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Green carnation, Austrian rose, peach blossom, a kumquat tree, and a single red rose.
Gay.Thou art all that is lovely.This heart is thine.Luck and prosperity, and a laugh at the kum-quick-tree memory.
Andeternal love.
That was the night I’d asked him to move in with me. We’d talked about it, we’d joked about it. But I wanted to make it happen. I wanted to spend my life with him, so living together was a good place to start.
His lease would be up in two months, so he’d opted not to renew it. I’d given notice on my unit, and together we’d found this gorgeous two-bedroom apartment.
I hung the five frames along the entry wall so they’d be in full view of the kitchen and living room.
Keats came out, stretching his back and dusting his hands off. “All your work stuff is in the spare room,” he said. He wiped his forehead with the back of his hand as he noticed the frames up already. He grinned at me. “Perfect.”
“They really are.”
“Yes,” Cory said flatly. “You set the bar ridiculously high for the rest of us, Keats. You need to stop it.”
Amon chuckled, giving Cory a bit of a jostle. “Do you not get spoiled enough?”
Cory looked up at him, his cheeks pink. “Never enough.”
Amon gave him a look, and I was sure if we weren’t there, he’d have kissed him. Amon was the quiet, private type, even though Cory told me he was very different when they were alone. I saw glimpses of that side of him every now and then, and he was relaxing around us more and more.
I really did like Amon, he was perfect for Cory, and I had to wonder how long it would be until they were moving in together.
Soon, hopefully.
“You know what?” Keats said. “I say we leave the other boxes for now. Let’s order some pizza and sit down. We can tackle the rest tomorrow.” He smiled at me. “We have forever.”
My heart did that silly little skip it did when he said stuff like that. “We do.”
He slid some boxes from the dining table to the floor and stretched his back. “I’m not cut out for removalist work. My poor body.”
“I’ll give you a massage later,” I said.
Keats ordered some pizza from a wood-fire place down the block, and the four of us sat in our new place, surrounded by boxes and smiles... until the intercom buzzed.
New apartment, new intercoms, new everything, it was exciting, if not exhausting. I pressed the button. “Hello?”
“Delivery for McCulloch and Acres.”
Keats McCulloch and Linden Acres.
I grinned at him, hearing our names together like that... “Are we expecting anything?”
“Oh, shit,” he said, shoving the pizza crust in his mouth and standing up. “Let them up.”
I buzzed them through. “Did you order something?”
“Ah, yeah. Maybe. When we got the move-in date. And then I forgot about it.”
He went to the door, and a second later, a man wearing blue overalls pushed a rather large sized box in on a trundle trolley. I saw the word IKEA first, then the diagram on the side of the box.
It was the cat climbing house.
“Keats,” I whispered.
He’d signed for the delivery and saw the delivery guy out while I stood there looking at it. “For real?”
