Chapter 40 Beauty and the Bear
Beauty and the Bear
Max
It’s Saturday morning, and Eli and I are supposed to meet this afternoon to “talk.” Normally, I’d be pacing the floor, obsessively decoding what that actually means, but I can’t. Thankfully, I have a very loud, very welcome distraction sitting on my sofa.
I sit back down and hand her a coffee just as Eslin stops mid-sentence, her hands still suspended in the air as she describes the new soccer stadium. And the boys.
“And girl! How can that many beautiful, muscular men exist in one single space?”
I laugh, shaking my head at my best friend. Usually, she’s the definition of polished and professional, but the Atlanta Strikers seem to have broken her filter. I’m just grateful I got to see her while she’s in town.
She’s been going on for over an hour about the state-of-the-art medical wing at the new soccer stadium, detailing every second of her final interview to be the team therapist. Usually, I’m the one geeked out over high-end tech and modern infrastructure, but my brain has completely checked out.
“And they have these hydrotherapy pools, Max. Like, actual built-in resistance jets that track muscle fatigue in real-time. It’s insane,” she says, her eyes bright with the kind of professional hunger I used to recognize in my own reflection.
“That’s great, Es. Really,” I mutter, leaning back against my sofa. I try to look impressed, but I'm mostly just looking at the clock.
She pauses, her excitement faltering as she studies my face. “You haven't heard a word about those damn resistance jets, have you?”
“I heard 'jets,'” I offer weakly.
Eslin sighs, crossing her arms over her chest. “Max, talk to me.”
I let out a long, jagged breath. “Truth?”
She takes a slow sip of her coffee, her eyes narrowing as she tastes it. “Truth. And ew! Is there rum in here? And cocoa?”
I shrug, leaning against the counter. “Once you meet Holly from HollyDates, that drink will make all the sense in the world.”
“I mean, it does grow on you,” she admits, taking another cautious sip. “Now spill.”
“So, Eli wants to talk.”
“Okay. Words are good. Words are progress.”
He texted me he loved me last night but that was it. And it has me freaking out.
“And while I’m hoping he says he wants a long-distance relationship and wants to try to build something with me, part of me doesn’t want to be without him. I don’t want to try something long distance.”
“Wait,” she interrupts, “you want him to stay in Atlanta?”
I frown. “No! I…I want him to ask me to go back with him. To Canada.”
Eslin gasps, nearly sloshing her spiked cocoa onto my rug. “Maxine Palmer. You’re the woman who swore she’d never live with a man before marriage. You were the president of the Destiny’s Child ‘Independent Women’ club! What the actual hell and what have you done with my friend?”
I don’t argue. The fact that she’s saying curse words when she rarely curses says it all.
I simply pull out my phone and show her that picture of him in the wild again—the one where he looks like he was carved out of mountain and man meat.
Then I tell her about the massages and the way he caters to me.
“Point taken,” she says, eyeing the screen before taking another sip.
“Why does it feel like you’re so nervous?”
“I don’t know!” I stand, pacing the small stretch of rug in my living room.
“I guess part of it is because I spent years wanting to be this badass boss. I took the job with Timantha because I wanted to be Timantha. But after spending a week being off...off the grid, off the clock. I’m questioning everything I thought I ever wanted. ”
With a sympathetic sigh, she says, “Sweetie, you’re allowed to change your mind.
High-powered, badass women decide to leave their careers to live off the grid in tiny homes all the time.
Women who once wanted marriage and kids might realize they’d rather live in a community of other women instead.
There is no right or wrong answer here, and you don’t need to feel ashamed of your evolution. Max, what is it that you truly want?”
“I want him,” I whisper, the admission feeling heavy and light at the same time. “I want nothingness. Stillness. I want the quiet he carries.”
“And you deserve that,” she says, her voice softening but remaining firm. “You deserve the man who stays. The man who chooses you every single day without being asked.”
“But what if he doesn't?” The question catches in my throat, raw and jagged.
She levels me with a look, her eyes searching mine for the woman she knows is still in there. “Sometimes people stay, Max. That’s a risk you have to take.” She pauses, a flicker of genuine confusion crossing her face.
“What?” I ask, bracing for the hit.
“I guess I’m just wondering...” She tilts her head, her gaze sharpening. “When did you become the woman who waits for permission? Stop wondering what he’ll do and tell him what you want!”
She’s right. Who even am I anymore? I’m a boss, a tech genius, a woman who builds empires from algorithms. I don't wait for things to happen; I make them happen. But here I am, reduced to a heap of nerves because I fell in love with a boy.
