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“Actually,” Lindy says, reconsidering. “Let’s take that option.”
Her eyes are glowing now, lighting up, and god, it makes me feel so good. It makes me feel good to be here, to have strings, to be forming this attachment, and to be forging this bond with her. Being with her is what I want to do with a good part of my life, maybe even the rest of it. Well, not here, here, in a hospital parking lot, but by her side. At least, I want to try, and I want to make one heck of an effort when I say try, not just a half-ass try.
I lean across the car, and she leans in halfway to meet me. I cradle her face and kiss her gently as she whimpers and kisses me back. I have to take this out of this parking lot before things heat up, and I find myself with a tent in my pants.
When I break the kiss and slide back, Lindy is smiling at me. Her eyes are still glowing, and she looks happy. Her doubts also look like they’ve vanished.
“Let’s go get that cake,” she whispers. “The subpar one. Not the good one. Also, we don’t want a cat landing in the middle of the cake, trying to devour icing because we didn’t offer tuna bribes, so tuna is definitely a must.”
“Copy that.”
“Oh, and Kirian?”
“Yes?”
“Thank you for not leaving and for not going anywhere. Thank you for staying right here, and thank you for not hating me for breaking into your house. Thank you for being honest with me, for your family, for the curse, for coming back for me, and for fighting for me when I tried to let you go. Thank you for not thinking I’m a hot mess when I got the love glove stuck inside me. Or for any other reason. Thank you for knowing what my past was like and still seeing me anyway. Thank you. And also for the cake that we’re about to get and go home and eat because you’ll still be right beside me when we get to my house.”
“And after. Always. Not just for the cake. Because it’s with or without cake.”
“With or without cake. I like that. But we should get the tuna for sure. The cats don’t subscribe to with or without tuna.”
I take Lindy’s hand and brush my lips over it again. And then, because I always have it with me, but I completely forgot in all the chaos, I take the necklace out of my pocket. It doesn’t start glowing until I set it in Lindy’s hand.
“I want you to have this. Because I think we’re finally at the point where I can give it to you proudly, and you won’t want to kick my butt for the curse that comes with it.”
“Lick your butt?” Lindy lifts a brow. “I might agree.”
“Kick…oh. I see what you did there.” My laugh starts out small, but then it grows and booms through the car.
She laughs, too, even as she slips the long chain of the necklace over her head and lets it rest on her chest. It glows for a few more seconds before it goes back to just being a beautiful stone in a gorgeous setting.
We laugh until we have tears in our eyes, and if anyone is observing us from anywhere in the parking lot, they probably think we’re a little bit off. Yet, we still laugh. And laugh some more.
Lindy closes her hand over the stone, and as I start the car, I see it beginning to glow again.
I don’t think I’ve ever been so happy to get cake in my life. And I’ve been pretty happy about cake in the past. But this time, it’s with Lindy, which makes it the best time.
EPILOGUE
Lindy
The first twenty-four years of my life were spent without any real family beyond my sister. She was always my sister first and foremost, and then my friend second. I never wanted her to have to fill in for the mom or dad we didn’t have, for the aunts or uncles we’d never know, or for the grandparents, cousins, and everyone else who wasn’t in our lives.
But I’m so proud to say that I now have a family. I have a wild granny who loves hot pink pantsuits, I have cousins-in-law, or however that goes, a brother and sister-in-law, and more. I have a nephew—okay, I’m talking about Milo, who I think is my nephew even though I don’t entirely know how things work with marriage—a mother-in-law who is like a real mom to me, and her sister, who I call my aunt because, again, I’m not very good with these terms.
We’ve never tried to be good with terms, and right from the start, long before Kirian and I went to Spain and eloped to tie the knot after just nine months of knowing each other, I knew I had a family. And also friends. Because Kirian’s cousins, his brother, Ellis, Luna, Milo, Kirian’s mom, aunt, and granny are not just family. They’re my friends too.
