Page 65 of When The Noise Stops

"That night. Did it feel good?"

"Yes."

"Did it make you feel better?"

I nodded.

"Yes."

She nodded.

"Then that's what we are. I'm sorry I can't offer you more right now. I'm not healed. I don't want to make you a crutch. I don't want to wake up in six months and find out I used a good man to feel safe and called it love because the sex was good and he sat with me when I shook in fear."

Water dripped somewhere in the ceiling.

"Where do we go from here?" I asked.

"Right back to where we were. You rebuild this. I bake. We live next door to each other, we share friends, become better friends. If we end up in each other's beds, that's because it feels good and it makes us feel better. Not because we owe each other a title."

I let her words sink in.

I got it.

I didn't like it.

I wouldn't push, though. Not yet.

"Alright."

She waited to see if I had anything else to say. When I didn't speak, she turned her attention to the bad lift.

"That's going to take a while to fix. And a lot of money."

"Yeah."

"You want me to pay for it and tie it into the monthly payments?"

I shook my head.

"You've done more than enough."

She shrugged.

We finished the walk-through. I needed new paint. A sign. There was a bathroom that needed to be gutted.

She drove us home.

That night, I meant to sleep in my own bed.

Then she knocked on my door barefoot, wearing one of those little sleep shirts she always wore.

"You want company?" She licked her lips.

I knew exactly what she was and wasn't offering.

I let her in anyway.

She stopped two steps in and bent. The shirt rode up that round ass. No panties. Her thighs were already shining. I could see it from the door. I was stuck. She looked back over her shoulder and giggled.