Chapter Thirty Nine
The kitchen is suspiciously tidy.
All of the debris, every broken shard of glass, trampled food boxes - gone.
The floor is swept and mopped without a speck of dirt in sight.
The couch has a folded blanket strewn over it in the living room, and all of my things - the one's Matt rifled through when he first found out - are shoved back into their bags.
"Did you clean?" Noah asks, appearing behind me with equally damp hair and shorts riding low on his hips.
"In the three minutes head start I had?" I snort. "No."
"Huh."
He walks around me and towards the kitchen, pulling open a cupboard. Various groceries sit neatly in each cupboard opened, stacked perfectly against each other. The fridge has freshly squeezed orange juice perched in the door.
All the dishes are done, every surface wiped with what I can only assume is anti-bacterial spray considering the clean smell lingering in the air.
I turn and look into the living room again, something white on the table catching my eye. It's smoosh, leaning against a vase of fresh flowers. My heart constricts.
"I don't understand," are the only words I have.
Noah hands me a glass of orange juice.
"Maybe he feels bad."
"You remember what I said to him, right?"
He smiles, drinking half of his juice is one gulp.
"Alright, so he hired a cleaner. I didn't even know we owned a vase."
I look back to the vase of flowers again. Tulips, an odd choice but long and elegant, thoroughly brightening the grey themed room. Very strange. Oddly unsettling.
Perhaps Matt had a full on mental breakdown after our argument last night and decided to fix everything instead of smashing it up. Maybe he's now fled the country because he can't stand the sight of me after hearing the word 'fingered' come out of my mouth.
God. What if he's told our mother?
That's one explanation. Maybe he's out having breakfast with her right now to discuss what a harlot I am. It would make sense - he'd clean the house for her and his bedroom door was wide open when I went past to shower this morning. He's certainly not hiding in the house somewhere.
"What's that look on your face?" Noah asks.
"What?"
"Your..." He waves his arm up and down, my eyes following the movement. "Look."
"There's no look."
A snort. "There's definitely a look. Don't get cagey about it."
I pull a face at him, waiting for his further teasing.
He grins and pulls me into his arms, kissing the top of my head.
"Stop panicking," he soothes, stroking up and down my arms as if trying to calm some sort of wild animal. I let my head fall back to his chest and rolls my eyes up to his jaw.
"This is weird though," I explain. "Has it ever been this clean here?"
He puts a hand under my chin and dips down to kiss me softly. A hand grazes over the slice of skin at the bottom of my stomach before slipping under the t-shirt I'm wearing - coincidentally, Noah's own t-shirt from the previous day.
I smile into his mouth.
"You shouldn't tell someone not to panic if they're panicking. It's incredibly unhelpful."
"He shouldn't have done a lot of things."
We break apart instantly. Fire hot embarrassment licks up my cheeks, coating my skin like a film and sending all the blood in my body upwards.
Matt is stood by the now open door with a shopping bag in each hand, glaring at us.
I can still feel Noah's hand up my shirt, splayed across my stomach even though it's gone. The heat of his touch remains, the shame of being caught even though we weren't really in a compromising position. It's as if we've been found out all over again.
"Hi," I say, like he hadn't just explicitly called Noah out.
Matt just frowns at me, carrying the bags past us and opening up the fridge. He stocks it slowly, methodically, moving things around to make sure they fit perfectly next to each other. Noah and I share a look.
"Did you clean?"
Are you developing some sort of mental health issue we should be worried about?
This is not normal. Matt doesn't clean, ever.
He's a typical guy: messy, obnoxiously loud, happy to live in his own filth.
Mum found a used condom under his bed when he was sixteen and vowed never to clean his bedroom again, which only meant that it was perpetually crusted in dirt until he moved out to go to University.
He looks back at me but says nothing.
I sigh. "Are we really going back to this? I'm sorry about yesterday. I shouldn't have said those things - I was out of my mind or something, I don't know."
"Fine," Matt says. "Whatever."
I blink. The fridge continues to be slowly stocked up, Matt ignoring the presence of us behind him easily, unflinching. Noah just raises his eyebrows when I turn back to him, like he's got no idea what that meant either.
My phone buzzes on the table.
Chelsea rescheduled her date with Tony after he profusely apologised for standing her up on Tuesday night.
They went out to dinner last night and I've been waiting to hear from her since - usually I get the full run down the second she gets back to her own house, so the lack of text either means the date went terrible or it went so well that she slept with him.
