Chapter 35
Sophie
“I can’t believe I just did that.” I shook my head, blowing on my teacup. The warmth was returning to my extremities, but I wouldn’t forget this day for the rest of my life.
I had really meant to make Pace talk about some of his feelings before he blurted his love confession. But when the world’s hottest fireman confesses his love, and you make plans for a lifetime together, people get swept up in the moment.
But we did need to talk.
Once we were settled in my kitchen, I brewed some tea, setting the dainty cups in front of each of us. Grandma had texted that she was staying over at Gigi’s tonight and made some comment about the thin walls of our home, which I was thoroughly ignoring.
Pace gingerly sniffed his chamomile tea before taking the tiniest, most hesitant sip. “Bleck. No, sorry, I thought maybe this time, but no.” He pushed the cup away, and I laughed.
“It’s okay. I have some of these too.” I pulled out one of his favorite bubbly waters and handed it to him.
We made a careful toast with our drinks.
“You did it though. You were incredible,” he said, smiling up at me. The snow had mussed his hair, and the cold made his cheeks red, and I had the vision of what his children might look like, and it made my heart swell.
“I wouldn’t have been able to do it without you,” I said. “You’ve taught me that I can experience the fear and still do the scary thing.”
“I didn’t do anything; that was all you.”
“Thank you anyway,” I said. “I’m mortified by how I handled everything the night of the ball. I’m sorry I hurt you. I’m sorry I left when I said I wouldn’t.”
Pace came around the island that separated us and held me in his arms. “You don’t need to apologize.
I never gave you any indication of how I felt for you.
I thought if I kept you at a safe distance, if I only showed the best parts of me, that you wouldn’t ever leave me.
I was so terrified that you had put me on this pedestal and I was doomed to come crashing off it.
But I want to share all the sides of myself with you.
It’s been so easy to love you and be whatever you need me to be.
Taking care of you is as natural as breathing for me. ”
“Let me take care of you, the way you take care of me. Please, give me the honor of being that person for you too,” I said.
His forehead lowered to mine.
“I asked Kaylee to marry me,” he whispered.
I shot back, out of his arms.
“Shit. Sorry. No. Years ago. On the night of graduation,” he added, quickly scrambling to hold me again.
“Pace, start with the date next time. Or, you know, just stop proposing to people,” I teased.
He laughed at himself. “This is what I’m saying. I have a hard time talking about this. It’s easy for me to be the listener, but sharing is hard. I don’t always understand what I’m feeling.” He tugged off his winter hat and tossed it on the counter.
I nodded and laced our fingers together before I brought him over to the couch and pulled him until his head rested in my lap.
“Just talk. And I’ll listen. You are safe here.” I brushed my fingers through his red-blond curls. “My love is made of tough stuff. It won’t scare away so easily.”
He grabbed me by the hips and tucked his face against me, squeezing me tight to him with a relieved sigh. Then he rolled back and began to talk.
“It was the night of graduation. I knew she couldn’t wait to leave.
She’d just turned eighteen and had always said she was leaving the second she could.
Her homelife was rough, but I thought I could keep her safe.
If we got married, we’d get our own place and start a family.
I would protect her. She wouldn’t be hurt. She wouldn’t leave.”
His prominent Adam’s apple bobbed on a swallow, and my heart wrenched for poor, sweet, teenage Pace.
He told me about how Kaylee turned down his proposal and left the next day without a goodbye, and how she told him at the ball that he was never a serious option for her.
It broke my heart that he’d been hurt so badly.
He didn’t feel like he was enough. Then he shared about the fear of watching his best friend shrink away after losing his mother.
I understood how my own fears triggered his.
“I would drive up that dirt road, and I would expect the worst. I thought—I was always so afraid he’d leave me too.” He went on to share about all the books he’d read on mental health. On the ways he’d tried time and time again to take care of Levi, to take his pain away, and failed.
“I thought if he hurt, then I wasn’t doing my job.” Pace’s voice was tight, and he turned into me to squeeze me again. I took a steadying breath and kept myself from crying as he shared all his years of pain with me.
When he went on, he found my gaze from where he still lay in my lap.
“It’s magic that brought us together—some sort of magnanimous enigma that knew when we were ready for each other.
” He sat up and held my hands, and we sat facing each other.
“I believe that with my whole heart. I was made to find your list. I was made to love you just as you are. It’s all I ever want to do.
I have never felt so sure about my role in anything else. ”
“Pace.” The tears that I’d held back finally spilled over.
“And as soon as I realized just how much I loved you, it was like every fear I ever had, every time I drove up Levi’s driveway, every time Kaylee ignored my call, all of that came flooding back.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked him.
“God, I was so scared.” He rubbed at his chest. “I had this idea that if I told you, if I brought it up first, then it would give you the idea. Like, ‘Huh, maybe there really is something wrong with this guy.’” He shook his head on a swallow.
“And I didn’t think I could ever bear not having you look at me with anything less than awe.
To look at me with disgust or disappointment. I thought it might kill me.”
