Chapter Thirty
Todd
“Hey, you hungry? I made buffalo chicken mac and cheese.”
At first I think my eyes are deceiving me. I’ve just finished running myself into the ground over missing Taylor, and here she is in the kitchen cooking like she didn’t go AWOL for forty-eight hours.
“Yeah, starving,” I reply, dropping my bag and kicking off my shoes.
“It’s in the crockpot; help yourself.”
I grab a bowl and do just that. “So how’d things go with Emma?”
“Well . . .” She chews and swallows. “She’s currently asleep in my bed.”
I sit beside her at the breakfast bar. “How’d that happen?”
“She asked if she could crash here—I hope that’s okay. I’m sorry—I should have asked you first.”
“Taylor, it’s fine.” I grab her hand, and our eyes fall to where we’re connected. “You don’t have to ask my permission—this is your apartment too.”
Her lips quiver. “Thanks, Todd.”
We fall silent, the sound of forks scraping against porcelain fills the room until she clears her throat.
“You’re home late,” she says.
“Yeah, I was off at practice tonight, so I stuck around and got some more work in.”
“God, I don’t even want to think about how much practice is going to kick my ass tomorrow.”
“Right—I feel the same way, only mine’s a game.” I hop off the stool to get seconds and something to drink. “Have you given any more thought to the job with the Rangers?”
She shrugs. “It really depends on what Emma decides to do about her pregnancy; she’s going to need my help if she decides to keep it.”
I want to remind her, for the hundredth time, that she’s not responsible for raising Emma, that she doesn’t have to turn her whole future upside-down because her sister can’t keep it together for more than a week at a time.
But I can see the fine lines of exhaustion around her eyes, the way she’s barely holding herself together, and I know exactly how it’ll go if I open that door.
Besides, her loyalty is one of the things I love about her, even when it’s a slow-moving train wreck.
So instead I lean back and rub my stomach. “Oh, that hit the spot.”
“Mm-hm.” She drops her fork as well. “Now I’m ready to sleep.”
I rub my nose, checking her out from the corner of my eye. “I can take the couch if you want to take my bed.”
She furrows her brow. “Why would you take the couch?”
“Uh, so you can have the bed.”
“Is it suddenly not big enough for the both of us?” She bites her lip, averting her gaze. “Or do you just not want to share it with me anymore?”
“No—I do! I just wasn’t sure since Emma’s here . . .”
She waves her hand dismissively. “She doesn’t care if we’re sleeping together—nothing has to change.”
That’s when it hits me: Taylor thinks nothing is different, not really, not at the core.
She says it so matter-of-factly, like everything that’s transpired in the past few weeks—every time we pushed past the edge of friendship and into something new—was just a natural extension of who we’ve always been.
But it isn’t—at least not for me. The bed’s the same, the apartment’s the same, her hair looped like wildfire strands on the pillow is the same, but I am not the same.
My thoughts shift and pivot like restless footwork in the paint.
I lie awake on my side, listening to the hush of rain on the window, watching the way her freckles become constellations when the moonlight catches her skin.
She’s already asleep, one leg thrown over my hip, breathing slowly, the faintest frown on her face like she’s locked in a dream she doesn’t quite love.
These moments used to feel like a holding pattern, orbiting something unnamed.
Now it’s like my body is a time bomb, every second ticking closer to detonation, and the only thing stopping me from exploding is the impossible idea that this—her, me, the way she’s claimed space in my bed, in my chest—might be permanent . . .
Because she doesn’t want anything to change.