I furrowed my brow and switched on the turn signal. “What did you do? You talk as if you committed a crime.”
“No, but…it was how I practically used him to convince myself I could find happiness without you—which obviously crashed and burned. I became very good at making promises, and then I couldn’t follow through.”
I nodded slowly and gave his hand a squeeze. “I get it. Jordan picked up those signs in me too. I did tell him I wasn’t ready for a lot, but even then, the ambitions got the best of me here and there.”
He sighed. “You and I are clearly a danger to society on our own.”
I let out a laugh.
Laughing suddenly felt great again.
“So it’s settled,” I said. “We’ll stick together for the rest of our lives.”
“I think we have to.”
I shook my head in amusement and took a deep breath.
Breathing was easier now too.
Funny how that worked.
“By the way, I’d like for us to talk to Hallie and Dylan as soon as possible,” he said.
“We’ll do it tonight.” I saw no reason to wait around. Everyone was gonna notice a difference in our behavior, and on that note… “I had an idea after the shower. I’m thinkin’ mostly about Mikey here?—”
“I think he’s noticed.”
“Exactly—yeah, me too,” I went on. “So, I’m wondering if maybe we can sit down with him and Lily—Dylan and Hallie can be there too, of course—and we tell them it’s been a rough year. The reason we’ve been working late so much is that we’ve been hoping to save up to buy a bigger house. And along the way, you and I started fighting more. We lost sight of what’s important or whatever, but now we’ve worked everything out—and would’ya look at that, we have a new house.” I cleared my throat. “You’llobviously fine-tune the approach and add some finesse to it, but that’s the gist.”
He nodded pensively and raked his teeth across his lip.
We were almost at the house, and Mikey should be home any moment. Knowing Nate’s parents, they’d let Lily fall asleep at their house, and then they’d either drop her off later, or they’d take her to kindergarten in the morning. At this point, everyone had spare clothes and some essentials at their house.
“I think it’s a great idea,” Nate admitted. “It would acknowledge their feelings if they’ve sensed a change between us, plus mark an end to the negativity without throwing them for a loop when we act all lovey-dovey again.”
I grinned, more relieved than I could say. “Are you gonna get lovey-dovey on me?”
“Oh, I’m gonna lovey-dovey you to death, honey.”
I chuckled and kissed his hand again. “I’m lookin’ forward to it. But, uh…I imagine we have a lot to work through, right? As grown-ups, we never get to go straight to paradise. We gotta talk endlessly first.”
He exhaled a laugh and leaned closer to hug my bicep. “I mean… We’ll need to talk a whole bunch about your new partners—or future partners—and see where I might fit into the puzzle. I haven’t even met them yet. But other than that…? I don’t know.” He pressed a kiss to my shoulder. “My problem was always going through life with a husband who sacrificed a big part of himself. I couldn’t do that.”
I nodded with a dip of my chin.
“I still feel like an ass about that,” I admitted. “How can someone be so scared of a fictional scenario? Once the situation with Jordan and James started developing, it was completely different. I could suddenly picture us, you know—two married couples—having fun together, building something meaningful, without breaking out in a cold sweat.”
“That’s how fears work, baby. They can be paralyzing. And I wish I could’ve approached things better?—”
I shook my head, cutting him off, because I wasn’t letting him finish that nonsense. “You tried everything, Nathan. I’m not saying you handled every fight perfectly, but you tried every damn approach. And you never asked for too much. You asked for progress and baby steps, and I refused.”
I slowed down as I reached our neighborhood, and I released his hand to rub at my chest. All the unease from before threatened to return.
“Hey—” He snatched up my hand again and gathered it in both his. “We’re okay now. It’s always easy to look back and see what you should’ve done better. We should’ve bought Apple stock in the nineties too, but we’re not walking around bitter about that, are we?”
I snorted under my breath and side-eyed him.
He smiled and leaned back into his own seat. “You know what weshouldfocus on? Someone’s birthday.”
