t just grateful for her kindness, that I was in real danger of falling for someone I’d never touched.
I wrote about the way her letters made the base feel less like a holding cell and more like a hallway leading somewhere.
I wrote about how I checked the mail like a rookie, how I read every page twice, fast and slow. I wrote about how I pictured her at the window, and somehow it was the only place that made sense to stand in my head.
I think I’m falling for you, and I have no idea what to do about it from here.
Her eyes travel those same words now, mouth slightly parted, throat working around each line. She doesn’t say anything. She just reads. All of it. When she reaches the end, she slowly folds the page, hands trembling. Then she looks at me. Her eyes are wet. Bright. Wide open.
“Oh, George.” She whispers.
Standing under that gaze feels like standing in front of a blast again, only this time I walked here willingly.
“I didn’t send it,” I say, voice low. “Because it felt insane. Because I told myself I was just grateful. That you were just a… lifeline. A friend.”
Her lips part in a shaky exhale.
“And then you got that notice,” I say. “And you came anyway. You sat in that hospital room and held my hand and talked like you weren’t sure I could hear you, and all I could think was I am already gone for you.
” She flinches like the words hit her body.
I step closer, heart pounding. “I haven’t stopped feeling like that,” I say. “Not once. Not since.”
The silence between us thickens. My palms are damp. Every scar on my body feels like it’s humming.
She sets the letter carefully on the coffee table without looking away from me. Then she stands. Bare feet on hardwood. My shirt hangs loose around her thighs. “Come here.” She says, her voice shaking.
I do.
She meets me halfway.
For one long, suspended heartbeat, we just stand there. Close enough that I can feel her warmth, see the flecks of color in her eyes, count the freckles on her nose.
Then she reaches up, curls her fingers into the collar of my t-shirt, pulls herself onto her toes, and kisses me. Soft at first. Just the press of her mouth to mine, testing and questioning if we are really doing this.
Then I answer, yes, to all of it.