Page 26 of Soothing Little Sylmen

Corrin

If people can’t understand that you will be a little harder to reach in the future, they’re not people you want to work with. Your happiness is going to make you a better songwriter, going to make the ideas flow and the creativity expand. I know when I met Austen it was like lyrics just appeared to me, and over the years, anytime I fought my attraction to him I would struggle. But the moment I leaned into it, I found success.

I sighed, knowing how true his words were. The man had yearned for his partner, had thought it wasn’t possible because Austen was his best friend’s younger brother. Talk about a sticky situation. Luckily, Tennyson accepted them. He’d seen how much the pair cared about one another and realized he might lose them both if he was an asshole. I didn’t have that same kind of situation.

Before I could respond to him, another message came through.

Corrin

If I need to come to you I can. Not right now, of course, but when it’s time to write or record we can do it over video. There is no reason we have to be in the same place at the same time, or that you can’t take a couple of days to do a trip and then go straight back to your boy.

The tension in my shoulders left, because I had needed to hear exactly what he said. I could make my life more remote. The house I owned wasn’t anything I was married to. I could replicate it in any city or town. Building a life with Sylmen would be more than worth it.

I would get to choose things to fit him and his desires. I could craft a playroom that would make him swoon. Money wasn’t an issue. Between what I got paid for new projects and the royalties I earned off of older ones, I was set. Hell, I could build a house from scratch if that’s what we needed. All I had to know was where my boy lived and what he wanted. And honestly, that was a reach, because I could still build it without much input from him if he did not want to make those Big decisions.

As I typed out my appreciation to my friend, I could see my boy wiggling. The blanket scratched against the plastic mat in the bassinet, interrupting the quiet in our small space. It wouldn’t be long till he woke up.

My response to Corrin was simple.

Gael

Thanks for the help. You’re right. I can do this from anywhere. I needed the reminder.

He replied with a meme of some kid in a cowboy outfit doing finger guns. It looked like it was backstage at a concert, and I found it hilarious that the two worlds had crossed—both the music industry I worked in and me being on a ranch. He probably planned it that way. The guy was ridiculously smart.

With that taken care of, I turned my focus back to my boy. There were plans to be made, things I needed to know, and my boy was the one who would have to give me those answers.

I could be patient, though. There was no point in attacking him right when he woke up. Coming down from sub-drop was hard. I had no doubt my boy had sunk deep. He’d been glassy-eyed whenever I was reading the books to him, like he was there but not.

The ten minutes between me finishing my conversation with Corrin and Sylmen waking up were the longest of my life. Only because I realized with an abundant clarity that I was falling in love with him.

A man whose last name I didn’t know.

A man who lived somewhere and worked somewhere and had all these pieces of him that had not been revealed to me.

And yet I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him. I wanted to take care of him until my last breath. I wanted to build a home with him, to give him the space to be Little as much as he desired.

When his eyes slowly blinked open, I fought back a joyous cry. “There you are, sweet boy,” I said, voice soft.

His lips kicked up in a tiny grin. I didn’t rush to unwrap him. There was a part of this interaction, this scene, that I wanted to see play out. And I had a feeling my boy did too.

“Did you wet your diaper, sweet boy?” I asked, my voice the same tone as before, not wanting him to think anything of my question.

He bit his lip, then gave a slow nod like he worried I might be upset.

“Good boy,” I said warmly. “Daddy needs to change you now.”

He laid still as I picked him up and shifted him back onto the mat. I reversed all of my moves from before: unwrapping the blanket and adjusting him until he was on the towel. Then I unsnapped his diaper and took a look at just how much he had actually gone. When I saw that the diaper was pretty full, I beamed with pride.

“Look at you. I’m so proud, so honored that you’d share this with me, sweet boy.”

The apples of his cheeks turned bright pink. I talked with him as I worked, explaining to him how good he did and how well he slept, and how while it was almost time for us to leave the room, we could absolutely extend our playtime into one of our private spaces.

He didn’t know it, but I had put in a request for a crib to be brought to my room. I should have splurged when I initially booked the space. There were options to have a nursery attached to your room, but it had felt presumptuous.

How could I have known I would find someone, and that they would trust me enough to come back to my space? The answer was I couldn’t. But fate had been good to me and given me everything I longed for, so I made the leap.

In my room now would be all of the things that we found here, minus the giant blanket fort. I really needed to know if I could tip people, because how did they do this. The craftsmanship was astounding. Mine yesterday paled in comparison. Not that it was a competition or anything. Not at all.