Wide Open

by Shelly Crane

  "Yeah," I said. What else could you say? "Uh, Mason. This," I gripped Maya's hand and pulled her to my side gently, "is Maya."

  "Hi, Maya," he said happily and shook her hand. "Really good to meet you."

  "Nice to meet you, too."

  "So, where's Emma?" I asked, wondering why he was standing in the hall.

  "You just caught me coming out to give her parents a second to go in. They only let a couple people in at a time so. It's almost time." He sat hard in the chair and gulped, but looked deliriously happy. "I'm about to be a father."

  Maya

  "Where's Mamma?" Milo asked.

  Oh, my gosh. He really did call her Mamma.

  "She's home with the nurse," Mason told him and stood when a prim and proper man and woman came out. "How's Emma?"

  "She's asking for you, Mason. Go," the man ordered.

  Mason started to go, but turned quickly back. "Uh, Rhett, this is my brother, Milo, and his…friend, Maya."

  "Brother?" the man breathed in awe, and I knew they had to know about Mason and Milo's estrangement. Of course they did if Mason was married.

  "I've got it, Mason. Go on," Milo said and waved his brother ahead as he turned to Rhett—coolest name ever—and smiled his charming smile. "Hi. I'm afraid I'm the problem son, Milo." He stuck out his hand. "Nice to finally meet you."

  They didn't laugh at his joke. Not a snicker.

  I felt awful and frankly, a little peeved with the mister and misses for not trying to help the obviously nervous wayward son find his way back. "And I'm Maya," I injected, way too happily. "Wow, a baby. If he looks anything like these two Sawyer boys, he'll be a heartbreaker one day, right?"

  "Sawyer?" the woman asked, her perfectly manicured brow raised.

  "My name was Wright," Milo leaned in and corrected, his lips touching my ear—as if that itself were the apology. "I had to change it. I promise I'll explain that later, too."

  I looked up at him and I knew he would. I felt a smile line my lips. Though, honestly, there wasn't much to smile about in that second. There was currently two very pompous looking adults who didn't look very happy with, and Milo had changed his last name, which could mean a multitude of things, but the fact that instead of letting me guess and be confused and over-think all night, he rushed to let me know that he would explain. That there was a valid explanation and he wasn't going to shortchange me in that.

  That itself seemed like an almost-explanation.

  And for now, that was enough for me.

  He leaned in close and spoke low. "Wow, I don't know what the hell I did to put that look on your face, but you need to write it down so I can commit it to memory."

  I bit into my lip to stop from kissing him. His smirk was adorable as he turned back to the couple still looking at us. He took my hand as we faced them again. With his hand in between both of mine, I felt whole, even for just a minute.

  Milo asked politely, "I'm sorry. I didn't get your names, but I assume you're Emma's parents."

  "Oh, my goodness. Yes, of course," the woman said, flustered and embarrassed. "Silly. Excuse us. Yes, this is Rhett and I'm Isabella. I didn't know that you'd met Emma."

  "A couple of times. Yes ma'am," he informed her. He rubbed his head and looked back at me a few times. "It wasn't always under the best terms, but I'm doing a lot better now."

  "That's good to hear, son," the man said, but you could still hear it. The tone. They always wondered if you were just telling them what they wanted to hear. "Do you have a place to stay?"

  "Oh, we've got to get back—"

  "Babies take a long time," Isabella told us and flashed white teeth. "A really long time. You didn't think you'd just run down here and run right back, did you?"

  We looked at each other and shrugged. Hadn't really thought it through, to be honest. I hadn't even grabbed any clothes. "Well, let's wait a while and see how it goes."

  She said it as if her word was bond and that was that.

  We didn't say anything; we just smiled and went to sit a little farther down in the corner. I asked Milo if he wanted to go walk around his old town and he quickly said no. I was hungry and he was, too, I knew, but I wanted to wait until he heard something from Mason before I said anything to him. He seemed calm enough, but I knew it was a matter of time before he started to get nervous again.

  And I could guess when we went to see his mother is when it would happen.

