Chapter 25
Micah
The night my parents visited was the last time anyone mentioned two-time things.
Since then, Ivy and I have settled into an easy routine and from the outside looking in, we’re perfectly good friends sharing a house.
She got that job at the psychologist’s office and works while Nell’s at school.
I do my twenty-four-hour shift thing and everything’s…
fine. She sleeps in her room. I sleep in mine.
We watch TV and eat dinner and she gets weird if I don’t let her pay for groceries and utilities out of her anemic paycheck.
I hate it.
But there’s something I hate even more.
That cot. That fucking cot. It’s tucked into a corner in my office, beside a desk I don’t use. There’s a pillow and a blanket and it looks like something a prisoner would sleep on. Ivy swears it’s fine, but…
It’s not.
Every night, she marches upstairs to that stupid contraption, and I feel like an asshole stretched out on an award-winning mattress with three layers of memory foam supporting my spine for the perfect night’s sleep.
“What’s on your mind?” Ivy asks. She’s perched on a stool at the counter, sipping wine while I cook up Thai Cashew Chicken for dinner.
It’s a favorite at the station, even among the pickiest eaters, so I’m betting it’ll be a win for Ivy and Nell.
But, just in case it’s too spicy for a six-year-old, I have a bottle of sweet and sour sauce and some chicken set aside as plan B.
“Nothing big.” I scrape the sides of the bowl with my whisk, then go to town combining the ingredients for the sauce like I can solve the cot problem by serving the perfect dinner. “Why do you ask?”
Ivy widens her eyes, watching me like I’m losing my mind. “You’re stirring that sauce like it dissed your mom.”
I put the bowl down and lean on the counter. “Switch rooms with me.”
“What? No. Why would I take your room?”
“I can’t stand the thought of you on that cot.”
“Don’t be silly.” Ivy sips her wine. “I’m fine.”
“You can’t be.” I toss diced chicken into the wok. The meat sizzles and I throw in some garlic, inhaling as the mixture becomes fragrant. “I’ve seen prison rooms that look more inviting.”
“You’ve been to prison?” Ivy arches a brow, her eyes twinkling with humor. The more time she spends with me, the more she reminds me of the girl I used to love, totally willing to bust my balls…or to dig in her heels when I’m trying to get her to do something she doesn’t like.
“No. But I do watch a lot of TV, thank you very much.”
“Micah, I’m fine, I promise.”
But the answer doesn’t make me feel any better. “If you switch rooms with me, you’ll have a king-sized bed, a walk-in closet, and a bathroom all to yourself with a whirlpool corner tub big enough to fit two people.”
I push the chicken to the side of the wok, add in a mixture of veggies and stir until they take on color, then pour in the sauce and cashews.
When everything looks about right, I scoop a mouthful onto a spoon and carry it over to Ivy.
Her lips part as she accepts the bite, then she sags onto the counter, moaning and groaning and damn all this one-time thing nonsense.
I want to be the reason she sounds like that, not some stupid piece of chicken.
“Holy shit! Micah! I can’t believe you grew up to be good in the kitchen!”
“I grew up to be good in lots of rooms.” I smile suggestively, but that’s all I’ll say on the topic.
Ivy said she needs space. I’m giving her space.
The last time things got hard in our relationship, she broke up with me and disappeared, then conveniently forgot that part of the story.
If I push too hard on the topic of one-time things, will she run away again?
I’m not willing to find out, so that’s it on the innuendo.
“I think it needs a bit more salt,” I say. “Just like you need an actual bed in a room that’s not an office.”
“I’m fine, Mi. I really am. It’s enough that you gave me a place to stay. You don’t have to give me your bedroom, too. I made choices that led to me sleeping on a cot. It’s time I learn to deal with the consequences of my actions without letting other people fix everything for me.”
She’s not gonna budge on this topic. I can hear it in her voice. Her heels are dug firmly in and while a lot about Ivy has changed, I doubt this is one of them. She’s made up her mind.
But you know what? So have I.
Just because she won’t take my room doesn’t mean there aren’t other ways to get rid of that stupid fucking cot.
Ivy
Grandma wraps me in the third hug since we’ve stepped onto her porch to say goodbye and I get the distinct impression she’s stalling.
Nell zooms around the front yard, arms out to her side, hair shining in the sun.
Everything about her seems easier lately.
Like she’s more relaxed, more comfortable.
Happier. Maybe it’s because she finally knows her father.
Maybe his absence weighed on her more than I knew.
Though, something tells me the change I’m seeing is more than that.
“I’m so glad things are going well,” Grandma says, peeking at her phone, then tapping away at a text message.
“So far, I’d say they’re pretty much idyllic.” My smile feels forced and I don’t know why. I love living with Micah. I’m happy. Nell’s happy. We’ve all found this rhythm that works for us. Our days are easy, though every night I go upstairs wishing I was heading to his room instead of mine.
Nothing’s happened between us since the night his parents visited. No kissing. No touching. Nothing. I catch Micah staring at me and I’m sure he’s caught me staring at him. And if he’d initiate, I wouldn’t be able to say no…
But he hasn’t.
He won’t.
