Chapter Seven
Willa
I watched Nitro move around the kitchen, his shoulders relaxed under his T-shirt in a way they hadn’t been that morning.
The argument seemed to have left no mark on him -- or maybe it had left one I couldn’t read, buried beneath the control he wore like armor.
He reached for the cabinet above the sink without looking, his hand finding the pasta without hesitation, like he’d done it a thousand times in the dark.
The kitchen looked comfortably lived-in -- dark wood cabinets worn smooth at the edges, a gas stove with one burner that clicked three times before lighting, a butcher block counter with a shallow depression near the sink where years of hands had rested.
It was a place someone had built a life in -- someone who knew exactly where the potholders hung and which drawer held the wooden spoon and how much salt to add to boiling water.
Nitro reached past me for the garlic, his arm brushing mine with deliberate care. “Hungry?” he asked, his voice low and even.
“Yes,” I said.
He nodded and turned back to the stove, where water was just beginning to boil.
There was something in the economy of his movements -- no wasted energy, no unnecessary sound -- that made it impossible to look away.
He crushed garlic with the flat of a knife, added it to a jar of sauce already warming in a pot, stirred in dried herbs from a small glass jar with no label.
Nothing fancy. Nothing showy. Just the care of a man who’d learned to feed himself and was now, without being asked, feeding me too.
The bread came next -- sliced and arranged on a baking sheet, slid into the oven with a twist of the dial. The kitchen filled with the sharp scent of garlic, simmering tomato sauce, and fresh bread warming in the oven. My stomach tightened with sudden hunger.
Nitro set down two plates onto the table without ceremony, arranged forks and knives beside them with the same precision he’d used on the vegetables that morning. Then he pulled out a chair -- my chair, though neither of us had said as much -- and waited for me to sit before moving to his own.
The pasta was simple -- spaghetti with red sauce, the bread warm from the oven, a glass of water for each of us.
Nothing to write home about. Nothing that would impress anyone.
But when I took the first bite, the flavors hit my tongue with unexpected intensity -- garlic sharp underneath the tomato, herbs cutting the sweetness, the pasta cooked exactly to the point between firm and soft.
I was so used to taking care of myself that the simple act of someone making me dinner felt unfamiliar.
We ate without speaking -- forks scraping against ceramic, the occasional sound of bread tearing, the soft click of glasses being set down. But the silence carried none of the charge from earlier in the day. It wasn’t waiting to be filled. It wasn’t holding space for the next argument.
Nitro kept his focus mostly on his plate, but I caught him glancing at me -- quick looks that came when he thought I wasn’t paying attention, his gaze moving from my face to my stomach and back again.
There was something in those looks, something that made my skin prickle with awareness.
Not the heat I remembered from our night together, but something steadier -- the focused attention of a man still learning what I meant to him.
“Good?” he asked after a few minutes, nodding toward my half-empty plate.
“Better than good.”
His eyes brightened for a moment. “It’s just pasta.”
“It’s not, though.” The words came out before I could catch them. “It’s… you made it. For both of us.”
He held my gaze for a moment, his expression giving away nothing. Then he went back to his food, but I didn’t miss the slight shift in his posture -- shoulders dropping another fraction of an inch, jaw loosening just enough to notice.
The meal settled into an easy rhythm -- bite, chew, swallow, the occasional reach for bread or water.
I finished first, pushing my plate away slowly.
Nitro was still eating, movements unhurried, attention fixed on his food instead of me.
I watched him openly -- the angle of his wrist as he cut his bread, the steady movement of his throat when he swallowed, the restrained control woven through even the smallest actions.
Four months ago, I’d memorized his body in darkness.
Now I was learning him in daylight -- the slow rhythm of his breathing, the faint crinkle near his eyes when something held his focus, the quiet stillness he carried into moments that mattered.
He looked up and caught me watching. I didn’t look away or pretend I’d been doing something else. Just held his gaze with the same attention he’d shown me since I’d walked through the gate.
“You’re staring,” he said, his voice carrying none of the accusation the words might have held.
“You’re interesting,” I replied.
His jaw tensed briefly. “Yeah, well. Not that interesting.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.”
The exchange hung between us. Nitro held my gaze for one more moment, then reached for my empty plate without being asked.
“I’ve got it,” I said, my hand moving to intercept his. Our fingers brushed, just enough that I could feel the heat from his skin. “You cooked.”
He hesitated, then nodded and pulled back, giving me the space to stand.
I gathered the plates with careful hands, aware of his gaze on my back as I moved to the sink.
The water ran hot -- almost too hot -- steam rising from the metal as I scrubbed at a spot of sauce with more force than it required. Behind me, Nitro cleared his throat.
“There’s ice cream,” he said. “If you want some.”
I turned, dishcloth still in my hand. “What kind?”
“Vanilla.” A pause. “The good kind. Not the cheap stuff.”
I almost smiled -- an involuntary movement at the corner of my mouth. “You eat ice cream?”
Something flashed in his eyes -- there and gone in an instant. “Sometimes,” he said. “When no one’s looking.”