  And why wasn't his mother up there? They said she needed to stay with the nurse, so maybe she was sick. That was another one of those things I wasn't going to ask. I wanted to know, of course I did, but I promised him I'd wait. And I would.

  When Mason came out again, he was jumped by Emma's parents, so he quickly shooed them back to her. He seemed relieved but so exhausted as he came over to us. I tried to stay quiet and let them have as much privacy and "them" time as possible.

  "So, how are you?" Mason asked quietly.

  "I'm good." Mason's eyebrows rose in question. "Really good, I promise. I live a few hours from here."

  Mason shuffled on the wall they were leaning on. "You know you can come back, right?" Milo sighed. "Milo," Mason argued.

  I was so lost, but tried to pretend I wasn't.

  "I don't know, Mason. I'm finally okay. I was so not okay there for a while. I know you know, but I'm…" He looked at me and his eyes pleaded for something, but I don’t think even Milo knew what. "I'm really okay," he finally said.

  I got it then. His brother was asking him to move back home, and he was saying that he didn't want to. I had to agree. It may have been selfish, but if Milo left, I'd be devastated to go back to the way things were before.

  "We just got you back," Mason said, completely oblivious to anything else.

  "I'm not going anywhere," Milo told him, but his eyes hadn't left mine. Finally, he looked over and they did some brotherly half-hug thing. "I'll come to see you. I promise I will. Besides, I'm going to have a nephew to spoil, right?"

  "Speaking of…" Mason looked around. "Where are her parents?"

  "We'll be fine here. Go."

  After about an hour, Mason came back and said that she was only three centimeters dilated, whatever that meant, but apparently in regards to babies, it wasn't good. Mason said we should go and crash at his house with his mom and come back in the afternoon after we got some sleep—kill two birds with one stone, or three, depending on how you looked at it. He said to sleep in his and Emma's room.

  It took some arm-twisting, but Milo finally agreed to leave the hospital, and I saw the nervousness come over him in the drive over. "It's really late. Or early. Will your mom still be up?" I asked, trying to make him see that there wasn't any reason to start freaking out.

  "Uh." He glanced at the clock on the dash to see it was almost five a.m. and sighed. "No, I don't think so." His hand in mine relaxed a little. "Probably not. You're right."

  "This isn't a question about your past," I began, and his recently calmed skin hardened under mine, "I just want to know one thing." I didn’t wait. "Are you more scared about her reaction or mine?" He stayed silent. "I mean, you were here the other day to see her, so I can't imagine she'd be too surprised to see you. I can only imagine it's me you're freaking out about."

  His thumb rubbed over my knuckles so softly it made my chest ache. He waited a long time before he said softly, "I just don't want to lose you now."

  "You won't," I promised.

  "You can't say that when you don't know everything."

  I leaned over the console and kissed his cheek. "Milo, I don't know why you have it in your head that you need me so much and I'm just enjoying the ride, but I need you, too." He looked over, our noses almost bumping. "I was scared to tell you about my past. So scared that you weren't going to want anything to do with me anymore. But you did, and so will I. Stop ending us before we've even begun." I kissed his cheek once more. "And find us some food before we go to your mom's or else you are going to have one cranky female on your hands."
/>
  I relaxed into my seat, his hand firmly clasped into mine. His chuckle told me this conversation was effectively ended for now. "All right, you win. If it's still open, I know the best greasy burger in town."

  One drive-thru, two stoplights, and one left turn later, we pulled into a small, cute house's driveway. He finished off his fries and drink and threw all the trash in the back. "I didn't realize I hadn't fed you all night. I'm sorry. I was too preoccupied and wasn't doing a very good job of taking care of you."

  "I can feed myself. I just wanted to stay with you."

  His eyes stayed on my face for a long time. "Come on. I'm beat. I know you are, too."

  When we got inside, there was a woman wearing scrubs asleep on the couch. He took me straight to a bedroom and began kicking off his shoes. The bed was slept in, and you could tell they left in a rush. I went into the hall and looked for a change of sheets. When I came back with some, he seemed grateful. "Good. I was a little grossed out by the thought of that."