“Oh, my love.” I brought his face to mine, cupped in my hands. I kissed him all over.
He held my hands, not finished yet with what was on his mind.
“The thing is, I didn’t care about Kaylee.
At least not how everybody thought I did.
I cared about what she represented, and that was my failure as a boyfriend.
I couldn’t protect her. I couldn’t keep her safe and happy.
She was just gone, and it was my fault. Same with Levi. ”
“You can’t stop people from feeling pain.”
“I know. I know. It sounds ridiculous when I say it out loud. I see that now.”
“It doesn’t sound ridiculous. I think it’s thoughtful, and your heart was in the right place. Navigating complex human emotions is not easy. It’s a career that requires higher education for a reason.”
“I know. But what I understand, what I need you to know, is that I just want to be there for you. Whatever form that takes.”
“You can’t keep someone healthy. That’s not on you. That is work they have to do for themselves, but you make me feel safe to do that work. Do you understand, Pace? That’s what I needed. You have always made me feel safe.”
“It’s all I want. To love you as you need to be loved.”
“You do. I wouldn’t even be here if it weren’t for you.
You love me more than I ever thought anybody could.
You never make me feel like a burden. You’re right that it’s some sort of magic that makes us fit together so perfectly.
I’m scared too. I love you so much.” I kissed his mouth, nose, eyes, and cheeks.
“I have found someone, against all odds, who I can actually be myself around. I’ve never held anything back, despite the fact that I probably should be, but I can’t.
When I’m with you, I feel seen and accepted.
To imagine that that could be real after a lifetime of thinking that someone like me is just destined to be alone, I can’t explain the total shift in thinking that requires.
How scary it feels because before, at least I was accepting of my fate.
It was just the way of the world, and sure, I was lonely, but I was authentic in my solitude.
Now it’s like some fairy-tale curse where I’m able to see this incredible, magical life, but know that it’s only a glimpse that could be taken away at any moment.
But you’ve given me so much. Shown me how strong I can be in love.
Life is too incredible to hide from. Even for me. ”
“Every moment with you, I’m excited to be alive. Every moment I’m away from you, I’m counting down the seconds until we are together again.” I smiled at his confession.
My whole body felt like it could vibrate with joy and lift off into space.
“I find it impossible to believe that anybody would be willing to put up with me, with all this.” I gestured to my head and the area around it. “It feels so exhausting.”
“Let me ask you a question,” Pace said, and I moved back at his sudden tone shift, eyebrows raised to show I was listening. “If I come to you when I’m sick with a cold, will you get mad at me? If I say I’m just coughing too much and I can’t go out, will you be angry at me?”
“Of course not, but—”
“But it is the same. You just can’t see the manifestations of your illness.
But sometimes you’ll need to stay in, and I will stay with you.
Or near you. Whatever you need. Trust me enough to tell you if I can’t handle it.
Nothing scares me more than not giving this a chance.
Not giving us a chance. Nothing. And loving you is the easiest thing I’ve ever done. ”
“I feel the same way.” I leaned closer to him.
“Caring about you has never felt like work. If anything, it’s a compulsion. I can’t stop thinking about ways to make things better for you. It’s all I want to do.” He leaned close to me.
“And that’s all I want from you too. To have access to every bit of you. To love you as you’ve loved me,” I said.
“That’s it?” he asked.
“Until we finish that list.”
“Until then.”
“You let yourself lean on me, and I’ll lean on you, and we will hold each other up.”
“For forever.”
Then we met in the middle, our mouths connecting. My insides exploded with joy.
We kissed and all the days apart were gone; our bodies remembered exactly how to please the other’s. The hurt and confusion were erased with confession and sharing. We kissed and held each other. I wanted to cry with the joy of it all. I wanted to make so many new items for the list.
“Oh!” I gasped as Pace was in the middle of taking me out of—or rather, attempting to unroll me from—the shapewear.
“What?” he asked, stilling.
“Kama Sutra.”
His dark blond brows shot up. “Go on.”
“Put it on the list. Explore all the positions,” I explained.
“Could take years.”
“At least.”
We continued to strip each other of our clothes. Our still-icy skin quickly heating as we remembered how well we fit together.
Our lovemaking was quick and frantic, making up for lost time, then slow and luxurious as we whispered promises of the future on each other’s skin.
We inhaled each other, and I let myself love him fully without fear.
It was different than any other time we’d been together because we were both present and raw and authentic.
He held my hands as he slowly moved into me, and his gaze spoke a hundred truths that our mouths couldn’t form. His body showed me all the ways he would take care of me as the years passed. This was the start of a new life together.
That night, as we made plans for the Life List, as we now referred to it, we held each other close, and I felt all the happiness any person could ever feel.
And for the first time in my life, I felt grateful that I’d been born with this strange little brain and all its issues, because ultimately, it made me who I was. And it brought me to Pace.
And honestly, who could be mad at a brain that caused all that?
Pace pulled me into his arms, because I could never be quite close enough for his liking, and sighed deeply, ruffling the hair at the top of my head.
“I love you,” he said.
“And I love you,” I said.