The followingweekend brings one of my favorite new traditions: Noah cooking for me.
He lets himself into my house with the key I gave him last week, arms full of grocery bags. I try to help but he shoos me toward the couch with a glass of wine.
“Tonight, you relax. Professor’s orders.”
I watch him move around my kitchen like he belongs there—which he does. I told Kat and Zennie I was making him a key and I’m pretty sure they were more surprised than Noah was when I gave it to him. “You’re sure?” He asked while the key stayed trapped between our hands, mid-exchange. I kissed him and told him the truth. “Very sure.”
He chops vegetables with grace, humming along to the indie playlist streaming from his phone, and glances over at me every few minutes with soft smiles. The smell of garlic and herbs soon fill the place as he prepares his famous pasta. I try not to think of who else he’s made this dish for, because it’s us now and the past is just that—the past.
We eat at the small table by the window, the candles I lit sit in iron holders, flickering between us. The pasta is perfect—al dente with a silky white sauce, lots of fresh vegetables and fresh basil. But it’s the company and conversation that nourishes me most.
We talk about everything.
Childhood dreams. I wanted to be a pilot for one summer after seeingTop Gun, and he always wanted to do this—teach about reading and writing.
Books that changed us—he tells meThe Boxcar Children, and I tell himThe Shining.
The fear of being seen too clearly by another person. Noah tells me about his wilder years, the casual hookups that never quite filled the emptiness, where he hooked upwith women and men, sometimes at once. How he’d watched me for years, wanting but unsure of where I stood, always trying to respect my boundaries.
“I thought maybe I’d never get this,” he admits quietly, twirling pasta on his fork. “You, letting me in. Letting me love you the way I’ve wanted to.”
My throat tightens. “I’m still figuring out how to let myself be loved. But I want it, Noah. I want you. All of it.”
He reaches across the table and takes my hand, thumb stroking my knuckles. The touch grounds me. He grounds me. Even with his past, and mine lacking, I feel like I can actually do this. Because he’s here to guide me.
Later, after the dishes are cleared and another bottle of wine is opened, we end up on the couch again. The conversation turns intimate. I tell him about the years I spent questioning myself, the relief and anxiety of finally understanding my pansexuality. How being with him has been like waking up to color after living in grayscale—that feels like an expressive metaphor but it’s the truth.
Noah listens with his whole being, the way he always does. Then he pulls me close and kisses me until I’m dizzy. The sun has set hours ago, and with just one lamp on, the room is shadowed, the perfect setting for hard to speak truths.
“I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop,” I confess into the darkness, voice barely above a whisper. “For this feeling of… I don't know, being normal, being capable of being in a relationship and knowing what to do… I guess I’mjust worried I’m going to wake up and realize I can’t do this after all.”
His arm tightens around me. “It won’t. Because this isn’t a phase or an experiment for either of us. This is real, Cade. And I’m not going anywhere.”
I turn in his arms to face him, searching his eyes in the low light. The sincerity there chases away the last shadows of doubt. At least for tonight.
“I believe you,” I whisper.
And for the first time in weeks, I truly do. I can do this.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-THREE
NOAH
I watchCade across the office, the late afternoon light spilling through the blinds and highlighting the fairest pieces of his golden hair. He’s frowning at a student paper, blue pen tapping rhythmically, but I know that crease between his brows isn’t entirely about the essay.
It’s the same quiet shadow that’s been lingering in his eyes for weeks now—uncertainty, that old ghost of self-doubt whispering that this new side of him may, at any time, vanish like a thief in the night.
I don’t push. I’ve learned the delicate art of Cade Mercer: when to lean in, when to hold back. Pushing too hard would send him retreating behind those careful walls he spent years erecting. So I let the moment breathe, and him, too.
“Earth to Noah,” he says suddenly, glancing up withthat lazy, half-smile that makes my chest tight. “You’ve been staring for five minutes. Is my abysmal paper-grading-face really that intoxicating?”
“Everything about you is intoxicating,” I reply, voice thick with all of the sweet things I want to say, but know he isn’t ready to hear. I lean back in my chair and stretch my arms overhead so my shirt rides up just enough to draw his gaze to the exposed strip of skin. His eyes flicker down, then away, a faint flush creeping up his neck. God, I love that blush. Still so new and so honest. “But yes. When you’re deep in concentration, especially. It makes me want to distract you.”
Cade huffs a laugh, carefully lowering the pen. “We have office hours in twenty minutes. Behave please, darling.”
I grin, but inside, my heart does that familiar twist. I see the insecurity he tries to hide—the way he sometimes pauses after we kiss, like he’s waiting for the desire to evaporate, or for his walls to snap back up, without his consent. The way he still marvels at his own wants and desires—and maybe even having them, as if all of this between us is a coat he might decide doesn’t fit after all.
