Page 89 of Before I Lost You

My hand roams up his back, and I cradle the back of his head and lean into him. He’s the one to close the distance between us, closing his eyes as we kiss softly. Gently. Slowly. My eyes stay wide open, though, no matter how hard my body fights me to close them. When he pulls away, he looks dazed. He doesn’t go far, though, and his lips brush against mine as he speaks.

“Have you ever been in love before?” he asks me, barely above a whisper. As if he’s afraid of the answer.

“Once,” I reply, not sure how to tell him I’m in love withhim. That I always have been, and always will be.

“Should I be jealous?” His voice isn’t playful, and I immediately shake my head.

“Never.”

“Are you in love now?” His voice shakes with the question, and he’s looking at me with a guarded expression, though there’s hope in his eyes. I’d know that look anywhere. Idoknow that look. The one where he hopes but is scared to do it. He thinks I’m about to let him down.

“Yeah, Kenny boy,” I whisper, my fingers caressing his cheek, my hand at the back of his head tightening slightly. “I am.”

“Say it then,” he urges. “Tell me.”

I let go of the back of his head and shift my hands to cup his jaw. I’m close enough to see the way his ocean-blue eyes dilate as he looks at me, the blue almost gone completely. He blinks slowly at me, and my heart almost bursts in my chest.

“I love you. Wholly. Desperately. Infinitely,” I whisper, then press my lips to his. He doesn’t deepen the kiss, but also doesn’t go far.

“I love you, Conrad,” he whispers back, and my stomach clenches. His eyes turn electric blue, and my heart feels like it’s going to explode. This is how he looks when he’s in love. “I’m so in love with you.”

My eyes well up with tears, and the next words spill out of me in a rush. There’s no way to contain them. They’ve been bottled up inside of me for way too long. “I will follow you to the ends of the world, Ken. Across lifetimes and different timelines. I’ll return to you again and again, and every version of me will love every version of you. The universe can try to erase what we’ve built, but my soul will never forget you. I’llalwayscome back to you.”

Tears stream down Kenneth’s face, and his shoulders begin to shake. “I’m scared. I’ve never felt this way before.”

I want to tell him that yes, you have.

Yes, you have!

Instead, I say, “Don’t be scared, baby. I will never let you go.” I pinch his chin and tilt his head back a little to look into his eyes better. “Never.”

He stares at me for a moment. Like his soul recognizes mine. Like he remembers. Me. Us. Our life. “I want to imprint myself on your heart. Your soul.”

“You already have,” I assure him, and he smiles at me. “You’re everything, Kenny. Everything I’ve ever wanted. I didn’t even know I needed you, but life doesn’t make sense without you.”

“Never leave me.” His voice shakes again. “Swear it.”

“I swear I won’t,” I tell him with conviction. “Nothing could ever keep me from you. Nothing.”

His smile is wobbly, but he says nothing.

“One day I’m going to ask you to marry me, so don’t get any ideas about asking first,” I say with a smile, which makes him smile back even wider. “You’re going to say yes, and I’m going to make you the happiest you’ve ever been.”

“I’m already the happiest I’ve ever been,” he replies, and my breath catches in my throat.

The words are stuck, but I breathe through it. “I promise it’s not. You’ll be even happier than you are now.”

Ken smiles gently, “I find that hard to believe.”

“I’ll prove it to you.”

We finally eat breakfast together, then lunch, and then dinner. Before I know it, we’ve spent the entire day watching scary movies. Halloween is Kenneth’s favorite time of the year, and he insists that it’s a holiday. I haven’t ever cared, but what’s important to him is also important to me. So if he wants to spend the next ten days watching horror movies, then that’s what we’re doing.

After hours on the couch, Kenneth turns off the television and gets up, extending a hand in my direction. I take it, and he leads us to the bedroom. The lamp on the nightstand is on, casting a soft glow across the room, making everything look golden. He crawls into bed and settles his back against the headboard, and I do the same, facing him slightly.

“You’re so beautiful.” Kenneth says, “Perfect.”

He grabs his phone and lifts it to his face, then takes picture after picture of me. I chuckle at the smirk on his face, and it makes me remember all those times in his studio when he took actual portraits of me. Though, for some reason, those don’t make me feel quite this shy. I think it’s because he’s actually keeping these pictures in his phone forever.