“Old-timey candy. I don’t eat the new stuff. Give me a handmade saltwater taffy any day of the week over something they made on a machine,” River had replied and tucked her hands into her pockets.
They’d bought popcorn and a soda and sat down at a movie that River hadn’t wanted to see. She wasn’t really into going to the movies to begin with, but she preferred action or horror films to romance or romantic comedies, which was the kind of movie they’d just seen. It starred Liam Waddington and Cameron Levine as a couple of friends who’d never been able to make it work until they finally realized that they’d been in love the whole time. Liam Waddington wasn’t Lacey’s cup of tea, but he was attractive enough for a guy, so she understood why the ladies might like him. Cameron Levine was a different story, though. She was on her top five list; the list of celebrities she’d technically be allowed to sleep with outside of her relationship with River, should she ever meet Cameron in person and Cameron be interested in that.
Of course, despite her living in Anaheim, which wasn’t all that far from LA, and Cameron living in LA, the odds of them ever meeting were pretty slim. Not that she’d actually do that. Cameron Levine was beautiful and just her type, but Lacey was committed to River. On top of that, Cameron was in a long-term relationship with one of the biggest TV and movie stars on the planet, Kennedy Gannon. They’d been together for over five years, if Lacey remembered her gossip correctly. There had been that unfortunate incident at some party that Lacey had read about online, yes, but she tried not to pay attention to stories like that since she doubted there was ever much truth to them.
“Good movie, huh?” she asked when the screen went black.
“Yeah, great,” River replied. “You ready?”
“Just need to pee before we go.”
“You drank all the soda. That’s why,” River teased.
“I know. I know.”
They stood and walked out of the row until they hit the stairs. A few minutes later, she left the bathroom and foundRiver sitting on a metal bench on the opposite wall, still looking down at her phone.
“Want to grab some dinner?” Lacey asked.
“You just ate that whole thing of popcorn. You’re still hungry?”
“I skipped lunch. I had a client who changed their treatment plan on me at the last minute, so I went long and didn’t get to eat before I had to go to my next one.”
“Can we just go to your place and order in? I can order something for us now, and it’ll be there by the time we get there.”
“Sure,” she replied, feeling the disappointment hit her harder than she’d expected.
She knew River preferred to watch movies at home instead of the theater and have food delivered in, even though it was usually more expensive than eating at a restaurant or just cooking, and it didn’t normally bother her, but tonight was supposed to be a date night, which they hadn’t had in a long time, since their one-year anniversary over six months ago now. That was the longest they’d gone without having a night out.
When they’d first met, she and River had gone out at least once a week, if not more than that, depending on how busy or tired they were. They’d made an effort, despite that business or tiredness in the beginning, but things hadn’t been the same since she’d asked River to move in on their anniversary and River had said no.
“I’m not ready yet, Lace,” River had told her, trying to be nice in her rejection. “It’s not that I don’t love you or don’t want to.”
“Then, what is it?” Lacey had asked.
“I like having my own place right now. I live above the shop, and it’s great. I can wake up, go downstairs, and I’m at work. I have the smell of candy and fudge pretty much always in my nose there, and it’s just nice.”
“And I couldn’t move inthere?”
“To my studio above my candy shop? The one you complain about how hot it is whenever we’re there?”
“You have ovens in the shop and other hot things and no AC in your apartment.”
“I have fans, and it works for me. Can’t we just do the back-and-forth thing for a while longer?”
“You’re here at least five nights a week, and I’m there at least one or two. I thought you’d want some stability, like I do, and we’d have one place together. I wouldn’t have stuff there that I need here, and you wouldn’t have stuff here that you need there because we’re in the same place. How would it work? You have a three-year lease on that building, which you just signed last year, so you have two years left. Are you going to move the shop then?”
“No, I’ll re-sign the building lease or do a loan to buy it if I can. It would be expensive as hell, so I would need a major loan, but business is good, and the location is great, being so close to Disney, but off the main drag, so to speak.”
“So, you’re likely to renew it?”
“Yes,” River had replied.
“Does that mean you want to keep living in the apartment forever?”
“Not forever, just for a while,” River had said. “I know you don’t like it, but it works for me.”
“And you don’t want to live with me?”
