Page 147 of Hushed

“Why would you want me?”

“Because I can’t think of my future without you in it. Because…I want to have a family with you. Like a real one with kids and a house and a lawn and animals.”

I scoop him up bridal style and deposit him on the couch. “Don’t say that. There’s no way you can forgive me. I’m so sorry, Bastien. All the things I said…”

“Shhhh. Oublié.” He passes one hand over his forehead. “Forgotten.”

“Not that.” The words come slow. “I raised my hand to you, Bastien. To your face. I don’t care that it was play-acting. I raised my hand to you.”

“You scared me,” he says after a brief hesitation. “When you started talking to me like that, I thought, at first, that this is what you really think of me. And then you raised your hand, and I thought, ah — this is a bit.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“But seriously, Minou. ‘Take my belt to you’?” He almost smiles. “You were doing it up a little brown, there.”

“Doing it up — say again? Who says that? What does that even mean?”

“It means you were laying it on thick. Way over the top.” He warms to it. “To whom, pray tell? The deaf people in the back row? It was like watching a bad silent film.”

I feel my cheeks redden. This is what he was chewing on while I gave that ridiculous speech. My hammy acting skills.

“Hey. You try improvising your way through something that important.” I put my hand back against his cheek, where it belongs. “I would never do that to you.”

“I know.” He turns his face into my palm. “I trust you.”

“I took off my wedding ring,” I say. I can’t control my tears as the anguish bubbles up.

“Well, you’re not doing that again, you hear me? Not ever. I put that ring on your finger, and by God, if you take it off, there will be war.” He reaches into the pocket of his vest and pulls out my wedding ring and his great-grandfather’s medallion. He thrusts them at me and I can’t explain the relief I feel when the ring goes back on my finger.

I get him some frozen peas for his ankle. “We should probably start treating this place like our home.” I sit on the couch and take off my boots before tossing them in the direction of the front door. “We really need a shoe rack there.” I sigh, looking at his shattered glasses. “I’m so sorry. I’ll buy you new ones. I liked them so much.”

“I don’t care about the glasses. Please don’t ever scare me like this.”

I pull him back against me. “What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know. I’ll look into a counseling license. I have the tuition money if I need to take classes.” He stops. “Thanks to you.”

“Fuck. How did you find out so fast?”

“My phone pinged me with the deposit and I looked it up. You were probably still in the hallway.”

“Goddamnit, I was so close to getting away with it.”

“Please. You hadn’t even left the room when your lies started to unravel. I wish you were there for it. It was chaos. It was glorious.”

I laugh. He smiles. I put his legs on my lap. “I love you, Bastien. I’m sorry. For all of this.”

“I’m sorry, too. I said some things yesterday that were cruel. Really cruel.”

“I don’t care. You were frustrated and scared.”

“No.” He catches my wrist before I can wave it off. “I love that you’ll give me a free pass. But if I take it, it stays in the room with us, and I don’t want it in here.” He’s quiet a second. “You are not asking too much of me. You never were. You were asking me to be your partner, and the truth is that I don’t know how. I thought I did, but every—”

He stops and takes a deep breath, tracing a circle on the inside of my wrist. “The men before you, it wasn’t a team. We met up at the end of the day and congratulated each other for surviving the day separately. That’s the only way I knew how to do it, and then you turned up and you want to actually carry things together and…” his jaw works. “And it scares me. Not a little.”

I shuffle the peas on his ankle and put another couch pillow on my lap to get it a little more elevated. “It’s a big ask. I shouldn’t have sprung it on you.”

“No, it’s not. Kitten, it’s the basic ask. It’s the most basic ask. You come first. Before anyone or anything. That’s the thing I signed up for when I said my vows, and I keep—” He looks away. “You always look like you know what you’re doing. I’m afraid of the day you work out that I don’t. That I’m petty and selfish and the only thing I’ve got right is you.”