Chapter 23 #3
He picks up my hand, turns it over, traces the lifeline with a fingernail. “Do you ever think about—later? Like, what you want in five years? Ten?”
I watch his face. The last of the sunlight catches on his jaw, the silver hairs at his temple, and I realize I never think of him as old until he reminds me. “Are you planning a midlife crisis? Should I start worrying?”
He lifts my hand to his mouth, kisses the knuckle. “No, I just—sometimes it feels like I’m holding you back. You’re so young, sweetheart. You could do anything, go anywhere. And I’m settled. You know, tenure and all that.”
I twist to face him, pulling my knees up. “You’re not settled. You’re just scared.”
He winces, but not at the accusation. “Maybe. But I want to know what you want. For real.”
I let the question fill the space between us. In the past, this is where I’d make a joke or change the subject, but not tonight.
“I want this,” I say. “I want school, and you. I want to get good enough at poetry that I can teach it someday, maybe even here. I want a life that’s messy and alive, not just—” I falter, searching for the right word.
“Scripted?” he offers.
“Yeah. Not just following the script.”
He relaxes, leans back so his head touches the siding. “Do you want to get married?”
The question lands with a thump. It’s not a proposal. He’s not on one knee. But it’s the kind of thing we never really talked about, beyond the jokes and the near-misses and the time I almost signed a surrogacy contract without thinking it through.
I laugh, a little wild. “Maybe. But we don’t even know if I can get pregnant, genius. The fibroids could come back. I might be a barren wasteland.”
He’s gentle. “I don’t care.”
I roll my eyes, but my heart beats louder. “If it happens, it happens.”
He looks at me, searching for a lie, but finds none. “You’d be a great mom.”
“Gross,” I say, but I feel the words in my chest. “You’d be the worst dad. So embarrassing. Reading Rilke at soccer games.”
He pinches my hip, grinning. “You say that like it’s a threat.”
We laugh, and the swing sways, and the world feels less daunting.
He gets quiet again, staring off at the neighbor’s porch, where someone is playing a sad, distant song on a tinny radio. “My house is too big for me alone,” he says. “I rattle around like loose change. Unless you wanted to, you know. Move in?”
It’s not a big production. He doesn’t even look at me, just lets the words dangle in the air, ready to shrivel or bloom.
I freeze, then bite my lip. “You’re sure?”
“Only if you are.”
I think about it: his elegant yet comfortable home, my pile of thrifted mugs, the way his shampoo smells. I think about the future, and for the first time, I don’t feel panic. I feel the edges of happiness.
I slide over, crawl into his lap, arms around his neck. “I’d love to,” I say, and mean it.
He buries his face in my shoulder and holds me so tight I can barely breathe.
It’s not fireworks. It’s not a movie ending.
But it’s ours.
And it’s enough.
The drive north is the color of sunlight filtered through bug splatter and pine needles.
The old Civic is packed to the roof with groceries, beach towels, the sort of optimistic gear you bring to cabins even though you know you’ll spend most of the time inside, tangled up in each other or hiding from mosquitoes.
I’m the DJ, as always, but Liam sneaks in a playlist of his own—Wilco, Cat Power, a dash of Depeche Mode for the nostalgia.
He sings along in a low, careful way that suggests he’s only half-trying, as if to remind me he’s more human than legend.
The lake cabin is not the horror movie type, nor the luxury Instagram sort.
It’s weathered, lopsided, a structure that squats rather than perches.
There’s a stone fireplace blackened from decades of woodsmoke, a fridge that hums so loud you can hear it from the dock, and floorboards that announce your location at all times.
The nearest neighbor is visible through a fringe of birch trees, but only if you squint.
The water’s so clear you can see minnows flickering in the shallows, and it smells like nothing except water—no gasoline, no runoff, just the endless, blank possibility of July.
We unpack, which is a joke, because neither of us brought more than shorts, swimsuits, and a few changes of underwear. I flop onto the musty sofa, while Liam inspects the kitchen like he’s about to host a reality show. He finds a box of pancake mix so old it expired during the Obama administration.
“You think it’s still safe?” he asks, shaking it so hard the cardboard bulges.
“It’s technically food,” I say. “That’s all you can ask out here.”
He grins, then stashes it back on the shelf. “Pancakes or death. Dealer’s choice.”
We make up the bed in the only bedroom—one of those foam-topped deals, more hammock than mattress—and spread our stuff around like a territorial claim.