  I smiled. After we made the bed, he began to rummage through the drawers. He pulled one of Mason's shirts out and handed it to me. I shook my head. "That's too weird. I can't wear his clothes."

  He looked down. "Okay. Here." He pulled off his shirt. "Put this on. I'll borrow one of his tomorrow."

  He left and I knew he was giving me privacy to change. Then I heard his voice by the door. "Here. These, too."

  He tossed in his loose plaid boxers. I gawked at them. "Um, what are you wearing, then?"

  "I'll borrow some flannels from Mason. It'll be fine," I heard through the door.

  I hurried and put the clothes on, doing the cliché sniffing of the collar as I pulled on his plain blue shirt. Good Lord, it smelled so good, like him. His boxers were way too big, but stayed on my hips. I gulped as I looked at that bed.

  He came in wearing nothing but a pair of red flannel sleep pants he must have found somewhere else in the house. He rubbed his hands together and looked at my legs and kept looking, his lips parted. "I turned up the heat. It's a little cold in here." His eyes lifted up my body to my face. "I'm going to make a pallet on the floor, so go ahead and—"

  "What?"

  "Maya, I'm not going to make you sleep with me just because there's nowhere else to sleep."

  "We're adults, Milo."

  He scoffed. "With those legs? You think I can be an adult with those legs next to me?"

  I grinned; I couldn't help it. "Stop it. I trust you."

  There was that word. It must have meant something more than that, because he sobered up quickly. "If you're sure. I don't want you to feel like you have to."

  "I've already slept with you once."

  "Satellite dishes and truck front seats don't count."

  "Oh, they count," I argued and grabbed his hand, dragging him with me. "Come on. I trust you completely to be the gentleman I know you are."

  "It's not just that." He sat next to me on the bed. The lamp on the bedside table was the only light left on in the room. My legs were folded under me, and one of his knees was bent as he slid next to me. "It's not just about trust. I know you know I won't do anything you don't want me to, but I want you to feel safe with me, too."

  My brow dipped. "Isn't that the same thing?"

  He smiled sadly. "No, it's not." His hand lifted from his lap to cup my cheek. "When a guy tries to pull a move and a girl says no, that's being a gentleman. That's trust. But sometimes girls let guys go further than they really want to because they feel like they should. Being safe is knowing that no matter what happens between us, how far we go, how hot things get, I won't be pulling any moves at all."

  I wasn't sure what to say to that. He was a guy, so I knew he wanted to, but I wasn't sure when I would be ready for that. I knew he was trying to protect me because he knew about my past.

  "Baby." He pulled at my attention and I sighed all the way to my toes. He'd never called me that before. "Tell me the truth. Do you feel safe with me? Do you know that no matter how much I kiss you and touch you and want you that I won't take it further than that until we both know you're ready? And you can tell me to stop at any time and I won't get angry with you like those guys used to?"

  "I know, Milo," I told him, my voice soft and sincere. I leaned in and kissed him, my lips barely whispering across his skin. "I've never felt so safe."

  He gripped my hips and pulled me into his lap. Our faces were the same height this way, and with his hand buried in my hair, he studied me once again. "Thank you for being there for me today."

  "There's nowhere else I want to be."

  He chewed on his lip a little. "I promised we would talk tonight."

  "We can wait 'til we get home. It's been a long day. And you've barely even gotten to see your brother. Just wait. I'm not going anywhere."

  His head shook as he looked into my eyes. "Where did you come from?" he muttered under his breath. He linked our fingers, pressing and locking them together, releasing them and locking them again right before they could be free.

  "What are those?" I nodded toward the stacks of books everywhere. "They have tons of them."

  "I don't know. Let's see." He reached back, but kept me on his lap. I had to put a hand on his stomach to keep from toppling over. He came back with a book and cracked it open to the middle. He read aloud. "A duck has three eyelids." His eyes lifted. "Hmm." He went back to reading. "It's impossible to sneeze with your eyes open. A man's beard grows faster when he anticipates sex." He lifted his head and looked at me, his smirk in full-swing.

