by A. M. Wilson
No. I blink and try to rid myself of those thoughts. They aren’t correct. I’m not betraying anybody. At least, not anymore.
The need to touch her, to ground myself here in the moment, consumes me. Kicking out my ankle, I bring it just below her knees and sweep toward me, knocking her forward off balance. At the same time, I jackknife out of the snowbank to catch her deftly in my arms. My thighs tightly secure her hips, careful of her belly, and lower her down on top of me in the snow.
“Nathan!” she cries in a bubbly laugh. “You ass, let me go.”
The name-calling asks for it. I flip us over so her back is cushioned in the cold, fluffy snow. I’d feel bad, but I know the iciness can’t penetrate her puffy coat.
“You like my ass.” I lean down and kiss the tip of her nose. “You’re so beautiful like this.”
“Like what?” Her breathless voice makes me want to tuck the sound inside and carry it with me.
I scan down her face and body, then back up to look in her eyes as I reply vulnerably, “Alive.”
Her arms loosely conform to my torso, hands skating up and down. Her alluring mouth tips into a sweet, closed grin. This moment is too perfect to pass up.
“Kiersten, I—” That’s all I get out before a handful of snow is violently shoved down the back of my pants. “Fuck!”
I propel myself off her as gently as I can manage with an icy ass and hop around in an attempt to shake it loose. Kiersten breaks out into a full-on belly laugh. Even a frostbit taint doesn’t stop me from joining her.
I approach her and lean over her prone form. The evidence of giggles etched into her features.
“That was so unnecessary,” I chastise and offer my gloved hands to help her up. Once she’s vertical, I innocently brush the snow off her back and lead us toward the snacks.
“Oh, but it was.” Her eyes twinkle as we exchange a glance.
The scent of fried food and popcorn makes my mouth water, and I’m highly aware the woman inside more than likely witnessed our entire exchange. The smile on her face seems to suggest it.
“Two hot chocolates, please. And a pretzel.”
The woman proceeds to fill our order.
“The overnight crew needs to eat, too. On top of cleaning, stocking, and prepping, someone makes hot drinks and a few items to keep the staff warm and fed.”
Kiersten rubs her belly and watches the woman work. “It took you like half an hour to finally answer one of my questions. Thanks for that.” Her sass is as natural as the rest of her.
I reach over and brush some of her bangs away from her eyes, returning her attention to me.
“Is it so bad that I want you to be surprised? That’d I’d rather talk to you about other things?”
Some of the attitude dissolves, and her expression softens. “I thought coming here was the surprise.”
“Part of it. There’s one more thing.”
Before she can ask yet another question I plan to ignore, the woman hands over our treats. I pay with my card and thank her. Taking my drink and our pretzel, I hide the secret disappointment that I can no longer hold her hand.
A particularly icy gust whips our cheeks. “Come on. Let’s keep walking.”
Kiersten holds her own drink and takes a careful sip as we resume our stroll. The lights become denser the farther we walk until brightness surrounds us.
“I can almost pretend it’s still daytime out here.” Kiersten rips off a piece of the soft pretzel and shoves it into her mouth. I swear only she can make something as mundane as eating cute as hell.
“That is, if it weren’t so cold. Give me like sixty degrees and string lights. Is that how they celebrate Christmas in warmer parts of the country? Do people hang lights from palm trees and cacti?”
I chuckle at her rapid questions. “Don’t know, babe. Lived here my entire life.”
“Yeah.” Her voice is a windy whisper. “Me too. I mean, not here.” She waves her hand around in front of us. “But West Virginia. I’d like to visit the ocean someday. Maybe ‘experience Christmas somewhere tropical’ should go on my bucket list.”
“Shouldn’t bucket lists have crazy things on it like backpack around Europe or skydiving?” When she gazes at the lights depicting the Golden Gate Bridge, I tear a piece of pretzel off with my teeth. My hands are too full to use my fingers. She glances at me, and I school the guilty expression off my face.
“Oh, that’s on there too. Though now I’m questioning how responsible it would be to fling myself out of an airplane at thirteen thousand feet when I have a child who depends on me.”
Merely the thought of some horrible accident feels like a gut punch. Also, she forgot to mention that I depend on her. Mother of my child or longtime best friend, the title doesn’t matter. The idea of not having her in my life is an unpleasant one I refuse to even consider.
“Being a parent doesn’t mean you fail to live your dreams.”
“You’re right. It also means I’m responsible for the health and happiness of a child, and I should make choices that aren’t going to negatively impact that.” She finishes her sentence by eating the last of the pretzel. I ball up the tissue napkin and stuff it in my pocket.
“You take risks every day. The chance of something bad happening is equal, if not much greater, from living everyday life than it is in skydiving.”
“Okay, Mr. Statistics. All I’m saying is that I’d feel horrible forcing you to explain to our kid why Mommy was selfish and got herself killed while trying to have a little fun in her life.”
“First of all, you’d be dead so you wouldn’t feel a thing,” I deadpan.
A little sneer emerges, so damn cute I want to kiss it off her face.
