His blue eyes go wide, a smile erupting. “Holy shit. I did. I actually remember.”
“Do you remember more?”
He closes his eyes for a breath before looking at me again. “His mom had to shave his head, so it didn’t look like he had a giant bald patch. And then she grounded him for being a dumbass.”
I’ve never heard this story before, so I know he didn’t hear it fromme in the past several days. I throw my arms around his neck, squeezing him so tight. He’s coming back to me.
He lets me hug him for a moment before he straightens, eyes searching mine. Without another word, he leans in and kisses me.
When he stands, he brings me with him, picking me up. With heat pulsing through my body, I wrap my legs around his waist, drape my arms around his neck, and gaze at him, loving to be eye level with him like this.
“Hungry?” he asks.
“Depends.”
He smiles, giving me a light kiss. “On what?”
I give him a long look, letting my potential answers bubble up between us—depends on whether you want to kiss some more, depends on whether there’s something else I’d rather taste, depends on whether we’re going to have sex instead—before answering with a grin, “Depends on who’s cooking.”
Afternoon has turned into evening, and I’m sure we’re both starving. Laughing, Luca gives me a loud smooch, saying, “All right, then.” He turns and gives a sharp whistle, jerking his chin toward the house, and Honey follows us inside.
In the kitchen, Luca slowly sets me down, teasingly sliding me down his body and bending again to kiss me, his lips playful with promise. “As if there’s any question who’s cooking.”
“I just like pretending to be useful.”
He tilts his head to the kitchen table. “Go be useful by getting out of my way.”
I laugh. “Ooh, he’s bossy.”
Luca smiles at me, walking to the cabinet to retrieve a wineglass, then to get the bottle of red from the counter, and he pours a glass, setting it down in front of me with a kiss to the top of my head.
“He’s bossy but sweet,” I amend.
With another smile, he puts the wine away and then crouches to give Honey another once-over before gently murmuring, “Go to bed now.” She jogs out of the kitchen, disappearing to the living room and her dog bed.
I am completely transfixed by this capable man in the kitchen, watching him wash his hands at the sink, gather the final ingredients from the fridge, get a pot of water boiling. While the ragù simmers lazily on the stove, Luca easily rolls out the batch of thawed, fresh pasta dough. He coaxes it through his pasta machine, hanging it to dry briefly while he seasons the sauce.
He’s Luca, but he’s someone else, too, somehow even more captivating. The reveal of my true career has probably taken some of the shine off his eternal optimism, but the clarity in his eyes seems to only add to the internal strength he’s always carried.
He’s quietly whistling, so soft I can’t hear it very well, but when he turns to get the pasta from the rack, I catch a few notes and realize what it is: “First Day of My Life” by Bright Eyes.
Heat burns at the back of my throat, and my eyes sting with tears. Our first night together, in his hotel room, we spoke on and off during rounds of lovemaking, sharing our favorite songs, movies, cities. We were excited to find out that this song was one of our shared favorites; only a couple months later, we danced to it at our wedding.
“Do you remember the name of that song?” I ask.
He looks over at me, then back to the boiling pot of salted water, carefully swirling in the pasta. “Uhhh… I’m not even sure what I was whistling.”
I hum a little, and when he doesn’t seem to recognize it, I start over with the lyrics.
“And I don’t know where I am, I don’t know where I’ve been
But I know where I want to go.”
Luca listens, tilting his head, before shaking it. “I don’t know it. Isn’t that weird?”
“It’s called ‘First Day of My Life,’?” I tell him. “We danced to it at our wedding.”
His hand stills on the saucepan and he looks over his shoulder at me. “Actually?” he asks, and I nod. “Tell me about that day?”