But it's not her. It's a random social media notification. I send out another text to her full of question marks in hopes that she'll respond quickly.
Noah clearing him throat makes my head shoot up. He tilts his head towards Matt, who is staring vacantly into the now full fridge. He doesn't even blink when my phone clatters on the table.
"Matt?"
"Yeah?" He responds too quickly, slamming the fridge door. "Do we need more cereal?"
There are three unopened boxes of cereal sitting in a neat row on the counter behind him.
"Are you okay, man?" Noah asks.
Matt turns to him and glares. My eyes widen.
I figured that I got most of Matt's anger as the sister, but apparently, true to his word last night, he really is more upset with Noah. The Bro Code, or something. Thou shalt not lay with a bro's sister.
"We have cereal," I say in an attempt to diffuse the upcoming argument.
"That's why I asked if we needed more."
"No?"
A full minute of silence passes between the three of us.
"I'm helping your sister move out today," Noah announces.
Matt smiles down at the tiled floor and then shakes his head, looking up to Noah with ice in his eyes when he responds, "now she's my sister?"
Noah clears his throat. "Alright. I'm helping your sister, my girlfriend, move out today."
Matt just swallows, pupils darting between the two of us. I hold my breath, feeling like a dead tree stuck in the ground between them, useless and completely in the way, rooted too deep to be moved.
"Fine."
Noah's eyes flash but he manages to keep his composure.
It's what I expected anyway - a noncommittal reaction. It's a shame it all has to end this way, Matt raging mad, Noah and I still on shaky terms considering we just started dating, everything a complete mess. But I always knew this was temporary. Matt didn't expect me to stay here forever.
His couch isn't even a fold-out.
"So we're just going to help her move out?" Noah clarifies, staring him down.
"You're helping her move out. I'm taking the TV up to my room and playing Call of Duty all day."
"You realise she's actually about to start paying rent again on her house, right?" Noah frowns. "As in, she is actually planning to move out this weekend. She won't live here anymore."
"That's what move out means, isn't it?"
I dart between them.
"Should I just..." I gesture to the door. Both Noah and Matt shake their heads, locked in a silent conversation I don't understand. "Maybe you guys just need-"
"To kiss and make up?" Matt asks, throwing my own words from last night back at me.
My voice is small. "If it helps."
Instead of standing between them like prey waiting for the predator to pounce, I walk around the island and grab and unopened box of cereal, pouring myself a bowl as they continue staring at one another in silence.
Noah crosses his arms, Matt does it a second later.
Noah draws his eyebrows together, so does my brother.
It's not something I'd like to be involved in or get in the way of, so I take my cereal and sit at the other end of the island, on the chair furthest away from both of them.
"Maybe I should move out as well," Noah states.
Incredibly, I recognise the tone immediately. I've begun to know him so well that I recognise the flight inflections in his voice, and here, it's almost teasing. Like he knows exactly how to press Matt's buttons to say whatever it is he wants to tease out.
"Fine," Matt spits.
"I'll pack too then, yeah?"
"Sure."
They stare at each other for a few long seconds. The crunch of my cereal the only sound passed between the three of us. I wish I'd chosen something softer, like toast maybe, or a marshmallow. Anything that wouldn't have me flinching after every bite due to the noise it emits.
Noah grabs another bowl, makes some cereal, and then sits next to me.
"I've never seen you act like this," he says, pointing a spoonful of cereal towards him. "I don't even know what to say to you."
Matt squawks, "don't point your spoon at me."
We're in a fucking sitcom. My lip twitches around the mouthful of food and Noah outright snorts, nodding frantically as Matt points a finger back at him. The spoon is retracted.
"Are you having breakfast with us?" I ask, gesturing to the empty seat opposite.
"No," Matt declares, voice hard like the suggestion is completely insane.
He's the one acting insane. I have no idea who he is - standing by the fully stocked fridge and staring at us like we're the one's being weird. The ignorance I could understand, this conversation I do not.
"Alright," I swallow. "Have fun playing Call of Duty."
He immediately, loudly, announces, "I will have fun."
Then he opens the fridge, glares at Noah, and walks out of the room. He stomps up the stairs. I look to Noah, the open fridge, and then back. He stands up and closes it, turning to level me with a deadpan stare.
"Don't look at me, I've got no fucking idea what any of that meant."
"You've broken him."
