Chapter 5 #5
The bread was torn open, half gone. Cheese sweating on wax paper. The wine bottle lighter than it should’ve been.
Somewhere across the water, a kid laughed. A duck cut a V through the pond. The city hummed at a distance like an old refrigerator—there, but softened.
We’d drifted without realizing it.
From the willow to the path.
From the path to wandering.
The garden had those little stone walkways that felt older than the rest of the city, curving past statues and benches and tiny fenced plots—old memorial markers tucked into corners like secrets. Names carved into granite. Dates a hundred years gone.
Not quite graves.
Not quite anything.
Just history, quiet and still.
She walked beside me, barefoot now, her heels looped through two fingers. Her dress swayed against her calves every time the breeze kicked up. The air smelled like cut grass and water and that coconut lotion she wore.
God.
That scent was going to ruin me.
Every time she moved closer, it wrapped around me like summer.
Our shoulders bumped.
Then stayed touching.
Like neither of us wanted to be the one to step away first.
“How long have you been single?” she asked casually, like it was nothing.
But her voice had that careful note. The one people use when they’re actually asking something bigger.
I shoved my hands in my pockets, watching our shadows stretch in front of us.
“Truthfully?”
She glanced up at me. “Always a dangerous start.”
“Forever.”
She snorted. “Please.”
“I’m serious.”
“Ethan,” she said, laughing, “no one like you has been single forever.”
I rubbed the back of my neck. “Okay. Fine. Last serious girlfriend—the kind where you meet parents and split rent and talk about the future—that was college.”
She stopped walking.
“College?” Her brows lifted. “That was what… ten years ago?”
“Yeah.”
“You’ve been single for a decade?”
“I dated,” I said quickly. “Just… not…”
I trailed off.
Because the truth sounded insane even in my own head.
Not like this.
Not like her.
Not like something that felt like my lungs depended on it.
I didn’t want to scare her.
Didn’t want to look like some guy who falls too fast.
“I dated,” I said again, softer. “I just wouldn’t say I was… in love. Or committed like that. Not since Aimee.”
She hummed like it didn’t matter.
But I caught it.
That tiny shift.
Her brain filing the name away.
“Oh yeah?” she said lightly. “Aimee…?”
And before I even thought about it—
“Miller.”
The name slipped out easy as breathing.
She nodded once.
Too smooth.
Like she’d just added something to a mental list.
“And she was your college girlfriend?”
“Yeah. Small school. Satellite campus of UNH. Nothing glamorous.”
We walked a few more steps. Gravel crunching under our feet.
Then I nudged her with my elbow. “Alright. Your turn. Don’t interrogate me and then dodge.”
She smiled, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. Her fingers toyed with the hem of her dress, picking at a loose thread.
I noticed everything she did.
The nervous tells.
The way she tucked her chin when she didn’t want to say too much.
She always wore dresses. Soft fabrics. Nothing flashy. Just enough to show those long, tan legs when she walked.
Her collarbone caught the light.
Her skin always warm from the sun, smelling shea-coconut sweet.
She took care of herself—but not like it was a weapon.
More like armor she forgot she was wearing.
“I’m… selective,” she said.
“That sounds diplomatic.”
She took a slow sip of wine, leaning back against the stone edge of one of the old markers.
“In New York, older men loved me,” she said. “Like… really older. Weekend date guys. Fancy dinners. They’d treat me like an accessory.”
Her mouth twisted.
“I hated it. Felt like I was something they wore to show off.”
I frowned. “Idiots.”
She smiled faintly.
“And guys my age?” she continued. “None of them wanted anything real. No settling down. No building something. Just… floating.”
“So nothing serious?”
“One relationship,” she said. “Ended over a year ago.”
She looked out over the water.
“Since Boston, it’s just been work. Career. Trying to build a life that’s actually mine.”
There was something lonely in the way she said it.
Something that tugged at my chest harder than it should’ve.
“So,” I said, stepping closer, lowering my voice, “I’m the lucky one, huh?”
She laughed softly.
Then looked up at me like I’d just asked something dangerous.
“Ethan… when I saw you that night?”
“Yeah?”
“You were the only man in that bar.”
My heart actually stuttered.
She stepped closer.
Close enough that I felt the warmth of her through my shirt.
Her fingers came up—gentle, slow—and brushed a piece of hair back from my forehead.
Then tucked it behind my ear.
The touch barely there.
But it hit like lightning.
“It’s your whole look,” she murmured. “California surfer meets corporate killer. Like… businessman by day, trouble by night.”
