28. Sloane
Sloane
Watching Eden paint is one of my favorite things in the world.
She gets so lost in the art, and I get to glimpse into her wonderful and creative brain.
She is laser-focused on whipping paint onto the canvas, not giving a shit where the residual colors land.
Her studio is a mishmash of paint splats and clay splashes.
It’s in these times that I get to sit back and appreciate the small things. Life can feel like it’s rushing by in a flash, especially when big things are happening, like having a baby or parents relocating abroad. The possibility of doing something as outrageous as following those parents.
I haven’t brought the subject up with Eden yet, but the more I think about it, the more convinced I am that it’s where our story continues.
Don’t get me wrong, I love the US. My whole life and support system are here, but I have this gut feeling that starting fresh in the UK will be the best thing for us.
If we did it, bit the bullet and relocated, I can see Eden flourishing.
I want to give her the cottage by the sea that she dreamed of in high school.
Okay, I’d prefer it if she weren’t a recluse hell-bent on acting like a grumpy old lady, but I think I’m safe.
She’s changed a lot since senior year at Holcroft.
Hell, I have too, and I really believe we’ve changed for the best and now we can reap the rewards.
Eden stood by me every step of the way when I was rebuilding my life.
It’s true what I said to Mom and Becca: Eden has always put my needs first. I want to repay that by giving her the best chance she has of succeeding.
Her art career is already pretty big, but I think it could explode if she were surrounded by the right people.
She’s got a great network of contacts in London, and it would be a hell of a lot easier to grab a train to the capital from Northumberland than it is to fly from Colorado.
As for me, I have a sister-in-law who works at a great sports university.
I might as well exploit that for all it’s worth and set myself up as a physio.
Maybe this time I’ll keep the business small, as in just me.
Take a few private clients or possibly see if I can do some part-time work for the university or one of the local soccer teams.
Everything seems possible and brand new when I think of moving. It gets me excited, and I want Eden to see that.
Another blob of blue paint hits the canvas and then the wall behind it. Eden smiles wide as she steps back and observes her work.
“It’s done,” she declares to the room, unaware I’m watching.
“It’s beautiful,” I remark, which of course makes her jump and throw her paintbrush at me.
I didn’t like this shirt anyway. Laughing, I pull her into my arms.
“Shit, you scared me!”
“Sorry, babe. I was just admiring the view.”
She grins and pulls me closer by my butt. “Hmm, want to check it out a little closer?”
Olivia is with Becca and Bella, so we have time for sex. We’ve been making up for the dry months at every opportunity. But, as much as I want to ravish her, I need to tell her how I’m feeling.
“Soon, honey. But I’d like to chat first.”
Her eyebrows crease. “Everything okay?”
Eden’s first thought is going to be my mental health, which is fair.
“Totally fine, I promise. This is about us.”
Her eyes go wide. Maybe I should have phrased it better.
“It’s not a bad thing, baby. Just listen.”
Eden pulls me out of the studio and into our bedroom.
“Let me get showered first and then we’ll talk. Wanna join me?”
I know that look, and I’m not getting suckered in, even though my body is begging for her touch.
Shaking my head, I back away, smiling. “I’ll see you in the kitchen.” Determined to torture me, she begins to undress, touching herself as she goes.
“Sure?”
I swallow hard. “You don’t play fair,” I growl, practically sprinting away from her laughter.
Twenty minutes later, Eden enters the kitchen looking and smelling fresh. She’s wearing a pair of Sonic the Hedgehog boxers and a muscle tee that allows me to see her boobs from the side. We are absolutely having sex as soon as I finish talking.
I try to play it cool and pour water, but I’m vibrating with anticipation. She sits across from me, bites into a cookie, and eyes me over the rim of her glass.
“So,” she says, “this about your mom? Or did Olivia do something unspeakable at Becca’s house?”
I shake my head, suddenly nervous. “It’s not about them. It’s about us. Our future.”
She freezes, cookie halfway to her mouth. “Babe. You’re not divorcing me, are you? Because that would be the shittiest way to do it—after promised sex and paint, with snacks as a buffer. That’s like emotional whiplash.”
