Chapter 26
Pen
Bear's dark eyes watch me carefully. I keep my breath controlled, but barely.
"The pub lady made me think of it," I say. "If you'd married Tamara, you might have had four kids of your own already."
Since our wedding kiss, my body tries to go into all sorts of weird states.
Randomly. Disconcertingly. Clearly, the parts of my brain that can't be reached by reason are going through it, and processing something new.
I'm not privy to the contents yet, but they feel intimate. Sometimes sexy. Scary, too.
All I can do for now is manage it all by holding a stable breathing pattern. In books, they taught me that helps.
Had Bear married Tamara, I would know if Bear's promises about the endurance of our friendship would stand the test of time. If he'd married her, he would be a dad most likely. Who knows how that would have changed things between us, considering how his romantic relationship impacted us.
When he and Tamara were together, Bear did his best to include me and spend time with me, but it didn't always work out that way.
For one reason or another, Tamara would often be there too.
It would be fun, of course, because she was so damn great…
but my one-on-one time with my best friend went from perfect to too little, and I missed him. I missed him so much.
I never told him. Not even when he started having inside jokes with her too, and was able to communicate with his girlfriend without words.
Until then, that had only been possible between him and me.
Just a few short months after I met her at the café, she was his go to— or so it seemed to me.
I heard everything, and I knew everything, but I was second.
He lifts an amused eyebrow. "Quadruplets? Two sets of twins? Tell me what I would have been aiming for, in your head. Because Tamara and I would have been married for less than two years, had I proposed. Hard to make the math work for four kids in such little time."
I roll my eyes. "You know what I mean."
"Yeah, that Tamara and I would have had to be fucking as if I had a breeding kink."
"I don't know if you have that kink— or any kink—" I stutter.
God. Does Bear have kinks? What might it feel like to have him carrying out fantasies with you— on you— to be taken and used by a man like him— I bet one would forget to breathe— you'd forget you exist from the power of it—
What the fuck am I doing? My banter skills have all but died. All I manage is to make myself breathless. I'm embarrassing myself.
I keep going before he can respond to that dangerous question. "Not that it matters—"
"I don't have a breeding kink, Penélope." He interrupts me, shaking his head like he's begging for a reprieve.
"Not the point," I finally say. "The point is that, bar fertility issues, you could be a dad by now. Fertility issues are more common than people think. But you want to be a dad."
And I find it harder to think about than I thought.
Not only because it means he'd be having sex with someone else.
I mean, with a girlfriend. Or his Future Wife, the one he'll marry for real one day, and with whom he might try to make babies.
It's because it's another reminder of the kind of things he wants, that he won't find in our friendship.
"It's not totally up to me, isn't it?" he asks. "Fertility issues are one thing, but what if she doesn't want kids? All I can do is have the conversation early and hope we're on the same page. The rest is still up in the air."
Breathe in, breathe out. I need all the help I can get. Not because of the baby thing. I never cared to think much about kids, and it remains something I don't spend too much time on. But the baby making part…
I twirl a strand of hair around a finger. "Did Tamara not want kids? Is that why you didn't marry her?"
"We had a few conversations. She wanted kids."
He takes a long sip of beer. I do too. All the while, I don't stop staring at him.
From the relationship he had with Tamara, I learned what to expect from him finding his one true love. If I learn why he didn't marry her, after all, I might know what he's actually waiting for. It seems important, somehow.
"I know you fell hard for her," I say. "So why?"
He rubs his lips together. "I think I did, but… at the same time… I don't think I fell hard enough."
"But the way you looked at her—"
"It never felt right."
"Bear…"
His high standards to the rescue again… or playing him. One of the two.
He lifts a shoulder. "Marrying Tamara would have made sense, and it would have been romantic, and it would have kept her in the country."
"I remember something about her visa."
"Yeah, but she wanted to go back home. She said she'd stay for the right reasons, and I knew exactly what that meant." He smirks. "Couldn't do it."
