Chapter 52 Eight Years in One Day #4
The space between us feels charged with eight years of missing each other and one day of finding our way back. His gaze drops to my lips for just a second before meeting my eyes again.
“Amanda.”
“Yeah?”
Instead of answering, he leans in. Slow enough that I could pull away if I wanted to. I don’t want to.
The kiss is gentle. Soft and achingly tender.
Nothing like the desperate collision of mouths I expected.
Just his lips against mine while Beethoven plays and the world keeps spinning around us.
Butterflies take flight in my stomach and spread their wings through my entire body.
Every nerve ending lights up, and my heart hammers against my ribs.
When he pulls back, I’m dizzy. Breathless. Completely undone by something so simple it shouldn’t have this much power over me.
“I’ve been wanting to do that all day,” he admits.
“Just today?”
“Okay. Eight years. But who’s counting?”
I laugh, and the sound comes out shaky. “Me. I’m definitely counting.”
YEAR ONE
Food trucks line the Queens street like a carnival of cuisines. Steam rises from grills, and a dozen different spices perfume the warm evening air.
“This is where it all started,” I tell him, breathing in the mix of garlic and cumin and something that might be burning. “Raven and I came here during my… difficult year.”
“The year after Vegas.”
My chest tightens. “Yeah. That year.” I order from the Korean BBQ truck that still remembers my usual. “We spent the whole night eating our way through every single truck and planning our YouTube series. ‘Sisters Eat Everything’ was going to make us internet famous.”
“What happened?”
“Life got complicated. Raven decided to stay in LA permanently to chase her acting dreams, and I was just trying to figure out how to exist without—” I catch myself before finishing the sentence. “Anyway, filming alone wasn’t the same as doing it together.”
The truck owner loads our plates with extra banchan, chattering about how much he’s missed seeing me. We find a picnic table while accordion music drifts from a nearby truck.
“When she moved back to the city last year, we convinced ourselves the whole thing was silly.”
“Was it silly?”
I pick at my kimchi and think about those nights when Raven and I would plan episodes until two a.m. We’d practice our introductions in her mirror and debate which trucks to hit first. For a few hours, I could forget about the husband-shaped hole in my life.
“No. It was fun. We were happy.” I steal a piece of bulgogi from his plate. “I just forgot how to let myself have happy things for a while.”
“You remember now?”
“I’m working on it.”
His smile tells me he understands exactly what that means. That it doesn’t happen all at once. That it’s something you become through love and time.
THE START
The final stop is the rooftop of my building.
When I step out onto the gravel, there’s nothing up here but the night, the view, and a single green felt craps table with a bottle of champagne sweating beside it.
But then I see them sitting on the edge of the table: a brand-new pair of pink Medusa Versace pumps, gleaming under the rooftop lights.
My jaw drops. “Are those—”
“Your size,” Kade says, satisfaction clear in his voice. “Figured you’d want to look the part.”
I pick them up, running my fingers over the pink satin, the gold Medusa head charm winking up at me. My old lucky heels are long gone, but these feel like more than a replacement.
The cool leather hugs my feet perfectly when I slip them on, the extra height making me feel just a little more dangerous. Just a little more like myself.
“Really?” I ask, grinning as I test my balance on the extra five inches.
“Really,” Kade says, holding out a pair of dice. “One last game.”
It’s ridiculous and perfect all at once. The skyline glitters around us, the air warm and heavy with summer, and suddenly I’m twenty-one again.
He nods toward the table. “You shoot first.”
I pick up the dice, feeling their smooth weight against my palm. I toss them. They tumble and spin.
Snake eyes.
I laugh, shaking my head. “Wow. Beginner’s luck.”
“Again,” he says, that infuriating half smile tugging at his mouth.
I roll. Snake eyes.
My laugh catches in my throat. “Okay, what the hell?”
He doesn’t answer, just pushes them back toward me. “Once more.”
I roll. Snake eyes. Again.
I narrow my eyes at him. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Finally, he leans in, resting his forearms on the edge of the table, voice low. “They’re the same dice, baby doll.”
It takes me a second to process. “The… same as—”
“That’s right.”
“So it wasn’t some impulsive, drunken whim for you?” My voice comes out barely above a whisper.
All this time. All these years, I thought our wedding was just Vegas madness. Two drunk kids making a beautiful mistake. But he planned it. He wanted it. He cheated fate itself just to make me his wife.
His gaze catches mine and holds it. “The moment you started dancing around me at that concert, I knew I had to make you mine. Nothing else mattered after that.”
The city hums below us, but it feels a thousand miles away. My fingers close around the dice, proof that none of it was an accident.
“Roll again,” he says.
And I do.