I laughed under my breath. “That’s a terrible brand.”
“It’s really hot,” she said.
Just like that.
Matter-of-fact.
My throat went dry.
Her hand lingered a second too long at my jaw.
My palm found her waist without asking permission.
The world shrank.
Water. Leaves. Sunlight flickering through branches.
Her lips curved like she knew exactly what she was doing to me.
We drifted back to the blanket like gravity had decided for us.
The garden had shifted while we were gone. The light lower now, softer, honeyed. The air thick with warmth and the smell of water and grass. Somewhere, music floated faintly from a distant street performer, but out here it felt like the city had pulled its breath in and gone quiet.
She sat first, folding her legs beneath her, dress pooling around her thighs. I watched her without shame. The way the last of the sun kissed her skin. The way her mouth curved when she looked up at me, like she already knew this night was changing something.
I reached into the picnic basket again.
She tilted her head. “You’re full of surprises.”
“Wait,” I said.
I pulled out the tealights one by one. Small. Simple. Nothing flashy. I set them around the blanket, careful with the spacing, shielding the flames with my hands as I lit them. The glow bloomed slowly, amber and soft, turning the white bread golden, the wine bottle luminous.
Her expression shifted.
Not surprise this time.
Something quieter. Warmer.
“This is…” she started, then stopped, like she didn’t trust her voice to finish.
“Too much?” I asked.
She shook her head immediately. “No. It’s perfect.”
Fireflies had begun to wake up around us, tiny flickers of green-gold blinking in and out of the dusk like the sky was winking. One drifted close, hovering near the willow branches, then another.
She laughed softly, reaching out instinctively.
“I forgot they existed,” she said. “You don’t see them in the city.”
I smiled. “Guess they came out for you.”
She rolled her eyes, but her cheeks warmed.
I reached for the guitar then.
The moment stretched—just a second—where I wondered if this was too much. Too earnest. Too obvious.
But I’d already crossed that line the second I asked her to meet me here.
I sat on the edge of the blanket, resting the guitar against my knee. The wood felt cool, familiar. Steady.
She leaned back on her hands, watching me like she was waiting for a secret.
“You play?” she asked.
“Not like… impress-people play,” I said. “Just… this.”
“That’s exactly the kind that impresses people.”
I exhaled, fingers finding the strings.
The first chord was soft. Barely there. I kept my voice low when I started to sing—not performing, not projecting. Just enough for her. Just enough to live in the space between us.
A slow ballad. Something old. Something about longing and almosts and the kind of love that sneaks up on you when you’re not looking.
Her eyes locked onto mine.
Didn’t look away.
Didn’t blink.
I sang like I meant it.
Like every word was something I’d been trying to say since the night I saw her across a crowded bar and couldn’t breathe right afterward. Like the song was a bridge and she was standing on the other side.
The candlelight danced over her face, catching in her eyes. The fireflies blinked in time with the rhythm, like they were part of it. Her lips parted slightly, her breath slow and shallow.
I felt it then.
That certainty.
That quiet, dangerous knowing.
Tonight.
This was it.
She shifted closer without realizing she was doing it, drawn in like the sound had weight. Her knee brushed mine. Stayed there.
When I finished the last note, I let it fade instead of filling the silence.
She didn’t clap.
Didn’t speak.
She just reached for me.
Her hand slid into my hair, fingers curling at the nape of my neck, anchoring me. Her thumb brushed my cheek, slow and reverent, like she was memorizing the shape of my face.
“You’re unfair,” she whispered.
I laughed quietly. “That bad?”
“That good,” she said.
Our foreheads touched.
Her breath was wine and summer and something that felt like promise.
I could feel her pulse under my palm where I’d braced myself against her waist. Fast. Matching mine.
I didn’t kiss her yet.
I wanted to.
God, I wanted to.
The tealights flickered low, little halos of gold around the blanket. Fireflies drifted lazy and bright through the willow branches, blinking on and off like stars testing the sky. The pond behind us whispered against the stone.
She hadn’t moved away.
Not even an inch.
Her knee still pressed to mine.
Her fingers still curled at the back of my neck.
I could feel the heat of her through my shirt like a second pulse.
I swallowed.
“Say something,” I murmured, because if she didn’t, I was going to lose my mind.
She didn’t.
Instead, her hand slid from my hair down to my jaw.
Slow.
Careful.
Like I might break.
Her thumb traced the edge of my cheekbone, then the corner of my mouth, like she was mapping me.
Her eyes weren’t playful anymore.
They were heavy.
Dark.
Focused.
Like I was the only thing in the world she could see.