I laugh louder than I mean to. “No. God, no! I just—” I exhale, stare at the bowl of clementines, and then just say it. “What if we moved to England?”
She blinks. Once. Twice. Her mouth forms a perfect “o” before she lets out a bark of laughter. “What if we moved to England? Like, for real?”
I can’t help but smile. “For real. I mean, what if we just…went? Lived by the sea like you always said you wanted. Did it for Olivia, for us. For your art.”
She leans back, arms crossed, not angry but wary. “Where’s this coming from?”
I shrug, but I know exactly where it’s coming from. “Your parents are there. Your sister. Gran and Grandad. You light up when you talk about them, Eden. And every time we go over, it’s like you’re home.”
She stares at me, and I can see her brain spooling, arguments forming and dissolving. “You’d do that? Just…leave everything? Your practice, your family, the world’s best barbecue ribs?”
I nod. “I would. If it meant you were happy, I’d move to the actual moon, let alone Northumberland. It just feels…right. Like our chapter here is winding down, you know?”
She gets quiet, which is always the most dangerous phase. I let her think, because if I nudge, she’ll just say no to spite me and the universe.
After a minute, she says, “Do you really want to leave? Or do you think you owe me something?”
It’s a fair question. The kind that years ago would have made me crumble. But I’m sturdier now, and I know what I want.
“I want this. A clean start. A different kind of life for Liv. And you’d have the space to make something huge with your art. You could get a studio in London, exhibit, teach, whatever you want.”
She picks apart the cookie, crumb by crumb. “We’d have to sell the house.”
“Yeah.”
“Re-home the cat.”
“Definitely not. That menace has to come with us. She’s too mean to die here.”
Eden snorts. “She’ll outlive us all.”
“Look, we don’t have to decide now. But I want you to know that if you want it, I’ll make it happen. I want you to have your family. Liv to know her weird British blood. Even if we’re just slightly closer in time zone, it’s worth it.”
She’s still quiet, but it’s not a stormy silence. She’s doing the thing where she lines her thoughts up in neat little rows and waits for the right one to step forward.
“I always thought I was supposed to be here. With you. I never thought I’d go back.”
I reach over and take her hand. “You’re not going back. You’re levelling up. You’re giving yourself, me, and Liv something new.”
Eden looks at me, eyes bright and wet, but she’s smiling. “You are so annoying when you’re right.”
“I know. It’s why you love me.”
She sighs, but it sounds like relief. “Okay. Let’s think about it. For real. Make a list. Do some math. Maybe talk to Jenna and see what she says.”
My own relief is so intense I almost choke. “Do you think she’d be cool with us crashing her scene?”
Eden grins, wicked. “Are you kidding? She’s been lost without me! I make her life complete.”
I stand and round the table, pull her up into my arms. “I love you,” I say into her hair, meaning it more than I’ve ever meant anything.
She pretends to struggle, but she’s laughing now, warm and real. “Don’t get sappy on me, Bishop. You know I’ll cry.”
I squeeze her tighter, then let go and spin her around in the kitchen until she protests. We plant ourselves against the counter, a tangle of limbs, both of us shaking with giddy, nervous energy.
“If we move, you’re the one telling my parents. Mum will have an aneurysm.”
I kiss her neck. “Deal. But you have to break it to Pia.”
“Jesus, that’s not going to go well,” she says, then hesitates. “You really don’t mind?”
I shake my head. “Not at all.”
She kisses me, slow and deep, and just when I think we might get lost in it, Olivia’s wail cuts through the air from the hallway. Bella mock wails in reply, and that’s the end of our alone time. We didn’t even hear the door open and close.
Eden sighs, but she’s grinning, and together we go to the living room where our friends are depositing our angry child. Eden scoops up the baby, and I grab the cat for a snuggle.
Bella recounts Olivia’s every move as Becca pulls out another knitted baby blanket. Olivia continues to scream as if the world is offending her.
After we’ve bid the girls goodbye and loaded them up with snacks for the “emotional turmoil” the goblin put them through, we all snuggle on the couch.
