Page 140 of Trouble from Abroad
It hits me sometimes, out of nowhere, how much of me belongs here now. With them. And then the clock in my head starts ticking again.
Pres announced Zaha’s coming next Saturday with her design plans for the rest of the house. He told Lily she doesn’t have to change her room if she doesn’t want to, but of course, she jumped at the chance. He offered to redesign our room from scratch, so it has more of me in it.
“Can I have a slide from my bed to the desk?” Lily asks.
Preston scratches his head once. “Let’s run it by Zaha.” Then he turns to me. “Go crazy with your research, bring your ideas too.”
“Pres,” I laugh, “we don’t even know for sure?—”
He cuts me off. “You said you trusted me, didn’t you?”
“I do.”
He smiles, gaze tracing my mouth as if committing it to memory. “God, I love those words coming out of your mouth. Say it again.”
“You’re insufferable.” I laugh again into his joke.
“Still waiting,” he whispers, kissing my tattooed wrist.
I say it again. “I do.” Quietly.
Somewhere along decorating plans and bedtime giggles, practical life still happens. School sent new emergency contact forms home. When Lily handed them to me, I froze halfway through the second page, where Pres had already written my name in his handwriting.
Mia Thorne: guardian.
My hand shook so much I nearly botched the signature. But he was there, steadying me without a word, just his presence.
Then there’s work—or the lack of it. I’ve started applying for remote gigs. Nothing glamorous, but enough to remind me I’m still me, and I have a life while Lily’s at school. When I called to tell Pres I got my first interview, he came back home and popped a Nosecco.
The scrapbook’s running out of pages, the hallway twine can’t hold another photo, and Lily’s drawing still rules the fridge. Every inch of this place feels alive with what we made of it. Maybe that’s why the silence hits so loud when I remember it’s all on borrowed time.
He doesn’t know I still wake up sometimes, counting weeks.
Less than three left on my visa. Sixteen days, if I stop rounding up to fool my nerves.
Joy shouldn’t come with an expiration date, but mine’s stamped and ticking.
I’m still awake when he rolls over, tucks me close, murmurs against my neck, “Don’t slip away from me. You said you trust me.”
“I do,” I whisper, trying not to tremble.
“Then let me handle this. We’ll move to London if we have to. Nothing’s going to tear us apart.”
“Pres, you can’t just uproot?—”
His arm bands tighter around my waist. “Trust. Me.”
His heartbeat’s steady against my back, mine isn’t. I turn so he can see my face when I say his favorite words again. “I do.”
He smiles—the kind that could sell ice to Eskimos. “I won’t let you down.”
Air rushes from my lungs. No one’s ever said that to me and meant it. Not my parents. Not anyone. And again, I trust him.
He doesn’t elaborate, and I don’t press.
Maybe that’s trust. Not asking for the footnotes.
Tomorrow’s Friday. Lily’s got a sleepover with Callie and April, which means one glorious thing: we’ve got the house to ourselves.
