Page 52 of Counting the Days

Danny:I promise that won’t happen until you are ready. No matter how perfectly horizontal the furniture might be

Rhea:Are you still here?

Danny:Yes

Rhea:Do you wanna come inside?

Danny:If you’re comfortable with that

Rhea opened the door as Danny was walking back up her fifty-two steps, and they immediately started making out again.They moved together into her room and fell onto her bed, kissing with the passion of abstinent high schoolers. All of Danny pressed against her body made her dizzy and weak. She reached down and started to unbutton his pants. He took hold of her hands and pressed them against the bed, pinning her down.

He whispered close to her ear, “I can’t let you do that. I just made you a promise.”

“But what if I just realized…I am ready?”

“Hmm…I think all this horizontal furniture is messing with your head.”

He kissed her hard and pressed his hands into her wrists. She felt like she was tied up in a gentle version of S & M, and that made her writhe with desire. He let go of her wrists and rolled off of her.

“Do you have any tea?” he asked.

“What?” Rhea said, trying to remember what tea was.

“Like herbal tea…I’d love to have some tea with you….”

“I don’t really drink herbal tea. I think I only have green tea.”

They went into her kitchen and found some old bags of peppermint tea, which might have already been in the cupboard when she moved in. They blew dust off the tea bags and dunked them into mugs of boiling water.

“This dire tea situation reminds me…. I need to install your garden, and maybe we should add some herbs.”

“You’renotstill giving me a garden—”

“Rhea…”

She started to protest again but relented, finally able to just shut up and accept his kindness.

As they finished their cappuccinos outside LACMA, Rhea wondered how date number five would end. How long could they keep making out and dry humping? Would she be able tocontinue abstaining? And what was therealreason she was still doing that? Her one-month rule did not actually make any sense; they had technically been dating forthree months,if she counted Zoe’s baby shower as their first date, and why shouldn’t she? They were her arbitrary, made-up rules. What was she so afraid of?

She’d developed the one-month rule to weed out bad men, but she’d known from date one that Danny Beckett was not a bad man. He had continuously proven himself to be the best man she had ever met, so what was holding her back? Rhea noticed a hummingbird flitting in a lavender bush; her mother was also wondering what was holding her back.

As Danny continued talking about a possible trip to Paris, Rhea realized how much she was genuinely enjoying this child-free existence—planning romantic vacations, strolling through museums, and savoring bowls of ramen in crowded, kid-unfriendly restaurants. She was looking ahead at a very different future than the one she had imagined, but different did not have to be bad.

An answer to the question of how their fifth date would end soon arrived in the form of a text from Ada:Ree Kee! Zoe’s baby girl has arrived! At Trinity. Tiny just got there. We’re heading there now

Rhea stood up suddenly and explained, “Oh, Zoe just had her baby—at Trinity—I should…do you mind taking me there?”

Danny paid for their cappuccinos and drove Rhea across town. She wanted Danny to come up and meet her friends, but the maternity ward felt like an intense location to introduce everyone. So, she kissed him goodbye, thanked him for a perfect date, and headed into the hospital alone. However, unlike many maternity ward visits in the past, Rhea did not feel alone. This time,she had a boyfriend. Although they had not used that exact word yet, they were behaving like a serious couple.

Rhea stopped at the gift shop, and instead of browsing onesies and stuffed animals with grievous longing, she was honestly enjoying picking out a gift for her friend’s new baby. Sure, she would never receive a onesie or a stuffed animal forhernew baby, but she would be too busy traveling the world with Danny to care about that.

She found a onesie that made her laugh. Printed on the front:A Star Is Born at Trinity Medical Center. She was fairly certain Zoe would love it and her husband would hate it, but she decided to let them argue over it. She purchased the onesie and headed toward the elevator with the energy of a woman in love with her new almost boyfriend.

At a nurse’s station, under a sign that readLabor and Delivery, Rhea was given Zoe’s room number.

The friendly nurse added, “We’re technically only allowed to let three visitors in at a time, but Zoe promised you’ll all be very quiet and well-behaved.”

Rhea wondered if the rules were bendier when your name happened to be Zoe Hornbrook and there was a Hornbrook Cancer Center inside the hospital in which you gave birth, but instead of asking if the bendiness was due to blatant nepotism, Rhea said, “I will personally ensure everyone follows those rules.”