“People die, Kiersten, and the saddest part isn’t that they’re gone,” I declare honestly. “It’s that they’re gone before they’ve truly had a chance to live. We mourn those who are taken away too soon the most.”
At the crack in my voice, Kiersten does an about-face and stands toe-to-toe with me, reaching up to stroke my cheek. Her lips part on an exhale, and the white puffs of our breaths float between us.
“I’m sorry, Nathan. I didn’t mean to be so flippant.”
I cradle her hand over my cheek, pressing it in deeper and soak in the additional warmth.
“You’re misunderstanding.” My head shakes, and I blink away at the scratchiness behind my eyelids. “You have to live. I need you to live. In whatever way that looks like to you. If I have to chase you around the earth and watch you jump out of airplanes and dive beneath oceans and dirt bike around canyons, I will.”
She crinkles her nose. “You’d follow me?”
Releasing her hand, I leave it against my face and claim her around the back of her neck. Our foreheads touch, and I contemplate her bright red lips.
“Anywhere.” The word alone feels too heavy, too romantic for this box we’ve found ourselves in. “Someone has to make sure you’re safe and cheer you on.”
“Just admit you want to join me on these adventures.”
She leans back, forcing me to release her even though I want to hold her close to me forever.
“Nah. Our little guy will need one sane parent. Otherwise, we might accidentally raise a stuntman and have to move to Vegas.”
“Vegas doesn’t sound so bad.”
“It does if you aren’t a fan of one-hundred-degree weather.”
She makes a face and tosses her empty cup into a nearby trash can. “Yeah, that sounds like hell.”
We laugh and continue on our way. I realize we’re nearly three-fourths of the way through, and I still haven’t given her my final surprise. Sudden nausea overtakes me, and sweat starts beneath my heavy coat.
Kiersten keeps walking and talking, oblivious to my inner turmoil. I seize my chance. While she seems intensely passionate about hot air balloons, I drop to one knee and wait.
“I just, I don’t understand. It’s a fabric balloon being propelled by straight fire! I understand gases and sc
ience and whatnot are involved, but at least with skydiving, you have two parachutes, and with bungee jumping, something’s tied around your ankles. If that balloon stops working, it’s a straight trajectory back down …” She turns, eyes wide and mouth dropping open the second she spots me on the ground.
“What is this?” Her throat bobs visibly. “I mean, hell no. You can’t be seriously doing this to me right now. I said friends. Jesus, what the hell, Nathan. Please get up before someone sees you and starts recording. Crap, you’re not moving. Can we just talk about this first?”
A man can only hold a straight face for so long. I pull my hand out of my pocket and tie my bootlace. The battle with my smirk is lost when she shrieks.
“You son of a bitch.”
I lick my lower lip and sink my teeth into it, her gift wrapped tight in my palm as I stand. She backs up as I near, worrying me she might fall on her ass. Games are fun as long as nobody gets hurt. Lunging, I snag her around the waist and pull her against my chest. Her struggle rubs her body against mine, making it damn near impossible to fight an erection with her so close to me.
Friends can remain friends as long as they don’t turn each other on. And I can tell by the increase in her breath and added flush to her cheeks that she’s not unaffected. Only time will tell what exactly that means for us, but it does the ego good to know I’m not alone in feeling things.
My mouth nears her ear, and my voice drops to a huskier tone. All she does to me filters through the inflection.
“Settle, baby. I don’t want you to fall.”
Her breath hitches. “That was a dirty rotten trick.”
“Coming from you, that’s a good one. You live for tricks.” I chuckle in her ear. Her fingers sift through the scruff on my cheek, and I close my eyes at her touch, fighting back a groan.
“Not that kind. That kind could give someone a heart attack.”
“Why?”
Pulling back a fraction takes my face out of her neck and in front of hers. Her brows pull together at my question.
“What do you mean, why? It’s obvious.”
“Explain it to me.”
Frustration paints her cheeks in an extra layer of red. By the way she rolls her lips between her teeth, I can tell she’s mulling over either a sassy response or a mature one. I never know which I’m going to get with her. One of my favorite things about her is how easily she keeps me on my toes. She makes life exciting and flavorful by simply being who she is at the core.
“Besides the obvious that, in this age of the internet, someone could have seen and made it go viral?”
I squeeze her waist. “Do you see anybody here?”
“Well, they could have,” she huffs. She’s so fiery it’s a wonder she wasn’t born a redhead.
“Is that all you got?” I don’t know why I’m pushing so hard, but I know I’m seconds away from having to back off before her temper boils over. Maybe because I want her to admit she feels something here too, even if we don’t know exactly what that is yet.
“Because we’re friends, Nathan. Because maybe I don’t want to hurt you, and that would hurt you. Because I can’t imagine my life without you, but the only way to stop you from falling in love with me is to put distance between us, and I don’t want to do that. I don’t want to be forced to detach myself from you.”
Well, fuck.
Am I reading her wrong? I know she believes we’re better as friends, but her actions speak differently. Not just about the sex and stolen kisses, as incredible as those are, but also the way she leans into my shoulder when she’s tired speaks volumes. How she snuggles in closer during a back rub. She holds my hand without a single objection and hugs me with abandon.