"I didn't-!" Biting my thumbnail, I re-think my outburst. "Maybe this is his way of coming around."
He gestures around the spotlessly clean kitchen with wide eyes, as if to announce: how the fuck does this say coming around? I follow his gaze and shrink back into my chair. The cereal in my mouth dissolves.
Okay, so maybe this whole scenario reads more like a mental break rather than coming around, but a girl can hope.
We both vacantly look around the conjoined rooms once more.
"I'm going to call Chelsea and see if she'll help us pack," I decide, picking up my phone. Noah kisses the side of my head, nodding and look at the now-closed fridge with a confused slant across his mouth.
"How was her date?" He asks distractedly.
"I don't know," I frown. "She hasn't messaged me yet."
Pressing the phone to my ear, I listen to the steady ringing of the dial tone. It rings out and I dial again, tapping my foot against the floor. No answer.
"I don't know what's up with her," I say, fidgeting with worry. "She would've messaged by now."
"She will," he soothes instantly. "Come on, I'll take you out for breakfast and by the time we get back she will have messaged. She's probably just still asleep."
"We're already eating cereal."
"You call this breakfast? Cereal is pre-breakfast; it's a warm-up at best."
He pulls my plate away and picks up his keys.
"Fine," I huff. "Waffles."
He smirks, leading me to the door with a hand across my back.
"Waffles it is, sweetheart."
He drives the long way round to get breakfast and then spends ten minutes trying to decide what he wants. Eats slowly, teases me constantly, tries to convince me to get another serving of waffles before we leave.
I realise what he's doing when we take the even longer way home.
Distracting me. Trying to hold off packing for as long as possible so that I can't sleep at my own house tonight. Not that I want to.
But this is what Matt needs and wants. He will come around eventually, when he stops obsessively cleaning and being overtly weird, and I think my moving out will help with that.
Once I'm gone things between him and Noah will go back to normal, they'll talk it out, and my stupid brother will realise that nothing has changed except that his best friend and I like each other more than we originally planned to.
Problem solved, easy as that.
The distractions continue. We drive around the block twice while I'm mindlessly staring out of the window and Noah acts like it was an accident. He decides we should cook Matt a complicated lunch together as a peace offering - which really isn't a bad idea, so we do.
(Matt enjoys it. He doesn't answer his bedroom door when we knock on to offer him the food but there is an empty plate sitting in the hallway when I go up to use the bathroom half an hour later.)
Then we have to make lunch for ourselves, becausegood cooking makes you hungry, Noah says. I've never cooked for so long in one sitting in my life.
"How is it?" Noah asks, eyes glistening as he gestures to the chicken dish we made together. I put another forkful in my mouth.
I've been awake for almost five hours and I've not packed a single thing.
"I know what you're doing," I say.
"Oh?"
He bites his bottom lip to stop the smile and then puts a lettuce leaf in his mouth. He chews slowly.
I raise one eyebrow.
"You must hate packing."
"Despise it," he purrs.
"I'm moving out," I declare, in what I hope is a this-is-final tone of voice.
His eyebrows raise briefly and then drop. "Sure you are."
Absurd. I laugh at his absolute brashness, the underlying disbelief in his voice.
Of course I want to stay - it's what I've wanted since I moved in, despite the uncomfortable couch and the mound of dishes that's always piled up in the sink whenever I get home from work - but staying isn't an option anymore. I'm not even sure it ever was.
"I really am," I say.
"I said sure."
He pulls me into his arms, my back against his chest. I look around the living, at all the bags shoved into every nook and cranny, at my clothes folded and put against any surface necessary. I hate packing too.
"So let's pack," I sigh.
"What if we just-"
"No more distractions."
He bites my earlobe.
"What about-"
"No."
His arms tighten around me.
"You turn me on when you're bossy."
I laugh.
"I turn you on when I do anything."
He murmurs against my ear. "Well, yeah."
Once again I glance around at all the bags, the absurd amount of things I've got to collect together. My glassware is in the kitchen (though, since Matt's outbursts, that may not be a problem anymore.) All my make-up is in the bathroom. Half of my clothes are strewn across Noah's floor.
So much to do and only two days to get it done.
Well, a day and a half now.
"So be turned on by me while we pack," I suggest, pulling away from him and walking towards one of my bags. He groans, faux collapsing back into the wall and staring down at me with sad puppy eyes.
I pull a suitcase out from under the couch, opening it dramatically.
