They were in their Sunday suits, both proud, both nervous. Oliver’s red bow was crooked, J’s jacket sleeves too short, but the shine in their eyes was everything.
Oliver stumbled and nearly tipped the bowl. “Oh no.”
But before the petals could spill and he hit the floor, I scooped him up fast with one arm. His little body barely weighed anything against my chest.
“Are you good to go, buddy?” I shifted him higher, easy as if he were nothing more than air.
“Yep. Now I’m flying!” His curls brushed my chin, and he laughed.
I set him down and gave him back the bowl. “There you go.”
“Dom,” Oliver gazed at my big biceps. “When I grow up, I’m gonna have muscles like you.”
“You sure will. Just keep eating good food and staying active.” I chuckled, squeezing him gently before setting him down. If only he knew—these muscles weren’t for show.
Most nights, when I couldn’t sleep, I punished my body in the basement apartment. Push-ups until my chest burned, pull-ups until my arms shook, weights until my hands blistered. All the cuts of muscle carved across my 6’4” frame was proof to my mind that I was still here, still fighting the ache of the family I’d lost.
Oliver’s cheeks flushed with excitement. “Dom, is this enough petals?”
“Plenty,” I fixed his favorite dinosaur pen on his lapel. “Your mom is going to walk in and think she stepped into a dream.”
The house was spotless. A cleaning crew had been here that morning, polishing every corner until the floors glowed. No trace of Scott’s chaos remained—not his whiskey rings on the coffeetable, not his half-snorted coke dust in the study. Only light, only roses, only the boys’ drawings taped with shaky Scotch tape onto wrapped cardboard.
They’d each made her a card. Oliver’s was covered in dinosaurs, lopsided hearts stamped between velociraptors and stegosauruses.
J’s was a riot of rainbows, their handwriting neat and blocky, careful where Oliver’s was messy. They were beaming with pride, bouncing on their toes, whispering their rehearsed lines over and over.
The chef I’d hired was finishing in the kitchen—three courses, high-protein, rich but not heavy, because I listened to Teyonah even when she thought no one did.
She worried about scales and mirrors, but she didn’t need to.
Every curve of her body was perfection.
Still, I wanted to honor her discipline. So tonight it would be seared tuna—bright with citrus, salmon glazed in miso, and a panna cotta that melted like silk on the tongue. Clean, decadent, and light enough that she could savor every bite without guilt.
To match the meal, Chef Marco had even prepared low-calorie cocktails: a sparkling grapefruit spritz laced with rosemary, and a cucumber-mint gin fizz sweetened only with a drop of stevia.
Nervousness hit me.
Will she think this is too much? Would this. . .scare her?
I was not her close friend, just the young tenant in her basement apartment, but every rose I scattered, every course I had planned with the chef, made me feel like a future husband rehearsing vows I’d never been allowed to say. The world might even call this wrong—me, in her house, arranging petals for her as if I owned a place in her bed.
Those truths pressed against my ribs like a blade every time I looked at her.
I wasn’t her partner.
I wasn’t her confidant.
I wasn’t her anything.
At best, I was the guy who lived in the basement and picked up her sons from soccer practice when she worked late.
The one who reheated leftovers and cut their grilled cheese sandwiches into dinosaurs because I knew Oliver wouldn’t eat them otherwise.
The one who crouched beside J, whispering that they didn’t have to finish long division tonight, not when their mom had already fallen asleep on the couch in her work clothes, exhaustion pressing her down like chains.
Sometimes I was just. . .there.
