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Honorand I ended up in bed a short time later, and we fucked slowly and deeply and the orgasm that hit me was a slow build, like thunder in the distance, but when it struck me, it was all-consuming.
Afterward, we snuggled together, talking about this and that.
“Can you help me come up with some ideas of what I could do for work? I feel like I need a backup plan. Just in case.” I’d never really had one before. I’d just been so sure that this nanny job was going to work out, and for the past ten years, it had.
“You could always work at a daycare or a preschool. Or be a substitute teacher, if you wanted to keep working with kids.”
I thought about that. “I don’t know if I want to work with a bunch of kids, though. They might drive me nuts.”
“What about being an aide? You’d be in charge of one kid.”
That was an idea.
“Okay, how about jobs that aren’t kid-related?”
“There’re all kinds of things. You could even work for Mark. There’s plenty of things he needs done. I could help you look for personal assistant jobs.”
I could also work at the boutique, and Liam would give me a job at the coffeeshop in a heartbeat. There were options, and I felt good about having so many. Just in case.
“You’re so casual about it,” she said. “I stress out about the future constantly.”
“Babe, I pretend that the future isn’t happening so it doesn’t freak me out. That’s not the same thing.”
I told her how I’d ignore my own loneliness and fears about the future of my job by reading or heading to the beach or doing anything else.
“We both have our ways of coping with negative shit, and I don’t think either of us is great at it,” I said.
“You’re better, I think,” she said. My head was snuggled right on top of her breast, using it as a pillow. Her heartbeat bumped in my ear.
“Does thinking about our future stress you out?” I asked.
“What do you mean?”
I moved so I could see her face. “I know we just started dating, but I want to know what you see. For you and me.”
If I was going to tell her I loved her, I at least needed to be somewhat sure she was going to say it back. The worst thing imaginable would be if she didn’t say it back or said something like “thank you” and then got up and left and I never saw her again.
“I see,” she said, taking a breath and then smiling softly. “I see us going on vacation and arguing about what to pack. I see us having more beach days and snow days. I see us having breakfast together and hanging out with your friends and picking out paint colors and filling our bookshelves. It’s as if the minute I let myself, I could imagine so many things with you,” she said, almost in awe. “It’s like I flipped a switch and opened a whole new world when I let myself think of it with you.”
I couldn’t stop from kissing her.
“That’s exactly what I see,” I said, once I could breathe again. “I have something to tell you.”
Her eyes went wide with panic. “What?”
“I love you,” I said, my voice only shaking a little bit. “I know it’s soon and I know it’s probably too much, but I wanted you to know.”
Honor closed her eyes and then she started laughing.
This was not a reaction I was expecting, and I didn’t really know what to do with it.
“Fuck, you can’t scare me like that, babe,” she said, opening her eyes. “I thought you were going to tell me something terrible.”
“I mean, I hope it’s not terrible?” I said, starting to panic.
She pulled me down to kiss me again.
