Page 206 of ClickBack

“Then give me your hand from over there.”

I do. He holds it without trying to bring me closer.

“I know I love you,” I tell him. “I know I want you. That part has been very difficult to miss.”

“I’ve been helpful.”

A laugh escapes with something wetter behind it. He waits while I wipe beneath my eyes.

“I don’t think I’ve had all of it together before. A man I’m in love with who I would choose to spend an ordinary Wednesday with. Who I want to tell things to because I want to hear what he thinks.”

He looks down at our hands. When he comes back to me, there is no joke ready.

“You’re who I wanted to tell first when Cam called,” he says.

“I was standing there.”

“You could’ve been across town.”

I look at the television because I need somewhere to put that. The match has continued without us. Men move from one end of the field to the other while a commentator gets louder about something I will have to ask Jarrett to explain.

“I hated that you heard all that on Saturday,” I say.

“I wanted to be there.”

“I know. But I kept thinking about what you must be seeing. Me still getting upset over something that’s supposed to be over.”

“You told him it was over. He was the one having trouble with it.”

I look down at our hands. “I thought I’d feel embarrassed with you afterward.”

“Did you?”

“No. We went to dinner. You let me talk when I needed to, and then you made me laugh.”

“You laughed at me.”

“You practiced the menu.”

“I knew you’d ask.”

I smile. He squeezes my hand and returns the smile without trying to get me past the rest of what I’m feeling.

I move my feet out of his lap and sit beside him. His arm comes around me before I have settled.

“I feel safe telling you things,” I say. “Even when I don’t know what you’ll say.”

He rests his head back against the sofa. I wait. He has listened to enough of my searching for words to be allowed some of his own.

“That means a lot,” he says finally.

I put my hand against his chest. “It does to me, too.”

He looks down at me and kisses me, firmly enough that I stop trying to see his face. I want him. Even with my eyes wet, even while I am telling him something that has very little to do with sex, I want him. That doesn’t make the rest less true.

When he lets me go, I stay close.

“We’re going to miss a lot of Wednesdays,” I say.