  I giggled. "Oh, I like that one."

  "I think that last one needs to be tested out." He set the book away and clicked off the lamp. "Maybe one day we'll see if that one works, yeah?"

  "Yeah."

  "But not today," he reminded.

  "Yeah. Not today."

  His arms wrapped around my waist and his mouth closed over mine gently before pulling away. "Come on, baby." He pulled me with his arm behind my back. "I'm beat."

  We lay facing each other, and I couldn't believe I was in the house Milo grew up in. I couldn't believe his mother was in the other room. I couldn't believe I'd met his brother, and he was as sweet and adorable as Milo was. Then a thought hit me. "Why aren't we sleeping in your room?"

  "It's not my room anymore," he said simply.

  There was a bizarre peace in that statement. An understanding of one's new place in the world he created for himself.

  His fingers skated across my cheek. "Even in the dark, I can see your brain working a mile a minute." His nimble fingers turned me, putting my back to his front, and he nuzzled into my neck, pulling my bottom to be snug with his hips. He put his lips to my ear and whispered, "Turn it all off." His hand swept down my hair and scalp.

  "Don't worry. Even if I can't sleep, I'll still be on my game tomorrow." He gave a short snort of a laugh. "I'll still be here for you no matter what. It's why I came."

  "You didn't come to learn all my secrets?" he asked in a joking, conspiratorial whisper.

  "Maybe a little," I stage whispered back. "But mostly I came for the free food."

  He laughed softly into my ear, my back shaking with his chest. "I knew it." He kissed my hair. "Just don't think. Sleep."

  "You're so good at that," I confessed, even as my eyelids obeyed his command.

  "At what?"

  I turned my head to rub my cheek against his nose. "Making me feel like no matter where I am, I'm right where I belong."

  "You are where you belong," he growled and tugged me closer.

  I heard his name sighed from my lips before his hand reached for my chin. He pulled my face around and his mouth latched on mine. His fingers were so gentle, even as his mouth commanded and demanded, almost as if he was taking what was already his.

  He stayed where he was behind me on his side and kept me on my side as well, knowing that the awkward position would be a barrier in and of itself.

  He urged me to open for him. I knew that our night was just beginning an
d it was going to be torturous in the best way.

  After my lips ached and my breathing was so hard, it beat against his lips, he pulled back just enough to pant his words. "I can see you in my life so clearly, just like this. Us, after a hard day, just wanting to be together, wanting to get lost in each other in the dark."

  I couldn't breathe. I couldn't imagine anything better. "I've never been able to imagine my future before. Never could see what that would look like because I knew Will…" I caught the sob right on the edge. He put his forehead to mine and smoothed my cheek with his thumb. "But right now? I could totally see this," I whispered.

  "This would be so easy to fall into and never want to come back out of."

  I nodded. He was right. I had never even wandered near the L word, let alone thought about saying it. It was scary territory, but I knew he wouldn't leave me alone there. I knew he wouldn't take me for a ride and then dump me off somewhere with a broken heart.

  This all seemed to happen so fast, even though it had been months, it seemed like minutes. I guess in the grand scheme of my life, it had been.

  "Get some sleep, sweetheart," he ordered against my neck and nuzzled in for the night.

  Milo

  Heaven.

  I was in it.

  Surrounded by it.

  Smelling it.

  Feeling it.

  Touching it.

  Her behind was still so snugly fastened in the crook of my hips when I woke I thought I had woken in hell and this was my torture device for the rest of my life—the thing always out of grasp to taunt me and tease me…but there she was, under my hands.

  I breathed in her neck and groaned at the smell of us mixed together—her in my shirt that was too big, her in my boxers that were too big. Good night. She was a walking, talking heap of adorable sexiness. I could have stayed in that bed all day, but I gently picked up her arm up to find on her watch it was already a little after one in the afternoon. I was sure she wanted to get home to her brother. If this baby didn't come soon, we were going to miss it.