Chapter 61
chapter sixty-one
Audrey
Today's vocabulary word: reunion
I stared up at the stars from the narrow balcony, searching for the handful of constellations I knew.
The hazy glow of the lights around the hotel and parking lot made it difficult to see more than the headliners, but I let myself look anyway.
It was quiet here, if I ignored the highway noise in the distance.
In a strange, out-of-focus way, this reminded me of all the summer nights I'd snuck out to meet Jude. It reminded me of being young and fearless and absolutely certain we'd be able to write the future we wanted for ourselves. And it reminded me that we'd grown up but not apart.
The sliding glass door opened and Jude stepped out, effectively taking up the last bit of standing room on this balcony. He leaned into me, his shoulder bumping mine. "He's asleep."
I bumped him back. "I still can't believe he ate the entire burger."
"And the fries and the onion rings," Jude added.
"Just wait," I said, nudging him again. "He'll wake up one of these days and be taller than you."
Laughing, he said, "I think we have some time before that happens."
Even on this dark doormat of a balcony, I could see the change in him. He was lighter now that the custody issues were settled. He didn't have to work so hard to breathe anymore. "You're probably right."
The new agreement was simple and short on legal maneuvers. Jude had sole custody of Percy, with visitation for Brenda and Maddie at his discretion.
Since Brenda would be making the move to a memory care community once she was finished with rehab, that left her home empty.
Maddie was confident she could rent out the house to cover the upkeep costs while still reserving some time for us to visit for a few weeks each summer, and she seemed excited about the prospect.
For all the simplicity of this outcome, I knew it wasn't without some major compromise from both sides. I didn't think they would've arrived at this decision without the pressure cooker of the past few weeks.
Something about intense stress had a way of distilling situations down to their most basic parts.
"There is another issue we haven't discussed," he said, his tone turning serious.
"I don't think there is," I replied. "We've had enough issues. We're good."
"One more thing. You need to go back to ballet."
"My knees and ankles disagree."
"That's not what I remember from your performance in Sedona." He scrubbed his knuckles over his jaw. "You looked better than ever that night."
"Am I to believe it was my ankles you were watching? Really?"
He grinned, young and devilish. "You did this thing where you put your leg on the wall. Like a split, but standing." A quick shake of his head. "I need you to get back into whatever it is that allows you to bend that way."
"Ah, that's nothing special. Nothing I can't do with regular barre and Pilates classes."
"Then I need you to get back into ballet because you loved it," he said.
I tipped my face toward the sky, the stars. How many times had I stared at them, wondering if Jude was doing the same? Wondering where he was, what he was doing, what his life looked like now. Wondering how we'd fallen so far apart.
"You lost all the things you loved, Audrey," he went on. "You had to give up too much. I want you to get those good things back."
"I'll think about it."
"That's what I want to hear."
We listened to the noises of the night for a few minutes. Then, I came to the one question that'd paced around in the back of my mind since the other day. "Are you serious about not needing to get married?"
He brushed a kiss over my temple. "Completely."
"Your mother is expecting us to have a wedding," I said.
"Fuck. Yeah. You're right." He stared off into the parking lot, his brows creased and his mind whirring.
A minute passed before he said, "What she really wants is for us to be together.
If I tell her we've decided to skip a ceremony and all the other formalities, she'll be cool with that too.
Especially if we let her throw us a party. "
"My most sincere apologies, but I'm still traumatized from our last attempt at traveling to Sedona."
Laughing, Jude said, "Come on. You had fun in Grandwood Valley. You broke about eighty-four cowboy hearts, but you had a good time. I know because I died a little while watching you do it."
I wagged a finger at him. "I have two words for you: curtain lizard."
"That's an outstanding point. Thank you for making it." He kissed my forehead. "But my mom would understand if we told her we'd decided to shelve the wedding. She just wants us to be a family, regardless of the shape that takes."
"You don't mind that it's kind of…undefined?"
"We're not undefined. We've known exactly what we are to each other for almost twenty years."
"And what's that?"
I felt his grin when he kissed my cheek, the shell of my ear, the crown of my head. "Everything."
And yet it wasn't everything. Not by a mile. "Will that be enough for you?"
"Of course," he said, laughing. "What did you think I meant by everything?"
"But…what if there comes a time when you want me to adopt Percy. I'm not sure about the specifics there, but it might be more difficult if we're not married. What then?"
He leaned back to meet my eyes. "You'd do that? You'd adopt him?"
"If you and Percy wanted it, yes, I would." I glanced away for a moment. "And if it came down to it, if we needed to be married in order for that to happen, then…I'd do that too."
I didn't want to make it sound like marrying him would be a death march because that wasn't it.
Not at all. I just needed to teach my body and my brain that I could be safe in a relationship of that sort.
That I wasn't trapped and I wouldn't be, not ever again.
It would take time. None of this was quick work. But that was okay. We'd be okay.
"Thank you. Thank you for loving my boy," he said softly. "All I need is for you to promise me that you'll be here with me when he grows up and stops sleeping with twenty stuffed animals and starts calling me bro."
"I'll be here, but keep in mind, if he's anything like you, he'll have a beard and be able to bench-press three hundred pounds before he's twelve."
He roped an arm around my neck, pulling me in close. "Stop it," he groaned. "And I wasn't twelve."
"Close enough," I said. "But don't think you're getting out of the sex talk. That one's all on you."
"That's fine. I mean, I gave you the sex talk. Seemed to work out well enough."
"Excuse me, but no. You didn't give me the sex talk."
"I explained a few things to you," he said, his hand shifting to my hip. Apparently, he wanted to make a demonstration out of this. "Showed you how it all worked. Made sure you knew what would happen and how to tell me what you wanted. Then I gave you everything you asked for."
I ran my palm down the center of his chest and over his belt until I stroked him through his shorts. "I think I need a reminder."
A growl sounded in the back of his throat. He covered my hand with his as his gaze swept from the balcony to the dark room where a small child was fast asleep. I could almost hear the calculations behind his eyes. Then a brow winged up. "I don't think I've taught you about shower sex."
I shook my head. "We've been over janitor closet sex, tiny bathroom stall sex, back seat of my car sex—"
"I still have a scar on my shoulder from the seat belt."
Cupping his jaw, I said, "You poor baby."
"Worth it." Tipping his head toward the room, he said, "Lead the way."