26. Kendall
Kendall
Here’s the thing. The cynics, the critics claim chivalry is dead, that all the good ones are already taken. Those people have never met Kai Matsumoto. Those people have never been on a first date with him. Or in my case, a second first date with him.
He shows up at my apartment with flowers, because of course he has flowers, and that gorgeous smile that does stupid, crazy, beautiful things to my heart.
His entire presence sets me off kilter and causes my chest to constrict.
The smell of his cologne, woodsy with a hint of spice, the way he moves with quiet grace and confidence, the way he looks at me like I alone am tethering him to this earth.
I have to check my pulse to make sure I am, in fact, still breathing.
He asks all the right questions, compliments my outfit, holds the door open for me.
Stares at me once, twice, three times like he can’t believe I’m real.
And I remember all the little, insignificant, subtle reasons I fell in love with him alongside all the obvious ones.
And isn’t that what love is? All the invisible things, the million nuances, that when added up and taken together make someone you can’t stand to live without.
***
The walk from my apartment complex to his car is short but cold.
The gray February day frozen and biting at our skin.
Kai curls a protective arm around me, tucking me into his side as we hurry through the parking lot and I’m grateful he can still read me like an open book.
Once we get in the car, we sit in comfortable silence broken up by easy smiles and stolen glances.
He takes my hand in his, interlacing our fingers and the car suddenly feels like it’s a thousand degrees inside.
The toasty heated seats, his presence, and the feel of his skin against mine sets my nerves on fire and thaws my frigid body.
How is it that we’re this close and still not close enough?
He gets off the exit and all at once, I’m struck by reminders of our youth; the nostalgia for simpler times caresses me like a gentle hug.
We pass by familiar streets and restaurants.
Hyde park where we spent hours as kids running around, playing, climbing trees, and getting dirt under our fingernails.
Jefferson’s, the convenience store Kai’s dad always used to send him and his brother to for miscellaneous supplies and tools.
I’ve tried to erase his dad from my memories.
I don’t want them to be tainted by pain.
But so much of Kai and his family are ingrained in my childhood.
Some places have been demolished, restored, renovated, while other buildings remain untouched by time or circumstance.
And I start to believe if a town can survive like this, growing and evolving, adapting and changing, bearing witness to both heartache and hope, yet still retain its unshakeable foundation, the very essence that makes it uniquely and distinctly what it is—if a town can survive this way, maybe we can too.
Maybe this thing we used to call us is salvageable after all.
Kai parks the car and quickly skirts around to the passenger side to hold my door open for me.
He ushers me inside, his hand resting on the small of my back.
It’s electrifying, taking root somewhere deep in my body.
We walk in the front door of the café and my senses are flooded with the smell of freshly brewed coffee and sugary pastries.
In the back, we find a table tucked into the corner, away from prying eyes.
I slide into my chair first and just as he’s about to sit down, he surprises me by pulling it to the right.
Before I can register his movements, he huffs, “Fuck this, the whole point of going on a date is being able to do things like this.” He sits down next to me, his face centimeters from mine, and without the distance of a table separating us, all bets are off.
It’s more intimate, romantic, and he’s so close I can smell his aftershave.
He leans in, invading my space and intertwines our hands, his legs knocking against mine underneath the table.
Pressing a soft kiss to my temple, he grazes the curve of my ear with his mouth.
“Not being this close to you on a daily basis is absolute fucking torture,” he whispers.
Fuck. I don’t know what I expected him to say but it definitely wasn’t that. I feel my face heating up, my cheeks burning red. How did he manage to turn my insides to mush and my core molten with just one sentence?
“Agreed,” is all I can choke out and it’s strangled. Agreed? That’s the best response I can think of? He smiles a devilishly handsome smile.
“It’s fun making you a little nervous.”
“I’m not nervous,” I respond but it’s completely unconvincing.
“Uh huh,” he laughs.
“Fine, maybe I’m just a little flustered.”
“Well, it’s nice not being the only one for once.”
“You mean I’ve ruffled the professional hockey player worth millions? I find that hard to believe.” I pause and then add, “You’re the bravest person I know, Kai.”
“Not when it comes to you. You fucking terrify me—you always have. It’s one of the things I love about you.
” He still knows exactly what to say and do to make me come undone and I don’t know what to make of that.
I shift forward wanting to be as close to him as possible, leaning into his chest. If I get any closer, I might as well be in his lap.
“So, I realized there’s some things I need to tell you.
You know the night you stayed over after Akio was in the hospital?
You told me the next day that you never wanted to let me go.
I know I have no right to ask this of you, but I really need you to believe me when I say I never wanted to let you go either.
It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do. ”
I watch him swallow, his eyes never leaving mine.
“If you didn’t want to let me go, then why did you?
And please don’t give me some spiel about protecting me.
Because I know it’s more than that, that isn’t the only reason you left,” he says, pain and confusion twisting his features.
And there it is, the burning question that’s been lingering around us like smoke for the past two months.
The one I always knew and feared he’d ask.
It sits at the table like an extra person between us and I don’t even know how to broach the subject. I can’t go there with him, not yet.
“I’m not sure that question is exactly first date material, but I need you to trust me that when I’m ready to talk about it, I will.” Because it’s not just one question. It’s all of them. All the ones that matter anyways.