I open my mouth to give her a sharp-tongued rebuttal. To tell her she’s right and I don’t pine. I certainly don't let mountain-sized men disrupt my badassery. But the words die in my throat because I hear it.
I freeze.
“Do you hear that?” I ask, cutting her off entirely.
Eslin tilts her head, listening toward my apartment window. “Hear what? The traffic? Someone's car alarm?”
But I’m already standing. That’s not a car alarm.
There’s a sound threading through the air—faint at first, filtered through the glass of my high-rise, but unmistakable. A bass line I know too well. A rhythm that lived in my bones long before I had language for what it meant.
My heart starts racing.
“Max? Where are you going?” Eslin calls out as I move toward the balcony.
I don’t answer. My hands are trembling as I push aside the heavy curtains. The sound grows louder, clearer, vibrating against the glass and echoing off the brick of the buildings across the street.
And then the words hit.
Girl, I think you’ve gone for far too long…
The song I played every single day when I was younger. I’d keep it on repeat, letting the melody fill the quiet spaces of my room whenever I needed to believe that someone, somewhere, was actually going to love the smart-mouthed, quirky, nerdy me.
Eli didn’t know it then, but when he played it for me in the mountains, I cried.
Quietly. Because it felt like a prayer finally answered.
I’ve spent my whole life waiting for someone to feel this way about me—to love me with the kind of intensity that moves mountains and crosses borders.
And now, hearing it vibrate through the humid Atlanta air, I realize I don’t have to wait anymore.
The man I thought only existed in the margins of my favorite books is standing on the pavement, holding a boombox and my entire heart in his hands, proving that he didn't just find me—he chose me.
The tears I was barely holding back spill over, fresh and uncontained. I don’t bother wiping them away.
Eli stands there, broad shoulders filling out a black suit that looks like it was painted on him. He’s got a damn boombox balanced against his shoulder like it’s 1980-something and he’s here to claim his woman.
For a split second, I wonder how he even found me because I hadn’t actually sent him my address, yet. But then I see Timantha standing right next to him, looking entirely too proud of herself.
I nearly trip over my own feet as I scramble into my fluffy slippers, not even bothering to grab a jacket.
I bolt out the door, my heart out-pacing my feet as I frantically mash the elevator button.
The ride down feels like an eternity, the mechanical vibration of the lift taunting me while the bass from the street vibrates through the floor.
The moment the doors slide open, I burst through the lobby and out into the Cinnamon Grove air. I don't care that I'm in pajamas. I don't care that people are staring. I just run.
“Max! Maxine! Get your tail back here and put a coat on!” Eslin is screaming behind me, her voice echoing off the brick walls. “Have you lost your damn mind? You're in your slippers!”
I won't stop. I don't even look back. I practically launch myself at him, clearing the distance in a blur of motion until I can finally throw my arms around his neck. He catches me effortlessly, his familiar, solid weight the only thing that feels right in this city anymore.
“My DJ equipment wouldn’t fit,” he jokes. “So the boom box felt right.”
“Such an old man,” I say, shaking my head.
Cars are passing us on the street but I don’t care.
Phones come out. People gather. And a circle forms around us as Eli sets the boom box down gently, the song still playing low behind him.
Then he looks at me, taking my hands in his. “My house hasn’t felt right since you left,” he says. “And it only took me five days with you to realize you were the piece I didn’t know I was missing.”
I cover my mouth, shaking.
“And after five days without you,” he continues, stepping closer, “I know I never want to live like that again. Not one more day. Not one more version of my life where you’re not in it.”
The song swells behind him, like it’s cheering him on.
“I don’t chase,” he says softly. “But I will cross borders. I will show up. And I will claim what’s mine.”
He stops in front of me, close enough that the rest of the world disappears.
“Maxine Palmer,” he says, voice unwavering. “You are my home. And I’m asking you—no rules, no end dates, no exits—will you stay? Be my burden, Max.”
The crowd erupts. Cheers.
I don’t hear any of it.
All I hear is my heart.
All I see is him.
The book boyfriend stepped off the page, reached for my hand, and stayed.
“Okay, Bear.” I say, my voice wrecked, tears everywhere, my hair a wooly mess. I don’t care.
When he pulls me into his arms—Ruff Endz still playing, the whole damn street now watching—I feel it settle deep, permanent and sure.
This is the part of the story that lasts.
I have been captured.
Found.
Loved.
The End.