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“Like right now?” she argued. “What’s the fucking point? Why should I stay one more night when I know we’ll both just feel like shit?”
I stormed over to her and pulled her against me. “Because I need one more night with you!” I yelled. “I don’t want to say goodbye right now. I want to deal with all the fucking pain and misery I’m going to feel tomorrow, because at least then I’ll know this was all real.”
She shoved away from me, stumbling back a step. “You had no right not to tell me. This is my life too.” She turned on her heel and stormed out of the house. I went to chase her down, but Shane grabbed my arm, stopping me from going after her.
“Let her cool down.”
“Fuck!” I shouted, pissed that my last two days with her were so fucked up.
“Listen, I’m gonna leave you two alone. I’ll head home tomorrow and I’ll contact you when we have solid plans.”
I nodded, not caring at all about the fucking rental properties. Taking Shane’s advice, I left Rose to calm down. She wasn’t going to leave without coming back here to pack, so at least I knew she couldn’t sneak out on me. While she was gone, I cleaned up everything. I put the tools in the small storage unit. Most of the house was already cleaned up, since Rose did that as we went. I swept up the floors, then washed them. And when she still didn’t return, I cleaned up the kitchen until it gleamed. I stood in the doorway, staring at our house, but instead of being happy, I was just fucking sad. Our house, and we only got one night in it completely finished. We never got to fill it with knick knacks like she talked about. We didn’t pick out decorations. We just have basic furniture and a few small touches she’d added here and there.
I glanced at the clock and noticed it was already five o’clock. She’d been gone for hours and I couldn’t take it anymore. I went out in search of her, finding her sitting on the beach, staring out at the waves. I sat down beside her, itching to touch her, but unsure if she would even allow it.
“I didn’t mean to hurt you,” I said after a few minutes. “I just didn’t want to take that happiness away from you.”
“I know,” she whispered. “I just didn’t want it to end.”
I took her hand in mine, staring at our linked fingers. I didn’t want it to end either, but that wasn’t the path either of us could take. “Come inside with me.”
She didn’t say anything as we stood and made our way across the sand to the house we built together. Once we were inside, I stepped behind her, wrapping my arms around her. Together, we looked at our house, and all the potential possibilities.
“Right there,” I pointed to the window seat with the table we’d picked up the other day. “Our kids would have eaten at that table with us.”
“Three,” she smiled, resting her head back against my chest. “Two boys and a little girl.”
“And she would have looked just like you.”
I pressed a kiss to her cheek and continued. “And I’d be sitting at the island, watching you cook as you told me all the crazy things the kids did that day.”
“And then you’d tell me about this secret thing you have going on with Shane,” she continued, smiling ruefully up at me.
Then I stepped around her and took her hand, guiding her to the kids’ room around the corner of the living room. Inside, I’d built two bunk beds into the walls. “We’d tuck the kids in at the end of the day—”
“And our daughter would fight her brothers for the top bunk,” she added.
“She’d get her way, because she’s a princess.”
“Well, not too much of a princess,” Rose said wistfully. “We wouldn’t raise brats.”
“Never,” I whispered against her ear. Then I pulled her back into the living room, over the bookcase. “And then you’d pick out your favorite book, probably some trashy beach romance,” I chuckled.
“You’d turn on the fire,” she continued, “and we’d snuggle on the couch as I read it to you.”
“And I’d pretend to not like it, all the while cataloging all the things you loved about it for future reference.”
She spun in my arms, sliding her hands around my neck. “At the end of the night, you’d carry me into the bedroom and make love to me.”
“The whole fucking night,” I murmured. I rested my head against hers, taking a deep breath as I let the dream sink in. It was a really good dream, even if it would never come true. “We can still have part of that.”
I watched her lips tilt up in the corners. “Is that your way of asking me to cook for you?”
“Just for tonight.” My lips skimmed her, tasting the salt from her tears. She stepped away from me and went to the kitchen, pulling out something to cook. I took my seat at the counter, and for the rest of the night, we just pretended we were living the dream. In the morning, we’d wake up to reality.