Why did I break his heart?
Why did I leave without saying goodbye?
Why did I lie about the abortion?
Why didn’t I trust what we had?
I can barely answer those questions for myself, never mind for him. But I need to, I want to. He deserves that much.
“Okay,” he answers.
“Okay? You believe me?”
“Yeah, Kendall, I do, and I know that whatever happened, whatever I did to make you feel like we couldn’t be together, I’ll never make that mistake again,” he says solemnly.
“Kai, listen to me very carefully. You didn’t do anything. I fucked up and I made the biggest mistake of my life leaving you and I’ve regretted it every day since. Nothing I say now can erase what I’ve done but hopefully everything will make sense in time.”
“I hope so too.”
We spend the rest of our coffee date falling into easy conversation, holding hands and straddling the thin line between kissing and making out.
Every so often, I have to remind myself we are in a public place and not in the privacy of my apartment or his car.
I pull back slightly from a kiss that I wish would turn into more with a mixture of relief and disappointment.
Relieved we haven’t yet made any mistakes we can’t come back from and disappointed because all the things I want to do to him, with him cannot be done in the company of other people.
I can feel his hot breath on my neck. Picture my hands trailing his muscled back, moving down to his torso to feel his abs carved from stone. I imagine his lips tracing my skin, his touch making me delirious with pleasure. Our bodies are molded together, moving in sync—
“Ken?” His voice snaps me out of the fantasy and his deep eyes searching my face ground me. I steel myself ready to answer his question I know is coming.
“What’s wrong?” he asks quietly, skimming his thumb over mine. I swallow and will myself to calm down, to continue breathing in and out slowly.
“It’s just… it’s so hard because I want to do this right. I want to take things slow, but it’s hard to do that when we already know what it’s like to give ourselves entirely to each other. To be all in. Does that make sense?” I whisper, hoping my rambling makes sense to him.
“Yeah, it does. I think you’re scared. Scared of what this could be. Scared to make a mistake. Scared that things will go wrong—or worse, they’ll go right. But I’ll tell you a secret. I’m scared too, and I know that we’re going to figure this out.”
“When did you get so wise?” I smirk.
“I don’t know but can I let you in on another secret?” he asks, a smile tugging at his lips.
“Do I have a choice?” I joke.
“I’m going to ignore that,” he says, his face turning more serious. “But honestly, Ken, we’re going to make mistakes. It’s inevitable. We just can’t let them ruin us this time, okay?”
“That sounds more like a hard truth than a secret,” I observe.
“Tomato, tomato,” he quips, looking thoroughly satisfied with himself.
Kai leaves the table to put in our order.
He saunters over to the counter and it’s hard not to stare at him while he does—he’s just so easy to look at.
His broad frame, his muscular build, and that smile that gives me heart palpitations.
And I know I’m not the only one ogling him.
The cute blonde behind the counter laughs and twirls her hair around her index finger as she talks to him.
Everyone in this café is probably wondering what someone like him is doing with someone like me.
I’m self-assured enough to know he only has eyes for me, but smart enough to realize every female in here would donate a non-vital organ just to be with him. In his orbit.
If I didn’t know him any better, I would be incredibly intimidated by his near Herculean body.
His face that suggests he’s the offspring of Hawaiian gods, a byproduct of superior genes.
But I do know him better. I’ve known him since I was five.
So, I know he’s not a god among men—he just resembles one.
The same way I know he hates melon. That he’s allergic to mushrooms. That when he sneezes, it’s always three times.
That he sometimes gets disabling panic attacks and loathes public speaking.
That he’s a textbook introvert who has been forced to act like an extrovert his entire life.
So instead of being threatened by his beauty, I accept it for what it is, a small facet of who he is.
Knowing that underneath the broodiness, the stunning armor, the facade of unwavering confidence, there’s a human who bleeds just like the rest of us.
And it’s this immutable fact that endears him to me even more.
He returns a few minutes later with his hands full and a tray piled with delicious food and steaming mugs of coffee. It takes me a second to realize he remembered all my favorite things.
“So, that’s one blueberry scone, one chocolate chip muffin, a bacon egg and cheese on a cheddar bagel to split, my coffee, and your abomination that you call coffee,” he rattles.
“A peppermint white chocolate latte extra whip?” I wonder, beaming at him with excitement.
“Uh huh,” he replies, setting the tray down on the table.
“I don’t even drink coffee for the caffeine anymore. It’s just part of my personality at this point,” I remark, causing a deep throaty chuckle to escape Kai’s mouth.
“You remembered…” I trail off, glancing from the food to him.
“Well, yeah, you love scones, but their blueberry is your favorite and we got lucky.
It was the last one. And we always used to split an egg sandwich, you know, offset the sweet with the savory.
Shit, did I forget something? Did I do something wrong?
I kind of just went for it. It was stupid to assume you still like all the same things—" he suddenly looks flustered, worried. It’s adorable.
Laughable even that this flawless human specimen would be nervous around me, but I revel in it all the same. I take his rough hand in mine.
“No, Kai, it’s perfect.” You’re perfect, I want to say but I don’t. I can’t. The words sit in my throat, coating my tongue like honey. And I can’t seem to force them out. Instead, I cup his face, my fingers tracing his bottom lip, and kiss him softly.