Page 50 of Without You

“Wow. So… he’s going to be here?”

“He is.”

“Will I get to know who it is after he arrives?”

“Yeah. Wondered if you wanted to have dinner with us. Think he’ll be here for the evening and honestly, I’m sick of not being around you. If it works, I’d like to have you there.”

I sit up so I’m on my knees facing Brody. Sabrina is still nuzzled next to his chest. He messes with her ear like he didn’t just ask me to have dinner with some country music star. “No way. You’ve seen me eat! I’d make a fool of myself.”

He rests his hand on my thigh and rubs his thumb back and forth. “First of all, that’s not even possible. Second of all, who cares? You think they’re not human like the rest of us? This guy? He’s nothing special. Sure, he has a lot of money and has a really good singing voice, but that doesn’t mean he’s any better than you or me.”

“Brody, you can’t be serious.”

“I can be and I am. Trust me, okay?”

“You really want me there?” I question him.

“Of course. I told you earlier that the last several weeks have been crazy and it was a good kind of crazy. But I missed you. I want to share that with you. I want to share everything with you.”

I lay my hand on top of his and he immediately flips his over, linking our fingers together.

“We haven’t even gone on a date,” I remind him even though we both know we’re together. I just wonder if inviting me to an important dinner is jumping the gun a bit.

“I know. And soon we’ll remedy that. You’re mine, just like I’m yours, even if the path to that has been pretty backward up until now. I like you. I want to date you. I want to do a lot more with you, I’ve told you that. We established that already.”

“We have. You’re right. I’m being silly because I’m so damn tired and I missed you, too. I hate that we haven’t spent any time together lately. It sucks.”

“It does. I wasn’t sure what to expect with this first customization but now that I know, I promise I’ll do better about making time for us, too.”

“B, it was me, too. I’ve been so busy and not prioritizing well.”

“Let’s stop the blame on ourselves. Right now, I want to sleep with you. Sleep. That’s it. Because the longer I lie here the more tired I become. I just want you to understand that we might be doing things completely out of order but I don’t care. I just want to see where it’s going and having you with me for this dinner would mean a lot to me.”

Well, there’s no other way to reply to that other than, “I think I can handle that.”

“Good. Now. Get down here. Sleep. Tomorrow we’ll tackle the crap we don’t feel like tackling but it will be better because we’re finally together. Then we’ll make a plan so that I don’t have to go five weeks without seeing you because that was stupid.”

I curl up next to him, my knee bent and draped over his leg, my hand resting on his chest, one of his arms wrapped around me, keeping me close. “Sounds perfect.”

“Night, Katie.”

“Night, Brody.”

If someone would have told me six months ago that I would be lying here with Brody, falling asleep, I would have laughed in their face.

Life is certainly strange sometimes.

---