Chapter Thirty-Six Lucy
Chapter Thirty-Six
Lucy
I’ve never been nervous meeting up with Katherine before, but I’ve been experiencing a lot of firsts in my life recently.
“We don’t need to tell them everything,” I say.
“What’s everything? How fucking sweet you taste on my tongue?” Hunter asks. “How you’re permanently wet around me, or how you close around my cock like—”
“Hunter,” I say, glancing around to see if anyone is listening to our conversation as we head toward Madison and 63rd.
“This is New York,” he says dismissively. “No one’s interested in our sex life.”
There’s no arguing with that. Everyone in New York has enough going on with their own lives without gossiping about perfect strangers.
“I just mean about the move and everything,” I say.
“You don’t want them to know we’re moving in together?” Hunter comes to an abrupt halt on the sidewalk. “How come?”
I scan his face. He looks genuinely confused and maybe a little hurt.
“I’m just worried Katherine will think it’s too fast.”
“So?” he asks.
“So, I don’t want to have to field questions. And have her questioning my judgment. Then she’ll tell Mom, and everyone will be in my business. Before I know it, I’ll be moving into an apartment I don’t want to live in because that’s what Mom and Katherine think is the right thing to do.”
He shakes his head. “Well, it will be my apartment as well, and they’re not going to push me into living anywhere I don’t want to live. And . . .”
“And what?” I say. I’m not used to Hunter holding anything back from me. I don’t want him to start now.
“I think that’s the woman you were. But things have changed, Lucy.
I’m not sure you’d be so easily pushed around now.
I don’t think you want to please them over yourself anymore.
You don’t have the same need to be liked by your mom.
Maybe it’s because you know how much I like you .
. .” He presses a soft kiss to my lips, and I feel his smile against my mouth.
He’s right. The old me would have been chastened by my mother. I would have ended up taking another place in Brooklyn because it was cheaper and because that’s what my mom thinks is best.
But I’ve already told Hunter I want to live on the Upper West Side. The lower end. I’ve been pretty specific with him. So why am I so concerned with what Mom and Katherine are going to say?
“It’s just memories,” Hunter says like he’s reading my mind. “You don’t need to question it. You’ve spent a huge chunk of your life trying to please other people. Now you don’t have to. It’s going to take some getting used to. Don’t stress.”
“So you think we should just come right out with it?”
Hunter shrugs. “There’s no reason to hide.”
I pull my shoulders back. He’s right: I have no reason to hide anything about my life from anyone. If people love me, they’ll be happy for me. If they don’t, they won’t. It’s as simple as Hunter makes it seem.
Katherine and Ed are already seated in the restaurant when we arrive. It’s the first time the four of us have been together since the wedding.
We all hug and take a seat. Katherine is beaming as usual.
There’s something different about the dynamic between Hunter and Ed.
They seem closer somehow. Like a barrier that was between them has been broken down or something.
Hunter told me about flying to Boston to get things back on track with Ed after the honeymoon, and it’s obviously worked.
“How’s the new house?” I ask. “I can’t wait to visit.”
“You have to come stay soon.” Katherine pauses. “Well, not too soon, because the entire thing’s a mess. We have so much to do.”
“Everything needs changing,” Ed says. “But it’s our forever home, so we don’t mind if it takes a while.”
“Just not too long,” Katherine says.
“How’s Mom with everything?” I ask.
Katherine winces. “I mean, not great. I’m getting the Lucy treatment. She’s being snippy and making snide comments.” She and Ed share a glance, and I can tell my sister gets strength from the man she loves. Strength to cope with the disapproval of our mother.
I nod, knowing exactly what Katherine is going through.
“She’ll get used to it . . .” I stop myself. “Well, she might never get used to it, but you’ll get used to her disapproval.”
“Ed says I need to train myself to tune it out.”
Ed and Hunter exchange a look. They’ve clearly had a conversation about this: our mom and the power she wields over us. Or at least, she did. Her power is waning as we move forward in our own lives.
“We have news,” I say, squeezing Hunter’s hand under the table. “We’re apartment-hunting.”
Katherine squeals. “You’re moving in together?”
We’re not just moving in together. It’s more serious than that, but from the outside looking in, we’re taking the next step.
