Page 99 of Fall From Grace

Once I made it up the rope, I shined the flashlight into the treehouse and sighed. “Our treehouse is getting old age,” I told him before sticking my head over the edge and shining the light in his face.

“Our?” he snorted. “I recall someone always calling it hers all the time. Stop shining that in my eyes.” I kept shining it in his eyes anyway. “Just wait, I’ll be up there to get you in a second.”

My stomach tightened with anticipation. “Hand me the blankets,” I told him.

I finally moved the flashlight from his eyes and he tossed me up one at a time. Once he made it up in the treehouse with me, he tackled me down and I screamed.

“Shh.” He covered my mouth with his hand and I was taken back in time to when he had done it to me when I first climbed into the treehouse.

I looked up at him with a smile and removed his hand. “You’ve come such a long way from the dirty boy I first encountered in this treehouse.”

His blue eyes were dark in the treehouse as he gazed down at me. “You’ve come such a long way from the polka dot priss I first encountered… But I loved that girl then, and I love her still, and I’m going to love all the many changes she’ll become.”

“Not just as a man that I love, Noah, you’re a beautiful human inside and out, and I’m so glad you’re my human.”

He settled between my legs and started working on taking off my shorts. “Let’s make more humans,” he whispered.

I sniggered as I grabbed his hand. “I’d like to have you a few years to myself before we start growing our family… Good thing you bought a decent size house,” I mumbled as he kissed his way down me.

“I want our kids to have brothers and sisters,” he told me as he dipped his mouth between my thighs and I gasped.

“Yeah, I hated being an only child,” I moaned. “Good thing I had you.”

“You’ll always have me.”

Needless to say, a baby with the last name Phillips was born nine months later.

Life with Noah…

Made all the bad things better, and all the good ones so much sweeter.

Epilogue

I’ve loved her since we met as kids, that’s 24 years.

I’ve been married to her 9 of those years.

I gave her time and distance for 5 of them.

She looked for me for almost 4 of those years when social services took me from my Dad.

How many years did it take to bring us back together? Zero.

It only took a second, staring at her freckled face and dark eyes to shape my future as a kid.

It only took two football games to reunite us during the first one and finally get her in my arms after the second.

And it only took two days for her give up her run and I got her back.

These days, she lets me in and doesn’t push me out. She cried on my shoulder the day Gus passed away, and she grabbed my hand and kept me close by her side the week her dad had a cancer scare. We talk and talk about her mom, especially to our kids.

We don’t talk about mine though. My dad still reaches out, I still push away. If he wants to change, I’ll open my arms wide and accept him into our lives despite how much I was neglected growing up. That’s just the kind of man I am.

Dean and Janet are still a part of our lives and our kids. It’s crazy, even after all these years the lengths people with no blood ties will go to stay a part of your life. That was the difference between good people and bad ones. They still foster, bit by bit, I think they make a difference in kids’ lives.

I still flirt with my wife, I think she’s still into me. I mean, she keeps letting me rub her butt when the kids aren’t looking… Yeah, I got what I wanted.

Am I happy? Hell, yeah, I am.

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