Does she not realize we didn’t do those things as friends? Sure, a flirty brush here or there would occur. We’d hug to say hello or goodbye when it’d been a while and trade innuendos over happy hour. Those things have ramped up tenfold in the past six months.
Is this denial, or does she not see it?
I rub my chest briefly over my heart, suddenly remembering the object clenched in my fist.
It feels so stupid now.
17
Kiersten
A weirdness blankets this conversation that I can’t place. Nathan fists his hand over his chest almost as if he’s in pain.
But what do I say? Do I confess my stomach swooped like turbulence on an airplane when I saw him down on one knee? That even though I drew the line, the first thought I had was if I was crazy enough to say yes?
Goddammit and goddamn him.
I open my mouth to tell him just that, but he beats me to the punch.
“Don’t worry. I’m not falling in love with you. I mean, I do love you but as a friend. That’s all we’ll ever be.”
Ouch.
“Be more blunt about it, please. I don’t think that stabbed me deep enough.”
His face morphs to a puzzled expression.
“If we’re just friends, why would that hurt?”
I’m so frustrated I could literally snarl. “I have a raging mass of hormones coursing through me on the daily. We might be just friends, but you don’t have to say it like that!” My bottom lip trembles. Great. Now I’m going to fucking cry, and I never cry. I don’t even know if I remember how to cry without looking like I’m auditioning for a bad reality TV show.
Nathan suddenly clenches my right hand, tears off my glove, and slides a silver band onto my ring finger.
“Dude!”
Warm palms cup my face. He brushes his thumb beneath my plush, wobbly lip in a move that surprisingly helps me regain control.
“Don’t cry, and don’t yell at me.” His gentle voice eases some of my unrest. “We’ve had a rocky road. Finding out you were pregnant was the hardest thing in my life, second to Janessa’s diagnosis and passing. And I’m still working through that. Not her.” His fingers add pressure to my face for emphasis. “I’ve coped with her loss. I just never expected to be anything to anyone for the rest of my life. Not a boyfriend, not a husband, and especially not a father. And I’m about to be a dad.”
The higher pitch and crack in his voice on that last word almost has me come undone. Coupled with the sincerity in his eyes, I’ve never felt more grateful for this man.
“This seems over the top now.” He brushes his finger over the silver ring. “You are not alone. You are strong and capable and independent, and I know this. I’ve seen it. But you don’t have to be in this.”
That first tear breaks free in a silent, icy trek down my cheek. Nathan’s quick to wipe it away with his thumb.
“One hundred percent from here on out. I know I’ve missed things, and I know I’ve acted a jackass on occasion, but I’m trying my best, and I promise to get better. That’s what this is for you.” He fingers the ring on my hand. “A promise.”
“You know you don’t have to do this. I know these things about you, too,” I choke out through the tightness in my throat.
His smile is so pure. “I know.”
For a moment encompassing an eternity, it’s just us, the bright crystal lights hanging around and faint flurries falling from the black sky. When I gaze in his eyes like this, it settles deep inside—his promise. Everything is going to work out okay, even if there are bumps in the road on the way.
He disrupts the silence first.
“Come on. We should get out of the cold.”
I don’t miss the way he pretends to wipe his face on his shoulder but secretly hides a grin. Unfortunately, I don’t have the right to ask him not to hide it from me.
He resumes walking, and I reach out and catch his wrist in my gloved hand.
“Nathan.” His name slips out even though he’s right here within earshot. He instantly stops and turns, directing his full attention on me.
Goddamn … my heart clenches.
“Thank you. For bringing me here. For the ring and your promise. I would have sworn I didn’t need to hear it, but I think, deep down, I did.”<
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He slips his hand free from my grasp, and it feels as though he twists the knife in my chest. That is until he curls his hand in order to lace our fingers together tight.
“You’re welcome.” A hasty kiss lands on the top of my head.
We complete our walk through the lights and get back into his truck. Nathan cranks the heat, and I remove my hat and remaining glove, aware of the staticky state of my hair and sweaty palm. I place my items on the seat between us before sitting back and admiring the new jewelry on my hand.
Nathan flicks his gaze from the dark road ahead of us to my hand and back again.
“You don’t have to wear it if you don’t want to.”
“Stop. Don’t say anything else. Of course I want to wear it.”
That seems to appease him because he goes back to being quiet.
It’s the truth, anyway. Glancing down at my right hand brings warmth to my heart. There are going to be tough times ahead. We’re going to have to navigate co-parenting with two working, independent adults in two separate households. I can already picture the arguments to come, but I also know that having a physical reminder will help. We’re in this together.
18
Kiersten
Thoughts of nursery designs occupy my mind on my drive home from work. My co-worker Lauren pulled up a trendy do-it-yourself site on her phone during a lull and planted the seed. One might think waiting until seven months pregnant to design a nursery is procrastinating, but I call it not rushing. Regardless of what color paint covers the walls, my baby will have two warm, safe homes to live in once he’s born. There are too many kids in this world who don’t even have one.
Besides, I’ve heard kids are colorblind for a while, so it’ll all look like shades of gray to him in the beginning.