He knows what I’ve been through and is trying to be what I need, but I wish he’d take the choice away from me so I can stop agonizing over it all…
And that thought, that one right there, makes it clear I’m not ready to be in a relationship. If I’m not strong enough to make the choice myself, then I’m not strong enough to be with someone.
When I broke up with Julian, he jumped right to me sleeping with someone else, to me letting another man support me.
In a way, he was right. I did sleep with Micah, and I wouldn’t have a place to stay if it wasn’t for him.
And while the real story isn’t nearly as manipulative as it might look on the outside, the thought of Micah believing that about me, even a little, makes me sick to my stomach.
He deserves to know I’m with him for the right reasons.
I have to be able to support myself before anything else happens between us.
Grandma checks her phone again, holding it at an angle so I can’t see the screen. That’s odd, especially from someone who recently made fancy speeches about adults not needing to hide things from each other.
“Everything okay with the construction crew?”
The insurance settlement came through and repair started on Nell’s room yesterday. Maybe that’s who she’s talking to.
“Okay?” Grandma gives me that crooked grin I love so much. “Three strong, young men were sweating and shirtless in my house for several hours yesterday. I brought them so many glasses of lemonade as an excuse to stare, they’re gonna start wondering if I’m losing my marbles.”
She checks her phone again, then leans against the railing, looking more and more like there’s something she’s not telling me. “Have you made any lemonade for Micah?” The twinkle in her eyes says she’s not talking about a zesty citrus beverage.
“Grandma!”
“What? I know too much about the world to believe you’re sharing a house with a man who looks like that, a man whose last name used to show up next to your first name on all your notebooks, might I add…
” She lifts a finger, her eyebrows, and the corners of her lips into a smile.
“I know too much to think you’re just happily living as friends and that’s that. ”
“There may have been some…lemonade.” I grin, remembering the feel of his lips against mine, preparing to spill the details and actually looking forward to it.
Keeping all this to myself is starting to make me feel like a bottle of shaken cola.
It’ll feel good to talk to someone and release the pressure, especially someone who’s rooted for me to fall into bed with Micah since this whole thing started.
“I knew there were juicy details you weren’t sharing…” Grandma peeks at her phone and her eyes go wide. “Oh! Look at the time! Well, I’ve kept you long enough.” She puts her hands on my shoulders and marches me to the car. “Nell! Sweets! It’s time to go!”
I stammer and stutter, confused by the sudden change, then accept her hug before lowering myself into the driver’s seat. She buckles Nell in, then actually shoos us off, her grin more crooked than ever.
“That was weird,” I murmur, and Nell agrees, though when we get back to Micah’s house, the weirdness continues.
He waits in the driveway in a pair of cargo shorts, his chest bare and gleaming with sweat, his shirt tucked into his back pocket. He’s grinning and I’m staring and suddenly, I wonder where I could get my hands on a glass of lemonade.
Maybe we were right that night on the couch. Maybe a two-time thing would be perfectly fine. This is Micah, after all. He doesn’t play mind games like Julian. Do I really need to worry this much about boundaries with him?
“Don’t be mad,” he says as I climb out of the car.
“Why would I be mad?”
“I did something you might not like at first, but you’re gonna appreciate in time.”
“This wouldn’t have anything to do with Grandma’s obsession with her phone during our visit, would it?”
“It might. And she fully supports the idea, by the way. In case that helps.” Micah takes my hand and leads me into the house, through the living room, and up the stairs with Nell trailing behind. We stop just outside my room.
“Just remember,” he says through the biggest grin I’ve ever seen, “I asked you to switch rooms with me and you refused. You basically left me no option.”
And suddenly I have a suspicion about what’s going on. He hated the idea of me sleeping on that cot from the first time he saw it. “What did you do?”
“It’s probably better if I just show you.” With that, he steps aside, gesturing toward my room.
“I told you I was fine…” I gasp as I move through the doorway.
Instead of a sterile office with a desk collecting dust, there’s a giant bed with a lush cream comforter and throw pillows in different shades of blue.
A dresser sits under the window, which is now covered with gauzy curtains instead of just blinds.
A vase of fresh flowers sits on a nightstand.
“It’s not much, I know, but the blue reminds me of your eyes and I’m sorry, but you can tell me you were fine on that cot all you want, but you weren’t. You couldn’t be.”
Nell peers around me, then steps into the room with a grin. “Now I won’t feel bad that I have a bed like a cloud and you don’t.”
“Exactly.” Micah ruffles her hair, and she ducks out of the way.
I don’t know how to feel about this. On one hand, it’s so thoughtful and he was right, the cot did suck. But if Julian saw this, he’d be leaning against the wall, shaking his head, filled with judgment.
And he might not be wrong to feel that way.
“I don’t know what to say.” I chew my bottom lip. “This is…”
Generous.
Kind.
Way too much.
“You look mad.”
“I’m not.”
“You’re a terrible liar.”
“You didn’t need to spend this kind of money on me, especially when we don’t know how long I’ll be living here. I’ve got that job, which means an apartment is just around the corner…”
Micah’s shoulder slump. His smile disintegrates. His heavy sigh fills the room, and he lifts a hand only to let it drop to his side while he shakes his head.
“But thank you,” I hurry to add. “This is incredibly thoughtful of you.”
Micah’s smile doesn’t reach his eyes. “Well, you know, what are friends for?”