“Yeah, we’re looking in this area, actually. A few blocks south.”
“So we can both walk to work,” Hunter adds. “Eventually, the nanny will walk the kids with us, so we can have as much time with them as possible.”
Katherine’s eyes flare. “You’re pregnant?”
Hunter laughs. “Not yet.” He turns to me. “Are you?”
It’s my turn to laugh, and I shake my head. “Very definitely not pregnant,” I confirm.
“Right,” Hunter says. “But later on. When we have kids.”
“So this is a real thing,” Katherine says.
I shrug. “He’s it for me.”
Hunter grins, leans across, and kisses my cheek. “She’s more than enough for me.” He laughs, and I elbow him in the ribs. “In the best possible way. She’s the woman I want to spend the rest of my life with. I want her to be the mother of my children and . . . yeah, I want us to grow old together.”
Katherine sits back in her seat. “Well, this isn’t what I was expecting to hear today. I thought you were going to tell us you’d split up and that it was all amicable, but that was that, or that you’d only ever pretended to be together to keep me happy.”
Hunter squeezes my thigh, but neither of us say anything.
“I didn’t think that,” Ed says. “I knew when Hunter came to Boston that things had changed for him. And Lucy was that change.”
“You’re right,” Hunter says. “Lucy showed me the man I want to become.”
I glance across at him. How did I get so lucky? I feel like he plucked me out of a hurricane of desperation. Desperate to be the good sister, the loved daughter, the capable paralegal. And now I’m . . . me. Not desperate to be anything or anyone but who I am.
“You were always that man,” I say to him.
“Not until I met you,” he replies.
“Good grief,” Katherine says. “Who are the two of you? What have you done with my feisty sister and my husband’s grumpy business partner?”
I shrug. “We fell in love, I guess.”
Katherine reaches for my hand. “I’m so happy for you. And I’m also happy for us, because we get to go on double dates, go on vacations together, live life . . . the four of us.”
“Wanna move to New York?” I suggest.
“Wanna come to Boston?” Katherine asks.
“It’s not so far away,” Hunter says. “We should all go in on a beach house for the summers.”
“On Martha’s Vineyard,” Katherine and I chorus.
“That’s where we should get married,” Hunter says, his face full of possibility and hopefulness. “We should rent out that house again and get married where we first fell in love.”
“You’re so romantic,” I say. I narrow my eyes. “And did you just propose?”
“I thought I had already,” he says. “Are you in any doubt that there’s anyone else for me but you?”
I shake my head and try to bite back a grin. Hearing how he loves me still hits me right in the chest. I’m not sure that feeling of surprise and bliss will ever go away. At least, I hope it doesn’t.
“Me neither,” he says. “I’d like to take your last name, if that’s okay, and know we’re bound together in law as well as love. I want all of that with you. So will you marry me?”
Contentment unfurls through my body like internal sunshine, leaving me warm and satiated, and I smile at the man beside me whom I’m going to marry.
So this is how good life can get. I really had no idea.
I stare at him, his cheeks rosy, his hair deliciously ruffled.
There’s not much for me to say. If he wants to marry me, my answer’s yes.
Of course it is. “I’ll marry you on Martha’s Vineyard,” I say.
“Or at the top of the Empire State Building, or out at sea. I’ll follow wherever you lead me. ”
Hunter cups my head and presses his lips to mine. The familiar buzz is back, and I sink into him, wanting no space between us.
We end our kiss and press our foreheads together.
“Can we get some champagne?” Ed asks a passing waiter. “Our best friends just got engaged.”
We turn back to the table, linking our hands and fingers.
“I’m matron of honor, right?” Katherine asks.
I wince. “I mean, yeah, of course, there’s no one else. But I don’t want a big fancy wedding.” I turn to Hunter. “Unless you do?”
He shakes his head. “Just the four of us on the beach in Martha’s Vineyard works for me.”
I can’t think of anything better. Me in a white dress next to Hunter, pledging to love him for the rest of my life, with my sister and Hunter’s best friend right next to us.
It’s all I need. I don’t need to be the perfect daughter.
The perfect sister. The perfect employee.
I just want to be the woman who loves Hunter, and the woman Hunter loves back.