"Has Chelsea called you yet?" It's another distraction, I know that much, but - no. It's been hours, even hungover she should've been awake by now. My entire body fills with worry. It must show on my face, because Noah suddenly asks, "she hasn't?"
"No," I frown. "What time is it?"
"Almost three."
My phone has no notifications, no missed calls. She hasn't even read my texts from this morning asking how the date went.
"That's not good, right?" I ask. "That's really worrying. She would never sleep a whole day away - even if she drank an entire ocean of cocktails last night."
"Do you want to go to her house?"
My head rolls up with my deadpan stare.
"I'm serious! Not a distraction, I promise."
My mouth pulls to the side. On the one hand, going to her house will at least confirm she got home last night. On the other, Chelsea would not like it if I forced her to hang out with a couple and her mother on a hangover - Lord knows she's heard enough about marriage from her mother as it is.
"At five," I decide. "I'll text her and say if she doesn't respond we'll drive other there at five."
"In the meantime-"
"In the meantime we're packing."
There's no room for argument. I gesture to another bag shoved under the TV stand and he pushes himself off the wall, muttering about Matt (possibly cussing him out) as he drops down on the rug and begins gathering my things from around the TV.
He's dramatic with the movements, throwing his body around to grab things.
I eye him with a smile and then sweep my arm across the bottom layer of the TV stand, pulling everything into an open bag.
"This sucks, let's do something else."
"Noah," I groan. "Shush."
His eye roll can be felt through the room.
We pack in silence again. For three whole minutes.
"Alright, let's pack my room."
My head flops to the side.
Before I know what's happening arms are underneath my criss-crossed thighs and I'm lifted into the air. A squeal falls from my lips as the back of my head falls into Noah's chest.
"What're you doing?"
"We're packing upstairs," Noah says simply.
"We've not finished packing down here."
He carries me up the stairs like I weigh nothing.
"Looks packed to me."
The audacity. I can already sense the smirk tattooing itself onto his mouth, always so smug, always so sure of himself.
I fish-mouth for a smart comeback as we reach the top of the stairs.
"Well. Maybe we should get your eyes checked."
He snorts. "Good one, sweetheart."
"Noah!"
I thrash in his arms. Suddenly I'm dropped in front of his closed bedroom door, barely managing to land on my feet as I grip the handle. I glare at him as I stomp into his bedroom and sit on the bed in the angriest way possible.
He closes the door and leans against it with crossed arms.
Mirroring him, I cross my own arms.
"I will not be seduced."
Eyebrows raising, he smiles.
"Won't you?"
"And I won't be distracted, either."
He pushes away from the door and opens up the wardrobe, pulling out t-shirt after t-shirt and throwing them towards me. They're a mixture of mine and his, each making me smile wider than the last.
"Most of these are your clothes," I say. "And what the fuck am I supposed to be putting these into? You didn't give me a bag." More shirts, some still on the hangers. "Stop throwing clothes!"
"We're just packing."
"This is the opposite of packing... it's. Unpacking!" Noah smirks at me. "I don't know what this is!"
He turns and begins pulling out more shirts - his own shirts, some of mine intermingled in the mix. I'm so baffled by his actions that I can't even open my mouth, though a smile does threaten to come to the surface.
I raise an eyebrow at him when he turns to me after a long stretch of silence (filled with clacking hangers since, of course, shirts are still being moved around).
I'm ninety percent sure he's losing his mind.
If I had known my moving out would've not only rattled Matt but Noah as well I might have broached the topic a little more gently. At least mentally prepared myself to deal with two insane men in one very small house - Matt being weird was enough.
Huh. There's an idea.
"Matt was being weird earlier, right?"
He shrugs.
"You're also being weird right now."
Still with his back to me, Noah stills. Half of the shirts from the wardrobe are now scattered between the floor and the bed, some still on hangers, others crumpled and now in need or ironing.
"No I'm not."
My mouth twitches.
"Could you look at me while you say that?"
Slowly, he turns.
It's incredibly strange seeing a man who's 6"4 look so sheepishly embarrassed. The blush on his neck is colouring in the skull tattooed there, such a lovely deep shade that I want to run my lips over it and stain it with my own shade of red.
My soft is an octave softer when I sit back on the bed and ask, "what's up?"
He sighs, dragging his feet before dropping down next to me, flopping back so we're both facing the ceiling.
"You shouldn't move out."
His voice is raw, deep, cutting with emotion. He sounds genuinely upset about it in a way that I haven't heard from him before.
