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Goddammit. I hate how much I don’t hate her.
“Don’t look at me!” I cry, swiping at my cheeks. “I’ll cry if I want to!” Olivia’s the first to throw her arms around me, and everyone else follows. Suddenly, the nine of us are huddled together, sobbing at a first birthday party. Nothing else could possibly go wrong.
“If you move out . . . You can’t, because . . . Because I-I-I . . . I can’t save you if you’re not here with me.”
Is this what it’s supposed to feel like? Being part of a family built from the ground up, where people choose you day in and day out? Because one moment I’m standing here, and the next I’m being held up by nine people who don’t have to support me but are choosing to anyway. And it’s a staggering, powerful feeling I’m terrified to lose.
broken heart and healed it without consciously doing it.
“Please, Jaxon! It’s one of the greatest romantic comedies of all time!” His face twists in disgust. “She’s the Man? She’s the Man is one of the greatest romantic comedies of all time?” “I said what I said.”
It’s a routine I’ve spent years fine-tuning, and it’s not just hair. It’s a part of me, and Jaxon . . . he’s making it a part of him now too.
He sighs. “Just that Ryne is a piece of shit. An agreeable version of you who sits quietly by, blending in instead of standing out, isn’t my Lennon.” My heart pounds at that simple two-letter word. “I thought you liked quiet.” “Before you, maybe.” “And now?” “Now I like loud.”
“Mmm. Don’t know if I like you in your shorts more, or my pants. One screams easy access.” My throat dries. “And the other?” Playful eyes coast to mine, a lazy, arrogant smile pulling up on one side. “The other screams mine.”
“You think I’m turned off by a little blood, honey?” I point at him, and I hate that it’s the dildo hand I do it with. “Don’t do that. Not the honey. You know what it does to me.” “Turns you on. That’s good. I’m always turned on by you.” He wraps his hand around mine until my dildo is gripped tightly by both of us. “Period or no period, Lennon. I’m always fucking turned on by you.”
“My mouthy girl. Always begging to be fucked when you talk like that, huh?”
“I’m a mess,” I sputter, face falling forward as pressure coils low in my belly. “You’re a goddamn masterpiece.”
Never been a jealous man, but honey, you got me all kinds of possessive. This pussy is mine. This ass is mine. These perfect tits. This fucking mouth? Fucking mine, honey. And I’m not fucking sharing.” He pulls his fingers from my clit, bracketing my jaw as he brings my gaze to his. “Got it?” “Got it.”
And then you wake up one sunny morning in April on your twenty-seventh birthday to a note on your pillow. Happy birthday, honey. Don’t make a big deal of it. And when you find the telescope you’ve been asking for waiting for you beneath your bedroom window, you don’t even try to stop the tears from coming.
One thing about me: I’m always prepared for a face full of dick.
“We still have to do Buckaroo Mitts! He’s the biggest, baddest cowboy in the Wild West!”
outraged—“if I’d known you were doing a fashion show, I woulda got his tux steamed!” “Mittens has a tux?” He scoffs, a look of utter disgust on his face. “Every respectable cat dad has a tux for their son, Lennon. Please. You insult me.”
these there too?” I run my fingers over the little charms. A cat, a camera, a hockey stick, the number 69, mountains, stars, and— “Your onion goggles.” He gestures haphazardly at the swimming goggles charm, then at the yellow slice of pie. “Mimi’s famous key lime pie.”
And there, above it all, dazzling ribbons of green, orange, pink, and purple dance through the deep blue sky, thousands upon thousands of stars singing as the Northern Lights illuminate my world.
“Maybe they’re dancing just for you tonight. For your birthday.”
“You’re my line.” “What?” “The line that marks my before and after. I met you during the worst time in my life, and everything that’s come since you has been so much better. This, Jaxon?” I gesture at a sky I’ve been dreaming of seeing in person for as long as I can remember. That’s when I notice the blanket laid out by the shore, the pillows, a bag of takeout, a pile of warm clothes, and my brand-new telescope, set up and pointing at the stars. I sniffle, tears dripping down my cheeks. “This is my favorite day, and it’s because of you.”
“My gran once told me that we become stars when we die. That the people we love and lose are set free in the sky, where no one can dull their light.” He swallows. “And they shine bright so . . . so we know they’re still with us. That they’re looking over us.”