There’s no cell service, no WiFi, not even a TV; just a battered stack of New Yorkers and a chess set with three extra queens.
I’m giddy. The world could end and we wouldn’t know for days.
The sun is still high, so we change into swimsuits and walk barefoot down to the dock.
The boards are so hot I have to jog, but the lake is a fridge—ice shock, then a numbness that peels away every other sensation.
I dive first, then surface and flip my hair back like I’m in a shampoo ad.
Liam follows, wading in slow, arms raised in a parodic panic, then lobs a wave at me that nearly drowns my sinuses.
We float on our backs, watching the sky change colors by imperceptible degrees, and he tells me about the book he’s supposed to be writing. The publisher wants more sex, less philosophy. He thinks it’s a metaphor for his life.
“Maybe you should write under a pseudonym,” I suggest. “Then you could say anything.”
He smirks, “I already say what I want.”
We drift until the water chills us, then climb out and sit on the end of the dock, feet dangling. He opens a bottle of cheap wine with a shoe and a stick (city skills don’t matter here), and we drink straight from the neck, sharing it back and forth. It tastes like sour cherries and wood smoke.
He watches a loon land on the water, wings splayed, a little awkward. “I think they mate for life,” he says.
I snort. “Only because they never see any other loons.”
He laughs, but then gets quiet. “What would you do if you could do anything, anywhere? No limits.”
It’s one of those questions that used to fill me with dread. Now, I just let the silence be.
“Write, I guess. Or teach. Or write about teaching.” I think about it. “But honestly, just this. I’d be happy if the world was just this.”
My handsome boyfriend leans over, kisses my cheek, then my jaw. “Good answer.”
We watch the sky go gold, then lavender. Somewhere behind us, a squirrel shrieks at another squirrel, but out here, there’s room for even their pettiness. When the sun sinks, we wander up to the cabin, shivering from the wet.
He builds a fire—old pro, one match, no starter fluid. I make a meal out of crackers and deli cheese. We eat on the rug in front of the hearth, both of us cross-legged, knees touching. The wine is gone, but the heat from the flames is enough.
He pulls me into his lap, arms strong around my waist. I press my forehead to his, and we just breathe, sharing the space.
After a long while, he says, “You’re the best thing that ever happened to me.” It’s not cheesy. It’s a fact.
“Even better than winning the poetry fellowship?” I tease.
He smiles, kisses my lips. “You have no idea.”
We move to the futon, not because we’re tired, but because the rug is bristly and the wine is making me floppy. The fire throws orange shapes on the walls. He touches my cheek, traces my jaw, runs a knuckle down my throat to the collarbone. I shiver, but not from cold.
“I want to take my time,” he says, and for the first time, I believe him.
He pulls my shirt over my head, then cups my face in both hands and kisses me so softly it aches. His touch is reverent, not like a worshiper, but like an astronomer who’s found a new star.
I undress him slow, wanting to remember every detail—his skin mapped with freckles, the muscle under his softness, the scar on his thigh he never talks about.
I bury my face in his chest, breathe in the salt of his sweat and the smoke from the fire.
He presses his lips to my temple and just holds me.
His hands move lower, palms wide and sure.
I’m already wet—maybe I’ve been wet all day, the anticipation bubbling under every word, every look.
He teases the waistband of my bikini bottoms, then tugs them down, discards them in a gentle, amused way that makes me laugh. I let him look. I let him see.
He slides his fingers between my legs, then pauses, asking for permission without words. I give it. He strokes, slow and patient, thumb brushing where it matters, and my hips move of their own accord.
“Fuck, you’re drenched, baby,” he rasps.
I moan a little in the back of my throat.
“I know. I need this.”
Liam grins. He knows what I like, and he gives it to me, but there’s something extra this time—a care, a steadiness that says this is not just sex, it’s a thing built on top of a hundred thousand other things.
He shifts lower, kisses the inside of my thigh, then trails up, up, until his mouth is at my center. He’s good at this. Not just technically, but emotionally—he loves the taste of my pussy, the act, the evidence of my pleasure. He moans into me, and I nearly lose it.
“Liam,” I pant. “Oh god!”
He moans into my wetness, circling my bud with his tongue before fusing his lips to my clit. I arch my back, almost screaming with pleasure, as he suckles and kisses, before lapping at my sensitive bud a few times.
“I know what you need, sweetheart,” he rasps. “Big dick.”
“Yes, I do!” I pant. “Breed me, Professor! I need it! Use my body to make yourself feel good.”