A hand reaches inside my chest and takes hold of my heart, squeezing so tight it feels like I'm about to burst. Noah wants to live with me. We've know each other a couple of months, we've been dating mere weeks, I became his girlfriend less than a week ago, and yet he still wants to live with me.
I want to live with him too. If I'm honest with myself, I want to live here - not just with him, with Matt too.
"I have to," I reason, that fist on my heart squeezing even tighter. "Matt-"
He groans.
"Alright," I grin. "I can take a hint. No more talk about my brother. But... I should move out. It's already happening. My house is ready, he-who-shall-not-be-named knows and isn't jumping to ask me to stay, I'll live closer to work."
"Work?" He huffs, turning to face me. "Your best excuse is living closer to work? I drive you to work."
I lean forward and kiss him gently on the mouth.
"It's not like I want to go either," I whisper. "But other couples don't live together as soon as they meet. It'll be character building."
"Character building?"
"I'm trying to put a positive spin on it."
"Right," he snorts. "Just to clarify though, I don't care about what other couples do. I like you living here. This is where you should be."
Squeezing so tight I'm surprised my chest isn't constricting around the movement.
"I-"
A knock on the door disrupts our conversation.
Noah doesn't even say 'come in', he just clears his throat.
It clicks open gently.
"Packing is going well then," Matt notes.
I push my elbows back and roll my body up so I can look at him with a deadpan stare.
Most of the clothes on the floor aren't even mine - although Noah did tell Matt that he was going to move out as well when they had that particular conversation this morning.
I didn't think he was serious but maybe he was.
After that conversation, I'm even more sure.
I could even go as far as believing that Noah would come and live with me out of spite, just until Matt lets us both move back in.
"It's going incredibly," Noah says, voice dripping with sarcasm. "Did you know that your sister is moving out?"
Matt glares, sticking up his middle finger before dropping on the bed next to me.
Sandwiched between the two of them, I shuffle back so we're sat in a triangle. Matt looks to Noah's hand on my leg and then meets my eyes, which I roll. I don't bother pushing his hand away.
I probably shouldn't roll my eyes though, I realise that quickly enough.
What I said yesterday still looms in the air between the two of us, hanging over my head like dead weight. Being a bitch about the whole situation will definitely not help it go away.
"I'm sorry about-"
"I'm not thinking about that, Mads. For the love of God, let that whole conversation die. If I ever hear those words come out of your mouth again I'll actually shoot myself between the eyes, alright?"
"Alright," I echo, eyes wide. "So what's up?"
"I don't like this: you two-"
"Oh my God, man," Noah groans. "I feel like I've heard this like a hundred times this week."
"I'm not finished," Matt quips.
"I don't like it," he repeats. "But... It's not exactly the end of the world."
Jesus Christ, it's happening.
I didn't think it would be this soon. I thought I'd at least have to have been moved out for a week for Matt to start coming around to the idea, at some points I wondered if Hell would have to freeze over first.
Fuck. After our argument last night too?
Matt is a little more mature than I've maybe given him credit for.
"It's not?" Noah echoes, since apparently I've lost the ability to speak.
"You're a shitty friend," Matt says, "but no, I guess it's not."
I nod wildly, looking between Matt's obvious defeat and Noah's surprise at his coming around so quickly, probably mirroring my own.
"And," Matt sighs, "I also guess that I'm willing to compromise."
What?
I reach out and press a finger into his cheek, just to make sure he's still real. He throws out a confused hand and frowns at me. Opening my mouth to say God-knows-what, I'm relieved when my phone ringing cuts me off.
I glance at the nightstand, jumping from the bed at the sight of Chelsea's name.
"I have to get this," I explain, already walking towards the door. I turn back to them as I open it, eyeing them both still sitting at opposite ends of the bed. "Don't kill each other."
Matt mumbles something under his breath. All I can do is send him a hard stare as I close the door behind myself and press the phone to my ear.
"Chels?"
"Hey," she says, yawning immediately after.
"Did you sleep all day?" I pull the phone from my ear to check the time. "It's like five in the afternoon."
"Uh huh."
"How was your date? Did Tony apologise?"
"Uh... something like that."
"Something like that?" I ask. "So he didn't apologise for standing you up the other day?"
"We didn't - there wasn't - it was a whole big... Mads, I just called because you've left me like seven messages. You don't need to come over here - my mum is being really weird anyway. Her and Charlie had a fight."