"Do you think it would have felt right at some point?" I ask. "Maybe given enough time… isn't that how people used to do it a long time ago? Get married and hope for the best…"
Meanwhile we're the ones married, and I'm crossing my fingers I don't go all the way around and end up on the wrong side of things. The side where the feelings that appeared on our wedding day stay, and they get stronger somehow, and breathing can't keep up with any of it.
"Maybe, but… you know how I am." A corner of his lips curls as he looks at me.
I sigh. "You're dead romantic, Leon."
"I always waited for the day when kissing someone shattered everything I knew about reality. Tamara was amazing and we had something really good together, but… well…"
I frown. "I find it hard to believe you would have stayed if you didn't like kissing her."
I never saw them kiss beyond a quick peck, but didn't think much of it. In fact, I was grateful they kept it mild. Who wants to look at their best friend making out? It's not like a movie where they make it artistic at least.
"I didn't say I didn't like kissing her." His voice, until then assertive, softens like he can't find the right words. "It just never felt…"
He frowns, and I let him think. I focus on my lungs, relaxing my belly, and getting air deep into my chest.
He sighs. "You know how in the shows I love so much, there's this tension that builds and builds with every episode, until you feel like you need to stop watching to free yourself from the torment, but you can't? That desperation makes the moment they finally get together sweeter.
It makes it hard-earned. It feels like… success.
Those kisses— they literally change the script. "
I smirk. He knows I watch the shows when he wants us to, but I don't feel the same desperation he's talking about.
He lets out a self-deprecating chuckle. "Show runners rarely know what to do after their characters get together, but I know what I want them to do. I want them to never let go of what they found, and walk away into the sunset, hand-in-hand tackling whatever comes their way."
I nod. He watches me like he sees an irony to all of this he can't quite explain.
"With Tamara, I was never desperate." He sighs. "So now I read fanfic, and I wait."
Air thins out around me. If I'm not careful, I could get dizzy.
"I see." I press my lips together. "So you're still waiting for that kind of kiss."
Leon doesn't respond. He takes the last swig of his glass.
By instinct, I reach out and put my hand on his. "Do you really believe kisses like that can set the tone for everything else?"
Because kissing him did something to the way my body works, and it's rearranging connections deep in my brain, and I'm still trying to figure out how it's going to change my script.
At that, he leaves his glass on the table and licks his lips.
"Yeah," he says. "They can. That's why they matter so much."
"Maybe that's why it never worked back when I was dating. I never felt anything remotely like that."
I take a deep breath. This big man sitting in front of me, so handsome, so loyal, will kiss someone else one day, and feel that way. I'll go back to my role as a third wheel. I'll think back to the time we were married, and remember when kissing him gave me palpitations. I'll miss him again.
But I'll be happy when it happens for him, because I will know his soul is full of fireworks.
He smirks. "I'm glad to hear that it never happened for you."
"You are?"
He shifts our hands together, until his thumb rests on top of my rings.
He smirks. "If either of us had had a kiss like that before, we wouldn't be here."
That shouldn't feel romantic. My heart shouldn't skip a beat. It shouldn't feel hard to breathe. And none of it happens— not really. They are only a mirage, caused by what we're discussing, and whatever is happening in those deep parts of my brain I have no power over.
I'm glad to know better. Otherwise, the next phase would be having proper romantic feelings. I would start hoping for romantic things, and I could end up pretending I can be romantic like they are in those shows.
Fuck, if only I could be more like the people in those shows, then I might have taken more risks in life. But I'm not.
I manage a small smile. "Do you think Tamara knows we got married?"
He lifts both eyebrows as if he hadn't considered that before. "It's likely, I guess. If she follows anyone on social media… or if she's still in touch with any of her friends from Seattle and someone told her…"
"What do you think she makes of it?"
"I think she'd still be trying very hard not to be jealous. Just like she tried back then."
It shouldn't make me feel better that she was just as jealous of me as I was of her, where neither of us tried to make a big deal out of it. But if I can barely manage the way my body has been acting lately, I have much less power over my heart.
The ledge I step onto is made of old brick and mortar, just like Bear described. Nothing touches me, but I'm wearing a harness and I'm hooked to thick bungee cords.