There’s Pumpkin About You

by Athena Carstairs

I thought that giving up my choices was the same as compromising.

“Do I make you nervous, sweetheart?” His lips press against each other, as if taking a second to see if he likes the taste the new nickname leaves on his tongue. My own form a gap when I let out yet another short breath, my lungs desperately searching for any kind of oxygen in the room. “Do I?” he repeats. “I…” I gulp. “I’m not sure.” The edge of his lips twitch, but he keeps his smile in check. “Good enough for me.”

“Why me?” Bash smiled warmly. “With any guys you dated, did you never get that feeling? That intense need to hide all the things that made you insecure so that he’d see only the best in you?” “No? I was just myself.” He looked at the ground as he softly chuckled to himself. His hands slipped from my shoulders. “Then you’ve never been in love.”

“Not true,” he argues. “Oh, really? Tell me one thing so far that has worked in your favor. You’re still behind on the harvest and the paperwork and you have an incomplete barn. What the hell could you have gained?” “I gained you, idiot.”

I don’t feel that I have to try really hard to please him because he just easily accepts all the parts of myself and I, him.

A smirk stretches my lips as I lean down towards her, letting my nose kiss hers. “Sweetheart?” “Yes?” she whispers. I move my lips to her ear, “I need you to come home with me.”

“I brought us right where we need to be.” In one swift move, his t-shirt is gone. “I was taught that you always eat at the table.”

“Would it be bad if I wanted you to put the boots back on after I take these jeans off of you?”

“Oh, sweetheart, I really hope you didn’t think I was done with you.” “You’re not?” “Fuck, no.” He begins carrying me to his bedroom. “I’m a growing boy, Wren. When it comes to you nothing more than three meals minimum will fill me up.”