Eden picks up her phone. “Do you think Bella and Becca would visit us?”
“They’d probably move in,” I say, picturing the endless parade of found family flowing through whatever tiny row house we end up in.
She hums, satisfied, and I see the gears turning—she’s already planning, already imagining the commute, the light in her new studio, the taste of salt in the air.
It’s not a done deal yet. There are a thousand logistics, a million potential disasters, but at least we’re talking about it, and not just in a throwaway comment kind of way. This feels tangible.
I lean back and watch Eden as she starts sketching on her iPad, the outlines of a new painting blooming before my eyes.
Her face is relaxed, the way it is when she’s dreaming.
I know right then that we’re going to be okay wherever we are.
Even if we’re in a haunted cottage on the edge of some wind-blasted cliff, with a feral toddler and a cat that bites.
“Hey, Bishop?” she says, not looking up.
“Yeah?”
“I love you, too. Even when you’re a pain in the ass.”
I grin, basking in it. “Especially then.”
Once Olivia is down for her nap, Eden corners me.
She has that look in her eye that tells me she hasn’t forgotten earlier, before we had the talk.
I can’t say I’m upset about it. Who doesn’t want their wife lusting after them?
I briefly worried about my body after Olivia, but Eden put those fears to rest the second she saw me naked for the first time post-birth.
“Can I help you?” I say smoothly as she crowds my personal space. We’re just outside Olivia’s door, and she has hawk-like hearing, so this can’t happen here.
“I have something to show you,” she all but whispers, grabbing my hand and leading us to our room.
She closes the door behind us, keeping her gaze locked on mine, and for a second I think she’s going to say something, but instead she just walks to the bed. She sits on the edge, knees wide, and crooks her finger at me.
“C’mere,” she says, voice dropping half an octave.
I cross the room in two strides, vibrating with the need to touch her, to taste her, to say thank you, and I love you, and this is everything in a language only we speak.
She pulls me in by the waistband, tongue running along her own bottom lip, then slides my shirt off with an efficiency that feels both practiced and reverent.
Her hands are cool, a contrast to the heat blasting out of her skin, and she lifts my bra over my head in one smooth motion, grinning like the world’s cockiest magician.
“God, you’re so fucking hot,” she murmurs, and the way she says it—like it’s an empirical fact and not a compliment—sends a flush up my neck.
I want to devour her, but she’s already ahead of me, kissing my stomach, my hip, and then the inside of my thigh through my clothes.
All the places she knows I’m ticklish or tender or both.
I sink my fingers into her hair, tugging just enough to make her look up at me. Her eyes are sharp and hungry.
“We have, like, fifteen minutes,” I hiss, but she just laughs, low and sinful, and hooks her thumbs into my leggings, dragging them down until I’m standing in front of her in only my underwear, feeling entirely seen and entirely wanted.
She traces a line up my shin, over my knee, and then tugs me into her lap. I straddle her, grinding down. Eden groans, sending the sound vibrating right through my core. I can feel how wet I am already, and from her grin, so can she.
“Missed this,” she says, fingers snaking under the edge of my panties.
She says that every time we make love now, and I know it’s true. She has missed touching me as I have her. I’ll never get tired of hearing it.
I try to say something clever, but she finds my clit and all I can do is gasp, loud and unfiltered. She plays me easy, circling and pressing, while her other hand cups my ass, pulling me in tight. I rock against her, desperate, greedy, losing all pretense of slow or gentle.
She kisses my throat, then bites gently at my collarbone, and I’m gone. I’m gone for her, every nerve ending singing her name, every cell reaching for her.
She slides two fingers inside me, curling up at just the right angle.
“Fuck, Eden—” I dig my nails into her scalp as I ride her hand. She grins up at me, a little wild, hair already coming loose from the topknot she tied after her shower. She’s still in her boxers, the patch of her own want obvious and almost comically visible. She’s soaked.
I reach between us and palm her through the fabric. Her hips buck so hard she nearly throws me off her lap. I love her like this: focused, feral, ready to ruin both of us for the rest of the day.