"About what?" I ask.
She clears her throat. "Honestly I didn't really listen when she told me."
I bite my bottom lip, eyeing Noah's suspiciously quiet room behind me. At least they aren't yelling - unless they have actually killed each other. And I'd have to clean that up? No way.
But something is bothering me about this call. Something I can't put my finger on.
"So the date went well?"
"Nothing out of the ordinary," she replies easily.
"Are you going to see him again?"
A pause.
"I have a feeling that I am."
"A feeling?" Something drops to the floor in Noah's room. "Shit - Noah and Matt are alone together right now, I should really - are you sure everything is okay?"
"Of course it is," she laughs. "I'll see you at work on Monday, alright? I'd offer to help pack tomorrow but I'm. The twins want me to take them shopping."
Are they laughing now? I try and press my ear to the door.
"Okay," I mumble distractedly. "See you Monday."
As soon as the call ends I push open the door and stumble into the room, seeing Noah and Matt sat facing each other at opposite ends of the bed, throwing a tennis ball back and forth. Dangerous considering they could probably bruise each other with it.
"We came to an agreement," Matt tells me, still watching the ball. Maybe he's weary of the possible bruising too. I hum in response. "You keep your room in that other house and stay there on the weekends. Monday to Thursday you stay with us."
"So I live there and here?"
"For now," Noah adds.
"Until the two of you ultimately get a place together, I'm sure," Matt responds flatly, finally casting a glance in my direction. I swear I see the ghost of a smile on his lips for a fraction of a second.
"You're serious?"
"As serious as Noah apparently is about you."
Noah catches the ball and holds it between them.
"Should we continue to expect these little sarcastic comments?" He asks.
Matt just gives a lob-sided grin, wiped off his face when Noah flicks the ball towards his face. He catches it with a faux-angry huff.
"So this is it?" I ask, cautiously walking towards the bed. "It was that easier - no more arguing, Noah and I continue being together, and we all get along?"
Matt shrugs.
I almost don't believe it.
Kneeling up to the bed, I fall into Noah's open arm and am pulled into his side, eyeing Matt the entire time. His eyebrows draw together but he makes no comment as they continue throwing the ball back and forth.
"And I'll sleep here?"
"Yes," Noah says.
"No," Matt also responds, simultaneously.
Noah just laughs. "She's been sleeping here just fine the past few days, you moron."
"You can't date my sister and insult me. They're - two sides of a magnet. From now on, I'm like your girlfriend's dad, alright? You can even call me Mr. Grayson."
"Ooh," Noah mocks. "Such a firm hand on the household, Mr. Grayson."
I bounce between them, smirking at Noah's sultry tone.
"Fuck off," Matt laughs.
I find myself leaning further into Noah's arm, grinning into his shirt sleeve. I'd never seen the two of them act like this, like best friends rather than roommates. Obviously, I didn't spend a lot of time with the two of them together, only with each separately.
Suddenly I can see the next year of my life playing out in front of my eyes. Four days a week in this house, winding the both of them up, cleaning up after my annoying (but also fiercely protective, for some reason) brother, sleeping in Noah's hold every night.
Sure, the weekends alone might be a little sad. But those are the days that I'll invite Chelsea over, and maybe even take up a hobby. I'll get better at texting people back and maybe even learn about to take well-angled photos that will wind my boyfriend up into oblivion.
We'll take turns cooking. Smoosh might even stay here full time.
When our parents visit they won't only be visiting myself and Matt, but my actual live-in boyfriend. We'll celebrate Christmas together. Noah and I will go and eat dinners at his father's restaurant. It'll be so easy, such a nice life in a bubble with the two of them.
I catch Matt's eye and feel the smile that I can't conceal take over my face. He shakes his head and smiles too, and I know that he didn't want me to leave today.
He's letting go of the past arguments and being the bigger person. We're siblings who can get over things now, apparently, which is a wild concept. We're close. I have a brother, one that will stand up for me and threaten to kill my boyfriend if he upsets me.
I hum, finally feel contentedness wash over me.
Noah leans down and kisses the top of my head, and just as I'm about to look up at him, Matt clears his throat.
"There's be none of that in my house."
"Sorry Dad," Noah murmurs, grinning against my head. "I can call you Dad as well, right? Mr. Grayson, sir?"
Yeah, I think to myself, unable to stop smiling. This new living arrangement is going to be perfect.
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