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We collapsed together, his spent cock sliding out of me as I pulled the sheets up and over our shoulders but didn’t move from being curled beside him. With his arm draped over my chest and settled over my breast, I fell almost instantly into a deep, peaceful sleep.
The shift of the bed as Kieran sat down on my side woke me up, and I rubbed my eyes blearily as I tried to focus on him. It was barely dawn, and he looked like he hadn’t really slept, bags under his eyes and a pensive look on his face. I sat up, fear creeping through my heart. Something was wrong.
“What is it?” I asked, eschewing all pretense. “What’s going on?”
“I didn’t want to tell you until now because I wanted to enjoy our time without the scepter of this hanging over us,” he said.
“Oh God, what is it?” I asked, the fog of sleep having completely disappeared and replaced with a creeping horror. My mind was coming up with all kinds of things that could be wrong and flashing at a rapid pace, even when some of them didn’t make any sense.
“I got a promotion,” he said.
“What?” I asked. Of all the confusing things my brain jumped to, that was certainly not among them. “A promotion is great! Why wouldn’t you tell me that? Why would you scare me that way?”
“It means I have to go to training. For six weeks,” he said, his eyes slowly traveling to meet mine.
A deep sadness settled over me as the reality of what he was saying solidified in my mind. He was going to go away. And he didn’t know if we would survive it.
“Oh,” I said. “I mean, I hate that you will be gone, but we’ll be okay. We have phones. We can video call.”
“It won’t be the same,” he said, hanging his head again. “You’ll be here alone. For weeks.”
“So, I’ll go back to how I was before I met you,” I said, trying to grin through the pain. “We’ll be fine. You’ll be back.”
I didn’t know if I was trying to convince him or myself.
He nodded, the corner of his lips curling up ever so slightly.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before,” he said. “I know it’s shitty to just drop this on you.”
I waved him off. “No, don’t apologize. I get it. We’re new. This is new. You didn’t want to rock the boat, I get it. I wish I had known, but I understand.” I paused, taking a breath. “But what we have is special. At least to me.”
“Me too,” he said.
“Good,” I said. “Good. Then you agree, it’s worth getting through a few weeks of video calls. Right?”
“It is for me.”
“Me too.”
“I have to go today,” he said. “I have to be at the station at noon, and then I head up to Nashville. Then the retreat is intense. I won’t have much time to talk until I’m in bed, and then I’ll get an average of only a couple hours a night. I might not be able to call until like three in the morning sometimes.”
“I’ll wake up,” I said. “Call me anyway. It’ll be okay. We can make this work.”
“You won’t move on without me?”
He had to be joking, but his eyes were pleading. Serious.
“No, I’ll be right here, waiting for you.”
I meant that. I just wondered if he would be coming back at all.
Or if when he did, he was going to still want me.
24
KIERAN
It was early, and though I wanted to spend every moment I could with Sofia, the fact was that I hadn’t packed anything. I was going to have to get everything I could together and try to get a little sleep before I headed into the station at noon. God knew I didn’t get any sleep the night before, and it wasn’t for one of the fun reasons I usually didn’t get sleep when I spent the night with Sofia.
Tossing and turning all night, I felt like I just couldn’t relax. The tension was unbearable as I watched the clock tick away and knew that I had to tell her. I had waited too long, and now it was going to be awkward and sudden and dramatic. But she took it well, or at least better than I had handled it and assumed she would, and I went back to my place feeling like things might just be okay.
It was only six thirty when I walked through my door, and I tossed the suitcase on the bed.
By eight, I was fully packed and had my bags by the door. I debated making something to eat but decided on sleeping instead. I could always grab fast food on the way out of town.
I lay down in the bed and immediately realized it just wasn’t comfortable anymore without Sofia there. We had spent so much time sleeping together in each other’s beds that it just felt massive and lonely without her. Still, I had to try. I pulled a pillow to my chest and clenched it as I shoved my head between two others to block out the light coming in from the window. Eventually, I fell asleep.