“That’s Sirius, the brightest star in the sky. When you’re looking for Bryce in the stars, look there. He’ll light even the darkest nights.”
“Yeah. I like your curls down, the way they frame your face. They move when you laugh, and it makes me smile.
If there’s only one thing in this apartment that makes it feel like home, it’s Lennon.
Ok ok, Mittens & Jaxon are the real love story but is anyone else hoping Jaxon & Lennon get together? OMG Jaxon is SO in love with Lennon!!! Look at the way he looks at her!!! I’d simply die if anyone looked at me the way Jaxon looks at Lennon. Watching these two fall in love in real time is the single greatest highlight of my year so far. Came for the cat, stayed for the roommates to lovers storyline.
sigh. “Like Adam, and Rosie, and Connor too.” “Yeah? How’s that?” “Warm and safe. Like sunshine in a hug.”
Her breath fans across my neck. “And the lights? The stars?” “You deserve to have the things you love most at the tips of your fingers, honey.” My gaze follows hers, watching the stars dance around us. “This is for the cloudy days. The rainy days and the cold days. The lazy days better spent in bed, and the days I keep you there, if you’ll let me.”
But I don’t want to fall alone. I want her to fall with me.
And, honey? I like me a whole lot better with you here too.”
don’t know if I liked being alone before you, but it was comfortable. I got used to the quiet. Felt like I belonged in it. But now, without you . . . I fucking hate the silence, Lennon.”
“You’re gonna fuck me like you’ve missed me for a week because you were too scared to talk to me. Groveling will bode well for you, honey.”
“Fuck, honey.” I press my forehead to hers as we fight to breathe. “Who made you so beautiful?”
“Wanna watch it drip out of you, then push it back inside, so you’re always full of me. And then I’ll lick you clean, and when I’m done and you ask to taste yourself on my tongue, I’ll say yes, because no is the last thing I’d ever say to you. So please, honey. Let me come in your pussy.”
“The best thing I’ve ever gifted to myself is, by far, the way I feel with you in my arms.”
How lucky am I that of all the fingers she could have her own twined so tenderly through, she’s chosen mine?
Maybe this really is it. Maybe this is my line, where everything is better than it was before. Maybe this really can be where I make my home. Maybe I can finally let myself be happy.
“I’ll wait, Jaxon. I don’t care how long. Because this? This is a once-in-a-lifetime feeling. You’re a once-in-a-lifetime find. I’m not walking away.”
One moment, I’m sitting here, Carter’s hand on my back as I crack myself wide open, spill everything I’ve been holding on to for way too many years. And then I’m on my feet, wrapped up in the middle of four men who wind their arms around me, holding me tight while I let it go.
For the first time in my life, I don’t have to hold myself up. And nothing has ever wanted to make me fall to my knees more.
“At the end of the day, the only person you need to be enough for is you. But for what it’s worth, you’ve always been enough for us too.”
That I wanna be the one who drives you out to the middle of nowhere at midnight just to fucking stare at you while you stare at the stars, because somehow, in this whole huge world, I got lucky enough to find you, not once, but twice?
“Here it is, honey. I love you. I am so goddamn, mind-blowingly in love with you, and the thought of losing you is killing me. I don’t want you to go. This place only feels like a home when you’re here.” I whisper my final plea. “Please, honey. Please stay.”
“There is no one alive who could love me better than you do, Jaxon. You love me the way I always dreamed of being loved. The way I deserve to be loved. And I’m going to love you the way you deserve to be loved.”
“Thank you for falling with me. I don’t think I could’ve survived falling alone.”
Kissing Lennon is like that first sip of coffee on a cold winter morning. She’s everything warm and rich, this cozy feeling that sinks into your bones, settles all your racing thoughts.
“It’s . . . it’s . . .” “An observatory,” he whispers, chest against my back as he winds his arms around me. “So you can watch the stars every single night.”
“Hey, Ryne? On your honeymoon, I fucked the ring right off your fiancée. Fucked her the way she deserved to be fucked. Best night of my life at the time, but it just keeps getting better. I’m gonna fuck her the way she deserves to be fucked for the rest of my life. I’m gonna love her that way too.”
“Life’s been beautiful since you walked into it, Lennon. Doesn’t matter what it looks like, because through it all, I’m only gonna be looking at you.”
“Do you know what I feel when I look at the stars? I feel love. I feel at peace. I feel at home, honey. That’s what I found in the stars. I found my home.”
