How do I get up there?
I go inside the barn and up into the loft space where Dawson’s studio apartment is. It takes me a few moments to find the hatch that leads me up onto the roof.
Grabbing onto the rungs of the ladder, I make my way up to find him, pulling myself up and onto the roof. He hasn’t heard me yet. He’s got his elbows on his knees, hands in-between, fidgeting. Whatever he’s thinking about has completely taken him out of himself, and whatever stick is always up his ass seems to have removed itself. He seems so…calm.
Is this what Rhett Thornwood looks like when nobody’s watching?
I’m so mesmerized by how relaxed he looks that I completely neglect what surrounds us. The land and sky open up into an endless stretch of land, the sun just starting to dip low, turning everything gold.
“Holy shit,” I breathe, stepping out beside where he’s sitting.
He turns to look at me, slightly startled. “What are you doing here?” he asks, repositioning himself.
“Trying to figure out how the hell you got up here. And why,” I say.
He smirks, and I take that as my green light to sit down beside him, settling close enough that our thighs press together and neither of us move to fix it.
I wouldn’t let him if he tried.
I pull my pack of cigarettes out my pocket, tapping one loose before offering the pack to him. He takes one out, and I hand over the lighter for him to light his first.
I watch the slow inhale and how his chest expands as the tension bleeds out his shoulders. Handing the lighter back to me, I brush my fingers against his to see if he pulls back, but he doesn’t.
Finally, I light my cigarette too, and we sit like that for a while—quiet, other than the inhales and exhales of cigarette smoke, watching the sun drop lower and lower.
“You come up here a lot?” I ask finally, exhaling smoke into the cooling air.
“Used to,” he says. “When I needed to think.”
I glance over at him. “What’s so big that you need to come here and hide right now?”
He shrugs one shoulder. “Some dude won’t leave me alone, and I could use the peace and quiet.”
Something about that pulls a grin out of me. “Yeah?”
His eyes flick to mine—steady. A small smile pulls at his lips. “Yeah.”
I hum, taking another drag, letting the silence stretch between us again.
It’s not empty. Well…not for long.
He breaks the silence, using the last few rays of sunlight to his advantage. “Gonna build a house eventually, out past the south field,” he says, nodding off in the distance. “Same as my brothers—keep it on the property.”
I follow his gaze, trying to picture it.
“How big?” I ask quietly, waiting to see where this goes.
“Big enough.”
“For whom?”
He glances at me again, something quiet in his expression. “The family I decide to have.”
I push, not willing to let him tell me if it’s a future I don’t fit in. Annoyance bubbles in my gut. I flick ash off the edge of the roof, jaw tightening slightly. “Yeah. Guess you’ll need it.”
He turns to face me, exhaustion written all over his face. “Don’t start, Colt.”
I shrug, moving my eyes forward. “I know you’ll need a huge house for the plans you have. Maybe you’ll be just like your dadand his before him. A big family. Ranch life. All that shit you keep in neat little boxes.”