The moment stretched between us. I set the dishcloth down and dried my hands on a nearby towel.
“I’d like that,” I said. “The ice cream.”
He moved to the freezer, his back to me as he reached for the container on the top shelf. I watched the angle of his shoulders, the control he brought to even this smallest of actions.
The ice cream was exactly what he’d promised -- not the cheap kind that tasted like freezer burn and sugar, but the good stuff that melted on your tongue and left your mouth cool.
We ate it standing at the kitchen counter, not talking, just the occasional soft sound of spoons against ceramic.
When we finished, Nitro washed the bowls and set them in the drying rack with the same precision he brought to everything.
Then he looked at me across the kitchen, his expression giving away nothing, and said, “There’s a movie on if you want to watch it. ”
It wasn’t really a question -- not a command either, but something in between that gave me the choice without making me ask for it. I nodded and followed him to the living room.
The space had transformed in the fading light -- shadows gathering in the corners, the single lamp by the armchair casting a warm glow across the hardwood floor.
Nitro crossed the room with the same restrained confidence he brought to everything -- no wasted energy, no unnecessary sound -- and pressed a button on the remote.
The screen flickered to life, colors washing across his face in patterns that came and went too quickly to track.
He put on the movie we’d discussed. The sound came up just enough to fill the room without overwhelming it, dialogue drifting through the quiet without demanding our attention.
Neither of us spoke. The movie played on -- some action thing with car chases and explosions, the kind of background noise that asked nothing of its audience.
I watched the movie without following the plot, letting the movement on the screen distract me from the awareness sitting heavy between us.
Nitro kept his focus on the television, expression neutral, but the angle of his body told a different story.
He was as aware of me as I was of him -- of the space separating us on the couch, of every inch between his shoulder and mine on the worn leather.
Time passed -- ten minutes, maybe fifteen.
My body, which had been held with such tension since I’d walked through the gate, began to relax by fractions -- shoulders dropping, spine finding a curve that didn’t hurt, breath coming easier in my lungs.
The twins were quiet, not the usual shift and roll that had been keeping me up at night, just the subtle presence of two bodies finding their rhythm with mine.
The living room was warm without feeling stuffy.
At some point, without meaning to, I drifted sideways until my shoulder rested against Nitro’s arm.
It wasn’t dramatic. I didn’t consciously decide to close the distance or think through what it meant.
My body simply gave up on maintaining the separation we’d been holding all evening.
My shoulder pressed against the solid warmth of his bicep, and for one suspended moment, neither of us moved, both caught off guard by the contact.
I didn’t pull away. I couldn’t have explained why if asked. I only knew moving would feel worse than staying where I was. My attention remained on the television, my breathing gradually syncing with the steady rise and fall of his chest beside me while my hands went still in my lap.
Nitro stayed exactly where he was, his body warm and solid against mine, his attention still ostensibly on the movie playing in front of us.
Then he moved slightly, and I felt it immediately through the solid line of his body against mine. His hand lifted from his thigh and hovered over my belly for one suspended beat, the hesitation visible in the held stillness of his arm, before it settled.
His palm came to rest against the curve of my stomach, fingers spread wide, and he went completely still.
It wasn’t the controlled attention he usually carried, but something slipping through the cracks.
Something closer to awe. His jaw went loose, his attention dropped from the television to his own hand, and the expression that crossed his face was one I hadn’t seen on him before -- unguarded, stripped of the certainty he wore like a second skin.
I watched his face in the shifting glow of the television instead of the movie itself -- the sharp line of his profile, the focus in his eyes, the slight parting of his lips when his breath caught.
His hand stayed warm against my stomach through the thin cotton of my shirt, heavy and grounding against the curve that had quietly become the center of both our lives.
For one long moment, neither of us moved, both caught off guard by the simple touch.
Then his thumb moved once across my belly, slow and almost absentminded, as if his hand had found where it belonged before the rest of him caught up. The twins shifted beneath his palm, and his fingers flexed slightly against the fabric of my shirt.
My hand moved without my deciding it should -- drifted to rest beside his on my stomach, present in a way that made it clear I’d seen what was happening.
Our fingers didn’t touch -- just existed in the same space, separated by millimeters that might as well have been miles for all the attention either of us was paying to the distance.
The movie kept playing in the background -- car chases, explosions, dialogue neither of us followed. The living room stayed quiet except for the low murmur of the television and the uneven rhythm of our breathing, gradually falling into sync.
Neither of us spoke. Words would have ruined it anyway.
His hand rested on my belly, my body leaned into his side, and the distance we’d been fighting to maintain finally gave way to something softer and harder to ignore.
So we stayed exactly where we were -- his palm warm through the thin cotton of my shirt, my shoulder solid against his arm, the twins shifting beneath the point where our hands almost touched -- and let the quiet do the rest.
Nitro’s hand didn’t move from my belly. My weight didn’t shift away from his side.
We sat in the dim light of the television, his palm warm through my shirt, my breathing slowed to match the rise and fall of his chest, and existed, simply and completely, inside the moment without trying to name it or hold it at arm’s length.
It was enough. For now, it was enough.