Page 84 of Four Weekends and a Funeral

When he bends into the fridge, I notice neatly trimmed hairs on the back of his neck. His beard is just as impeccably groomed when he turns to face me.

I narrow my eyes, and his cheeks turn the loveliest shade of pink. “What?”

My face splits in two. I can’t contain my amusement. “Did you get a haircut today?”

He rubs the back of his neck, but the gesture doesn’t erase the evidence.

I pull his arm back down and slide my hand into his. “No, wait. I don’t mean to tease you. It’s just…this is very romantic.”

“Why do you sound so shocked? I can be romantic.” He threads his fingers through mine.

“I’m not shocked you’re romantic. I’m shocked that I’m someone who inspires romance.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“I’m serious! I don’t know what to do with myself.” I swing our clasped hands to demonstrate this.

“You inspire me.” Adam squeezes my hand and pulls me toward him, his back against the kitchen counter.

I’ve never felt such reciprocated attraction with another person, but it’s so much more than lust. When I overhear someone complaining about Christmas creep or make it on the train just in time or have some minor work success, I want to tell Adam. I want to earn one of his rumbly laughs. He makes me feel desired and wanted for every odd and boring part of me.

“What do the subjects of your romance normally do?” My voice is lighter than air.

He leans his head down, placing a firm hand possessively on the small of my back. “You could start by kissing me.”

“Why didn’t I think of that?”

I tip my mouth up to his, and he responds with a slow, deliberate kiss. Quickly, the fire between us builds. It was four weekends of forced proximity before the heat was too much. Now we can only kiss for a minute before we’re flicking off burners and backing out of the kitchen to frantically pull each other’s clothes off.

It’s too good, my brain worries.

But with Adam, nothing feels too anything. It feels exactly right.

22

A Pikachu Balloon

“June? Where do you want the pies?” Adam hollers through the doorway. The rosemary wreath bounces against the door knocker, sending the scent of herbs into the late November chill.

We step into the sunny yellow entry of his sister’s 1920s bungalow. He removes his boots on the hallway runner while balancing a pair of pie boxes overhead, and I follow suit.

“You brought the pies?” A honeyed female voice greets us.

His sister’s house is irrepressibly joyful. We walk through the minty-green living room—packed with pops of oranges, corals, and blues—into the cheery peach kitchen.

A tall brunette in a pink knit sweater smiles from behind her dishwasher.

“I told you I was bringing them, didn’t I?” He greets her with a kiss on the cheek and sets the boxes in the only open spot on the counter, which is otherwise occupied by three bowls of chips, a cutting board of vegetables, and six CrockPots of varying sizes, putting the Minneapolis power grid to the test.

“But there was that one year—”

“Am I ever going to live down that power outage? It was the ice storm’s fault. It took down all of Two Harbors.”

“It’s a shoddy carpenter who blames his tools.”

He removes the pies from their boxes and breaks them down to recycle. “Just for that, you’re not getting any of the caramel apple pecan. Did you hear that, Dev?” she shouts across the house. “More for us.”

“No! Fine, fine. You’re perfect and nothing is ever your fault.”

---