Chapter Six: Six Weeks
1240 Words
At eight fifteen, Gavin pulled up outside my building.
He was late, but he brought daisies.
I had mentioned once that they were my favorite. It had been months ago, during one of those conversations that seemed insignificant until someone remembered a detail no one else ever had.
I climbed into the truck and accepted them.
“Are these an apology?”
“Do I need one?”
“You’re fifteen minutes late.”
“I’m a firefighter, Harper. Sometimes people inconveniently need rescuing.”
I tried not to smile.
“You could have texted.”
“I was driving here.”
“That excuse only covers the last twenty minutes.”
He leaned across the console and kissed me.
It was brief, warm, and familiar enough to dissolve some of the tension I had carried since leaving the station.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “Better?”
“Maybe.”
“I’ll take maybe.”
He drove with one hand resting on my knee, occasionally brushing his thumb against my skin. We didn’t talk about Cole. We didn’t talk about the photographs or the children.
For one night, I was grateful.
I was tired of every moment between us becoming a trial in which I had to decide whether I believed him.
The apartment building sat on a quiet street lined with old trees and parked cars. It wasn’t luxurious, but the brick façade was clean, and small balconies overlooked the sidewalk.
Gavin watched my expression.
“What do you think?”
“You brought me to an apartment building.”
“Very observant.”
“Why?”
He smiled and reached into his pocket.
A key rested in his palm.
My heart started beating faster.
“The manager gave me permission to see the unit again.”
“Again?”
“I toured it yesterday.”
I stared at him. “Without telling me?”
“I wanted to make sure it wasn’t terrible before I brought you.”
The apartment was on the third floor. Gavin unlocked the door and stepped aside so I could enter first.
The rooms were empty, but they didn’t feel cold.
Pale walls. Wooden floors. A narrow kitchen with a window above the sink. There was enough space beside it for a little table and two chairs.
I walked farther inside.
“Is this the apartment from the photograph?”
“Yes.”
I looked over my shoulder at him.
“You were really considering it.”
“I told you I was.”
I had wanted proof.
Now I was standing inside it.
I entered the bedroom and opened the closet. It was smaller than I expected, but I could already imagine my clothes hanging beside his.
“This won’t be enough.”
“For what?”
“My things.”
Gavin leaned against the doorway.
“You own seven pairs of shoes.”
“How do you know that?”
“I counted.”
“You counted my shoes?”
“You left me alone in your apartment while you showered.”
“That’s disturbing.”
“You also have twelve coffee mugs and only two matching plates.”
“The mugs have sentimental value.”
“One says World’s Best Grandma.”
“I bought it at a thrift store.”
“That somehow makes it worse.”
I laughed.
The sound echoed through the empty room.
Gavin smiled at me, and for a few minutes everything felt easy again.
No firehouse.
No wife.
No unknown number sending photographs.
Just an apartment and the man I loved standing in its doorway.
I moved toward the window.
“When would it be available?”
“The beginning of next month.”
“That soon?”
“If I apply this week.”
My excitement dimmed slightly.
“If?”
“I want it, Harper.”
“But?”
He came to stand behind me.
“But I have children. I can’t walk into the house tomorrow, announce I’m leaving, and expect them to understand.”
I watched our reflections in the dark glass.
“I know.”
“I should have told you about them sooner.”
“Yes.”
“I thought you’d see them as proof that I could never leave.”
“Are they?”
“No.”
His answer was immediate.
I turned to face him.
“They are the reason I need to do this carefully,” he continued. “Not the reason I’m staying.”
“How carefully?”
Gavin was silent for a moment.
Then he took both my hands.
“Give me six weeks.”
“Six weeks for what?”
“To talk to Natalie, find a way to explain the separation to the kids, and move out without making them feel like I abandoned them.”
Six weeks.
It was longer than I wanted.
But it was a date.
A real period of time instead of another vague promise.
“And after that?”
“I submit the application.”
“What if someone rents it first?”
“Then we find another one.”
We.
The word wrapped around everything inside me that still felt uncertain.
“You really want to live with me?”
“I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.”
I lowered my gaze to our joined hands.
“Cole thinks I’m an idiot.”
“Cole thinks everyone who doesn’t make the same choices he would is an idiot.”
“He also thinks I don’t care about your wife.”
Gavin sighed.
“Do you?”
The question surprised me.
“I don’t want to hurt her.”
“But you want me to leave.”
“Yes.”
“Both things can be true.”
Could they?
I wanted to believe so.
“I’m not proud of how this started,” I admitted.
“Neither am I.”
“But you don’t regret me?”
His expression softened.
“Never.”
Gavin reached into his pocket and placed the key in my hand.
I looked down at it.
“I thought it belonged to the manager.”
“It does. You can hold it until we leave.”
“That isn’t very romantic.”
“It’s symbolic.”
“Of an apartment we don’t have.”
“Of the apartment we will have.”
I closed my fingers around the key.
Gavin moved behind me, wrapped his arms around my waist, and rested his chin against my shoulder.
“Where would you put the couch?” he asked.
I considered the living room.
“Against that wall.”
“Too far from the television.”
“We don’t even own a television.”
“I do.”
“Then it can stay at Natalie’s.”
He laughed quietly.
It was the first time I had said her name without feeling as if the room had changed.
We spent the next hour pretending.
We argued over imaginary furniture, decided the kitchen needed yellow curtains, and debated whether the narrow balcony was large enough for two chairs.
When Gavin drove me home, I rested my head against the window and watched the streetlights pass.
For the first time since seeing the photograph of his children, I felt calm.
Six weeks wasn’t forever.
I had waited years for someone to choose me.
I could wait a little longer for Gavin to keep his promise.
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