Out on a Limb

by Hannah Bonam-Young

neither of us moves. If anything, Bo holds me tighter against him.

“To thank you for everything.”

And out of the many, many smiles he’s given me, this one is different. There’s something unmistakeably hesitant about it, but mostly, it’s the hopefulness amidst it all that strikes me.

“I’d do it all over again to be at that party,” he says. “To meet you. To get Gus.”

“You’d have gotten yourself out eventually, Win.” He presses the corner of his mouth to my wrist, releasing a trembling breath against it.

“You can do anything,” he whispers against my pulse point. And the way he says anything is as if he really means any possible thing. And I believe him. I truly do.

“You two walked in, and Bo looked toward the table where we set everything up. Then he checked in with you. A tilt of his head and a sweet little smile, then you nodded. He was getting permission to walk over there. That’s the look of a man on someone’s leash. Pussy-whipped!”

Sarah’s eyes narrow on me in suspicion. “You do give great hugs,” she whispers. “But not that good.”

“No!” I say, panic-stricken. “No, no, no—” But it’s too late. Sarah is up from her seat, slapping the desk with both palms like a drum.

“No!” She flicks the side of my head, and I swat her away. “Just speak!”

I can’t live with the thought that he might wish I was her. That I was just the available option.”

The worst-case scenario is not having found out what being with Bo could be like.

“I love Bo.”

“Maybe you could tell Bo how you feel on his birthday? Tie a bow around your tits and let him unwrap you. You must be dying to fog up those glasses of his.” And she’s back.

“Obviously! Bo’s one of us now. I can’t be caught slacking on a birthday.”

In the kitchen is the most gorgeous man I’ve ever seen… and his son. Holy mother of—No, actually. Holy father of Bo.

If this is a sneak preview of what Bo will look like in thirty-ish years, then I better get to work locking that shit down.

I don’t miss Bo’s crooked smirk when I offer his father the nickname that, until very recently, I was not fond of. I don’t miss, either, the warm affection in Robert’s eyes as they land on my stomach.

“He also speaks of you very, very well…”

his eyes held on mine and teasing just like his son’s. “Seems you’re both taking a slower pace.”

“maybe because I’m not making my pregnant—” He stops and tenses, then with a quick shake of his head, starts again.

Fuck me, those glasses.

When I move away, his eyes follow me, dropping down to admire the hollow space between my breasts. He bites his lip and shuffles up the mattress, sitting straighter against the headboard.

“How do we stop ourselves from just buying all of this?” Bo asks, plucking my phone out of my hand. “Look at this bear! Gus needs this bear.” He taps add to wish list.

“Do you want to feel?” I ask. “Can I?” He immediately sits up, his blankets thrown away.

After a minute of waiting silently, I remove my hand from his, but he doesn’t follow. “I think maybe they’re done for now. I’m sorry.” “One more minute?” he asks, his voice awfully small. “Just in case…”

“Holy shit… Hi! Hey there!” he yells to my stomach.

“I kind of forget how wild this all is. What your body is doing. What you are doing. It’s amazing…”

“I do,” Bo answers, his voice far more earnest than my little jest was. “I don’t take it for granted, Win. I feel very honoured to get to do this with you.”

“Your friendship means a lot to me, Win,” he breathes out. “You mean a lot to me.”

And so he holds me. His thumb moves in slow circles, as if he’s in no hurry. As if he has zero expectations for more.

Bo holds every door open between the parking garage and the clinic.

I turn over my shoulder and see Bo smiling broadly. “After you, wife.” He extends his arm out toward the waiting room.

Bo’s face lights up as he pouts his lips in an effort to not smirk, nodding like a bobblehead. “Oh, really?”

“So we would have dated, huh?”

“With those saxophone moves? Of course,” I say, flipping the attention back onto him. It doesn’t work. Bo’s smiling brighter than the damned sun, and it’s fucking contagious.

“Hey,” I say, capturing his attention. “It’s okay,” I reassure him, smiling. “I’m sure everything is fine.” “That’s supposed to be my line,” he says with a weak, crooked grin.

“There they are,” Bo says, breathing out a sigh of relief. I reach out to him blindly, refusing to take my eyes off the screen, and he wraps my smaller hand with both of his.

“You’re perfect, Win,” Bo says, as easily as breathing. “Of course I’d want them to have every part of you.”

“So I’ll see you tomorrow? For my, uh—” He hesitates, looking up at the ceiling as if he can’t believe he has to say this next part out loud. “For my birthday?”

“I’ll be home when you get back.” And so will six other people. “Promise?” he asks, far too quickly for it to have been intentional. My brows knit together as I nod. “Yeah, of course…” “Okay,” he says, smiling weakly, his eyes still on the floor.

Caleb, I swear to god if you eat another pinwheel before Bo gets here, I’ll give you and Win matching fingers,” Sarah says, setting a pitcher of lemonade on the table.

He shakes his head, smiling broadly as he beelines across the room toward me, dodging furniture and people in his path. Without warning, Bo picks me up off the ground and into his arms, crushing me against him in a tight hug as my feet dangle underneath me. “I’m so glad you’re here,” he whispers, his mouth tilted into the crook of my neck.

“I missed you,” he says, lowering me back to stand on my own two feet.

Sarah challenged Walter to a lip-sync battle and got her ass handed to her with a vote of six to one. Caleb, of course, voted with his heart.

“I’m very lucky,” Bo says softly—eyes held on mine. I blush, but the dimly lit room is hopefully dark enough to disguise it well.

To not have history repeat itself. But now? Now is different. I think he needs you.”

“Hey,” he says gently, his neck turned as far as he can over his shoulder. “What’s going on?” “Nothing,” I answer, my voice muffled by his sweater. “I just needed to hug you.”

Instead, I crawl over top of him, straddling his hips and burrowing my face into his chest. “Win…” Bo says as his large hands spread across my shoulders, rubbing up and down my back. “Talk to me, honey. What’s going on? Did something happen?”

I go to move to the mattress next to him, but he pulls me back onto his lap with his hands on my hips. With our faces just a few inches apart, Bo moves his hand to my neck, his thumb tracing my jaw tenderly next to my ear as his eyes delicately track the pattern.