Page 54 of Take What Hurts

It was a tentative thing. Like a scab over a wound. Delicate and easily removed with trauma, but enough for now. Enough to hold the wound closed until the next day or the next week, until it finally evolved into the newness of regrown skin.

“Elliott.” It was nothing more than a breath. “It doesn’t matter.” The same hurt Mackenzie had watched wash over Elliott’s face the night before was back, and the same urgent need arose in Mackenzie to soothe it away.

In that instant Mackenzie realized Elliott’s brain would always try and twist her reality. Make her try and believe she was simultaneously not enough and too much. And despite the way that knowledge made Mackenzie’s heart ache like it was bruised, she couldn’t wait to remind Elliott over and over again exactly how wrong her brain was. Her fingers found the deep line at the edge of Elliott’s mouth and traced. Over and over, until it disappeared. She brought her eyes to Elliott’s. “Honey, it doesn’t matter, because—” She cleared her throat against the lump that had formed there. “Nothing does. Not when it comes to you.”

She watched Elliott’s sharp intake of breath. Felt it expand her chest where it pressed tightly against Mackenzie’s. Mackenzie went on: “I meant what I said this morning. With one revision, I guess.” She let a breath of laughter escape, fingers moving, tracing, smoothing the crinkles around Elliott’s eyes. “I know I want to do this with you for a long time. And I want you to listen to me now and remember what I’m saying the next time your brain tries to sabotage the things you know and replace them with things that are scary.” She heard the whimper leave Elliott. Saw the way her eyes started to glisten in the late-afternoon light. Mackenzie’s throat went tight, and she fought to keep her voice steady and sure so when Elliott inevitably wavered in the future, she could look back and remember the absolute conviction with which Mackenzie spoke. “Whatever it is. Or—or wherever we are.” She swallowed against the love that wanted to escape. Too soon. “It doesn’t matter, because we will work it out together.”

And Elliott, a sob finally wrenching itself from her body, lifted Mackenzie off the ground and held her tight. Mackenzie, needing no further invitation, wrapped her legs around Elliott’s waist, and, with Elliott’s hands on the underside of her thighs, she kissed Elliott, feeling like she’d drown if she didn’t.

It was late when they arrived back in Seattle. Nancy had refused to allow them to leave without dinner, and Elliott and Mackenzie had been too weak to put up much of a fight.

When they crossed the 520 bridge, Elliott turned to Mackenzie, a question in her eyes, mouth lifted in a smirk so arrogant it was difficult to believe this was the same person who had broken apart so completely the night before. “So,” she drawled. “Your place or mine?” The line was so ridiculous that they both descended into gut-aching laughter.

“Yours,” Mackenzie eventually said, eyes dropping to her hands resting in her lap. “I don’t—” She paused, considering the words. “My apartment isn’t—um. I guess it’s not my favorite place.”

Elliott nodded but didn’t say anything more. She was astute, and it couldn’t have escaped her they’d only been there once together. “Mine, then.”

Once they were there, they didn’t leave except to go to work. When the clock struck 5 p.m., they’d shoot out of their office buildings and race back to the comfort of Elliott’s bed. They DoorDashed or ate whatever they could find in Elliott’s kitchen. They drank wine and binged the latest season of Love Island in between languorous make-out sessions. But mostly, when they were in Elliott’s home—together—they didn’t leave Elliott’s bed.

On Wednesday night, Mackenzie lay curled up against Elliott, her head on Elliott’s chest, half in a stupor after one of the most intense orgasms she’d had in her life, and Elliott’s chest depressed in a sigh under her cheek. “Do you mind if I⁠—”

Mackenzie eked out a lazy noise that she hoped Elliott would interpret as one of encouragement.

“I want to ask you something, but I don’t want to hurt you.” Under her cheek, she felt the way each word left Elliott’s body with effort.

Finally, Mackenzie gained the presence of mind to push herself up onto an elbow. “Okay.” Mackenzie breathed out the word that was accompanied by a prickling of worry at the nape of her neck.

“Okay. Um—well you said your apartment isn’t your favorite place.”

Mackenzie’s lips pulled into a slow, languid smile as she marveled at how Elliott’s brain could ruminate for literally days on end about the smallest of things. She loved Elliott’s brain, despite the fact it liked to engage in sabotage.

“And. Well⁠—”

Mackenzie watched the struggle line every feature of Elliott’s face. She waited, nodding. Encouraging her to go on.

“Is it—do you not want to be there because of the nursery?” The words rushed out all at the same time, and Mackenzie let them roll around in her brain, unspooling themselves until they made sense.

Mackenzie’s chest rose with a breath, and she waited for the pang to hit her there. Right where it had always hurt. But it didn’t come. Instead, she found herself considering why Elliott had asked her that question. “It’s not necessarily that.” The words tumbled out without much input from her. Like they had been sitting there waiting for Elliott to ask. “There’s just a lot of… stuff… that happened there.”

She pushed out another breath and ran a finger over the underside of Elliott’s breast. She tried to count the goose bumps that erupted on Elliott’s skin at the touch. “And Reilly—” She paused. Reilly had fucked her over. But it went beyond that, and with all the therapy and all the time and the space, and with Elliott… well, she’d finally worked it out. “I don’t know that Reilly ever really loved me. The idea of me, sure. But not me. And I see that now. And, well. It’s hard to be there knowing that. And the nursery—” She cut herself off and splayed her hand over Elliott’s chest, right where she could feel Elliott’s heart ramming away under her sternum. “That’s going to live with me wherever I am, but I want to celebrate her—” The familiar burning started in her throat, but she sucked in a breath around it and pushed on. “That she existed. Rather than mourn her for the rest of my life.”

Elliott’s toned arms pulled Mackenzie tighter against her. “Do you—I mean—” Elliott sighed, and Mackenzie suppressed a chuckle. One of the things she loved about Elliott was the unwavering and comforting awkwardness. “Would you ever want to try again? To have kids, I mean.”

Mackenzie’s stomach swooped pleasantly. “With you, you mean?” She smiled wickedly at the flush that crept up Elliott’s neck.

“Um—I mean, yeah. If—like, if we’re hypothetically together⁠—”

Chuckling, she covered Elliott’s mouth with a soft kiss. “Yes, Elliott. I would like to try and have children with you.” She narrowed her eyes. “Hypothetically, I mean.”

“That was mean.” Elliott huffed out a laugh and flipped them over.

THIRTY

MACKENZIE

With Elliott hovering above her, pink nipples hard with arousal, Mackenzie dropped her legs open around the slender thigh that slipped between them. It took her breath away how willingly she opened herself to Elliott. How insatiable she was for her. She had never been like this. Never had she felt for another person the almost unquenchable desire that kept her in bed with them for days.

Mackenzie’s heart rammed against her ribs as she studied Elliott’s face. Elliott’s eyes, initially crinkled with laughter, had darkened; pupils almost entirely eclipsing her honeyed irises before she leaned down and sucked hard where Mackenzie’s neck met her shoulder. Mackenzie gasped, the space between her legs flooding, and she groped and clutched for any part of Elliott’s skin she could reach. She skated her hands up Elliott’s arms, over the firmness of her triceps and up the sinew of her neck to her hair.