The cabin she's staying in is just visible through the trees, lights on, curtains drawn. She's been here a couple of days now, and I still don't know why I offered it. Why I'm letting her stay. Every part of me wants to pull away, create distance, protect whatever stability I've built.
And yet something insists I don't.
Maybe it's the faint hope that we can navigate this awkwardness without collapsing into the past. Maybe it's just that seeing her here feels right in a way nothing else has in years.
Movement catches my eye through the window.
The cabin door opens and she steps out, heading toward her car.
And I freeze.
She's wearing shorts—denim, frayed at the edges, riding up just slightly on her thighs—and a loose tank top that moves with her as she walks.
Her legs are lean and toned, curves in all the places I remember, and my brain immediately supplies the observation: she must still run.
The thought is automatic. Unwelcome. Devastating.
Because I remember those legs. Remember them wrapped around my waist, trembling against my shoulders, soft and strong and perfect.
And now I'm standing here watching her walk to her car like some kind of creep, unable to look away from the way the shorts hug her hips, the way her hair catches the afternoon light.
My chest tightens without warning.
My hands curl into fists at my sides.
This is torture.
Having her this close. Watching her exist in my space, wearing shorts that should be illegal, looking like every fantasy I've tried to bury for seven years.
I've forgotten how careful you have to be when someone carries as much of themselves as she does. How easily the weight can shift, how quickly things can break.
How impossible it is to maintain any kind of distance when she looks like fucking that.
Julian'sin the booth running through a riff, his voice cutting through clean and honest the way it always does.
But I'm distracted.
"Yo." Julian's voice cuts through my headphones. "You hearing this or are you off on another planet?"
I scowl, pulling one side of the headphones off. "I'm listening. Keep going."
He grins, leaning against the mic stand. "That brunette staying in the cabin have anything to do with you being completely checked out today?"
"Shut up and sing."
He laughs, but there's curiosity in his eyes. "I'm just saying, man. You've been different since she showed up. Not bad different. Just... different."
"Your job is to finish this track, not psychoanalyse me."
"Multi-talented," he says with a shrug, but he drops it. Goes back to the riff, lets me pretend I'm focused on levels and EQ when really I'm thinking about that brunette.
My phone buzzes on the console.
Jay
Sonder tonight. You coming? Ollie's gonna be there. Drinks. Talking shit. The usual.
Nate
