Rafe looks down at my hand like he’s grounding himself.
While I might have been the one to call it off and Rafe’s stint at rehab did its rounds in the media, without a doubt I know he’s thinking about just how bad it got. My own fear back then attempts to raise its head.
Fuck, if I’d just come out then, none of this would be happening. I’m the reason for this shitshow. The party line of “in your own time” feels weak.
I swallow hard. “You don’t have to do anything you’re not ready for,” I say quickly, too quickly. “We can keep it vague. We can?—”
Rafe’s head lifts. His eyes are sharp. “Stop.”
The word lands with more bite than I expect. I blink, and he squeezes my hand firmly.
“Stop acting like you’re asking me for permission to exist,” he says, voice losing some of its control. “Stop treating yourself like a liability.”
Eric’s brows lift slightly.
Rachael goes very still, listening.
I swallow. “I’m not?—”
“Yes, you are,” Rafe cuts in. His gaze doesn’t leave mine. “Every time you say you don’t want to pressure me, what I hear is you giving yourself an escape hatch. You’re already bracing to disappear again.”
My throat closes. “That’s not fair,” I manage.
Rafe’s expression shifts, the anger under it softer than it looks. “Maybe it’s not fair,” he says quietly. “But it’s true.”
The room holds its breath.
Miles, in the kitchen, turns the heat down on the stove like he can feel the tension spiking.
Rachael speaks gently. “Ollie, what are you afraid of?”
The question is careful. There’s no accusation in her tone.
I stare at the table because looking at Rafe’s face feels like staring into a mirror that knows all my worst impulses. “I’m afraid,” I admit, voice low, “that the more I ask for, the more I’ll ruin it.”
Rafe’s thumb starts moving slowly again over my knuckles, the touch reassuring.
Eric nods once, like he expected that answer.
Rachael’s expression softens. “And what do you want?” she asks.
I lift my head slowly. “I want… to be married to him,” I say. The words feel too small for the truth. “I want to be with him in a way I didn’t let myself want before.”
Rafe’s throat works. His eyes go dark for a second, but not with anger. With something that looks like grief pressed into longing.
“And what does that look like in the real world?” Rachael asks, practical again. “Are you living together? Traveling together? Are you attending games and shows? Are you ‘dating’ publicly? Are you a married couple in public now?”
My heart hammers.
I don’t answer immediately, because the honest answer is I don’t know. I’ve spent so many years building plans that kept the truth at arm’s length that imagining the truth in daylight feels like trying to picture a color I’ve never seen.
Rafe inhales slowly. “We’re not moving in together tomorrow,” he says. “We’re not doing some big bullshit interview. But we’re also not hiding.”
I nod quickly. “Yes.”
Rachael looks between us. “Define ‘not hiding.’”
Rafe glances at me, then back to her. “It means if we get photographed, we don’t deny it. We don’t spin it. We don’t say ‘just friends.’ We don’t feed the machine with half-truths.”
