Epilogue
Ryan’s arms wrapped around Jasper’s chest, pulling him back against his warm, hard body.
“Relax, possum,” he whispered in Jasper’s ear. “Let me do this for you.”
“I can’t—it’s too much! I’m gonna—"
“Shh.”
Jasper wiggled out of Ryan’s arms and flattened his hands on the table in front of him. “I will destroy you!” he shouted across the event hall. “You cheating bastard!”
“Let me handle it, I said.”
Ryan left Jasper by the table holding the wrestling arena they’d entered in the annual miniature contest. It was their first foray into a display that featured a more industrial setting, and they’d learned the people who made that type of miniature were mostly men their age, not the older, gentler, in-it-for-the-fun crowd that focused on trains and mountains.
It wasn’t fair. Ryan and Jasper had painstakingly assembled thousands of individual arena seats from cardstock and foam.
They’d spent hours painting the ground with spilled drinks and individual popcorn kernels made from clay.
They’d braided their own rope because Ryan insisted the premade kind didn’t have the same vibe as a real wrestling ring, and Jasper agreed.
They’d taken third place, losing to a jackass who 3-D printed most of his pieces. Of course that guy’s display was larger and more detailed. He’d spent a quarter of the time on building that Jasper and Ryan had, so he’d had more time to paint and perfect things.
“Now you’ll see!” Jasper yelled again.
Ryan turned to face Jasper and glared, pressing his lips together before mouthing shut up, please.
Whatever. Jasper huffed and started packing up their display, peeking up at Ryan occasionally to see if he’d ripped that guy a new asshole yet.
Unfortunately, every time he looked, the guy was smiling, laughing, or nodding excitedly, while Ryan pointed out bits of the display or asked engaging questions, before finally handing him a business card—which he’d dropped at first. Jasper watched to see if the guy was going to check him out as he bent over, but he didn’t.
That was even more annoying, because he’d stolen an opportunity from Jasper to look at Ryan’s ass, just like he’d stolen the win.
Ryan walked back to the table, smiling.
“What are you so happy about?” Jasper asked.
“I might have secured a new client. He needs his shed finished.”
“That’s good. Does he need it for his printers, so he can create a cheating empire?”
“Maybe,” Ryan said, twirling a small pair of wire snips he’d been using for last minute updates to their display. He held them up and grinned. “But I have a feeling that plan will be delayed a bit.”
“Why?” Jasper said, grinning. “What did you do?”
“I snipped all his cords when I dropped my card. He brought three printers with him.”
Jasper burst out laughing. “Ryan! That’s terrible.” He stepped closer and whispered, “And very sexy.”
“I know what my baby needs.”
“Uh huh.” Jasper eyed him, wishing he could lean over and drop a big kiss on him.
“And right now, I think it’s dinner,” Ryan said. “Or maybe that’s just me. But I’ve been simmering stock for twenty-four hours. What do you say we go home and I make soup?”
“I love that idea.”
Half an hour later, they were pulling up the driveway. The porch light had turned on with the evening hours, casting the front deck in a warm pool of golden light against the gathering dusk. Jasper took a moment to enjoy the view, the same way he did all the time now that things were so good again.
He loved looking at the house now that evidence of Ryan was everywhere.
The siding had been replaced—a project he’d taken on as education, so he could offer it as a service through his new business.
The flower beds were full, even in winter, of evergreen plants and overwintering vegetables for wildlife to snack on.
The chicken coop, of course, had been given a facelift, the run extended an extra twenty feet, fully covered by thick wire.
After putting the car in park, Ryan looked over, questioning Jasper’s silence. “You coming?”
“Yeah, of course. I’m starving.”
“Me too. I got mushrooms.”
“Can’t wait.”
The past year had been both the best they’d had in recent memory, and a lot of work.
Jasper had spent the first few months bracing against the sound of a ringing phone or a bag of clothes by the door before Ryan finally brought up counseling again.
He’d reassured Jasper it wasn’t because things were bad, but because they’d spent years learning how to push through hard times instead of learning how to just be together.
Jasper had agreed before the words were fully out of Ryan’s mouth.
And thank God for that, because now Ryan had stopped throwing gifts and money at Jasper in lieu of hard conversations, and Jasper had stopped imagining their happiness was something delicate that had to be supervised.
It turned out their happiness wasn't delicate at all. It survived arguments, grief, counseling appointments—where both of them occasionally looked like the bad guy—bad days, and all the ordinary messes of a shared life.
Ryan had put in work, too. Even now, as he reached for the grocery bag balanced between their seats, his phone buzzed somewhere inside the center console, muffled beneath a receipt and sunglasses and whatever snack wrapper he’d shoved in there. Neither of them moved to check it.
“Probably just Micah,” Ryan said, rubbing his eyes. “He’s so whiny now. He asked me to go down to Florida with him to track down an ex.”
“When?”
“Early February.”
Jasper nodded. Two years ago, it would have ruined his day to hear that.
Jasper and Ryan had a trip planned for February—Mexico City, to revisit the museums and markets they’d seen before—and years ago, he would have been living on pins and needles with anxiety that Ryan would cancel.
Now, all he felt was the absence of a tightened stomach and racing heart.
“I told him we’ve got plans, so he’ll have to figure it out on his own.” Ryan climbed out of the vehicle and stretched, smiling at Calliope in the window, who was meowing silently behind the glass.
“Oh, look, her preferred parent is home,” Jasper grumbled. He shouted towards the house. “Traitor!”
Ryan laughed as Calliope stretched impatiently against the glass.
He waited at the door for Jasper, then nudged it open with his shoulder.
Warmth spilled out into the cool evening air, followed by the cat twisting figure eights around their legs.
Jasper guided her gently with his foot and followed Ryan inside, the door closing itself behind them and settling easily in its frame.