Page 51 of Pippin & Nacho

“Sam.”

“Yep. This one?”

His smile turned shy as I spelled out, ‘I love you.’

“I love you.”

“You’re good at this. How about this one?”

“Hmm, I can’t tell.”

“I spelled out soul mate.” I rested my head next to him, my hand now lying flat on his strong back. “Because you’re my soul mate,” I whispered.

His eyes popped open, and he kissed the tip of my nose. “I know.”

“You belong to me always, and I belong to you.”

“Forever.”

That was the most confidence I’d ever heard from him since we began all this with my accidental kiss. Whatever happened between us or what roads led us to new paths, I knew we would always live it hand-in-hand together.

On Sunday afternoon, I was still high from having sex with Nate. I’d never felt more whole in my life. Loving him from afar made me realize how incomplete I had been, like missing bits and pieces of myself until we had sex. Nate had put me back together without even realizing it.

Our crew headed over to the indoor skating park at Old Town Mall. Well, it wasn’t an actual skating park, but one all of us had contributed to building over the years, filled with halfpipes, graffiti, and lighting.

The area was filled with gutted, abandoned shopping buildings. They were all falling apart and probably weren’t the safest to be in, but we loved them, making them our own. I hoped they’d never sell the buildings off, but eventually, some business would buy them up. We came here whenever the weather was too cold or wet outside, and sometimes, we’d use them for parties.

Perhaps we should celebrate Nate’s birthday here. We partied here last year, too, but I wanted to do it again. Now that we were together, perhaps I should do something different for him. We could always go back out to Federal Hill and see a movie again. This time, I would get him some nachos to munch on. Was there a restaurant that served special, fancy nachos? What would he like as a gift? We didn’t have much money to blow. I could get him a cool T-shirt or something.

I needed to think quickly since his birthday was coming up in April. I didn’t remember shit about birthdays, but I remembered Nate’s. Still, I always kept the special day on my phone’s calendar.

I looked around the skate area in search of Nate and found him doing his tricks with Stix and Alpha. Alpha rarely spent time with us nowadays since he was always too busy at the bar and running a business, but today, he showed up. I was glad he finally made it out and could chill with us.

“Why are you so fucking quiet?” Cueball asked Blaze, yanking my attention away from staring at Nate.

I looked at Cueball, who had a freshly shaved head. What would his hair look like if he grew it out? He wasn’t balding, so why did he shave it? Was it as smooth as it looked? Did he have curly hair like Nate? Was it straight? I bet it was as dark as Nate’s. And why was he asking Blaze about being quiet when Cueball rarely spoke himself? That was why he suddenly grabbed my attention.

“What the hell are you talking about?” Blaze huffed. “I’m talkin’.”

“No, you’re off. Something’s going on with you. I’ve noticed your mood all day.”

“So! What's it to you?”

To my complete shock, Cueball grabbed a fistful of Blaze’s dark brown hair and forced Blaze to look at him. “Your face is fucking red. Why?”

Blaze scowled and shoved Cueball away, saying nothing, which was odd. Blaze never stopped yapping and bitching, especially at Ajax.

“Fuck off!”

Cueball took no offense as he scanned Blaze again before moving his eyes to Ajax, who I just noticed was huddled into himself, trying to hide behind Jazz and Blondie. His face looked… sad. What the hell? I didn’t always pick up on bodily or social cues, but Ajax always stood out to me as strong and dominating. He never cowered to anyone. I didn’t recognize this Ajax.

Cueball’s eyes grew wide. “You… holy shit, you and Ajax? Did you two…?”

That got everyone’s attention as they stared back and forth between Blaze and Ajax.

“Fuck me. I was joking when I said you two should bang. I didn’t mean it literally,” Jazz said before she snorted a laugh and ended up in a fit of giggles.

“As if! We didn’t fuck! I fucking hate you all!” Blaze stood, yanked out his smokes from his jacket, and lit one up before he stormed off outside.

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