Page 66 of Shoot Your Shot

As he sits beside me, the bed shifts from his weight. Our shoulders brush against each other, and from the corner of my eye, I see his hands are cupped together.

“It feels different in here than it used to, huh?” he utters, glancing around.

“You didn’t change anything though,” I whisper, smiling sadly. “The whole house … it’s the same.”

The quiet between us is deafening. For a moment, he simply sits quietly beside me when, suddenly, his deep voice speaks.

“I wanted everything to stay the way you’d left it … in case you ever came back.” He pats my knee. “It could have been one year later or eighty. I wasn’t changing anything you’d picked out for our home, Buttercup.”

My heart feels like it’s being slowly put through a shredder, and I let my head sink against his shoulder.

For only God knows how long … we just sit in silence.

We sit in our room.

After sitting together, side by side, for at least half an hour, if not longer, she cranes her neck to look at me.

“Thank you,” she says, reaching up and brushing a hand over my forehead and sweeping my hair over. Something she always used to do. Before she left.

“What for, Buttercup?” I murmur, dipping my face a little closer to hers.

“For going through these emotions with me.” She shrugs sadly. “I don’t think either of us knows what the future holds. But that doesn’t matter because I’ll forever be thankful for thistime together. Even if some of it has been painful and has made us face our problems.”

“I’ll be here for as long as you’ll let me, Paige. You’re my wife. And that’s my job.” I kiss her temple.

We have a lot to discuss, yet I think we’re both stuck in this bubble. A bubble where we just want to enjoy each other and wish all the heavy shit away. The trouble with that is … the heavy shit is closing in on us.

And we’re leaving it all for the last second.

I press one more kiss to her temple. “I’ll go run you a bubble bath with all your favorite smelly shit in it.”

I swear that woman used to take a bath almost every night when she lived here. Sometimes multiple times a day. Yet, since she’s been back, she hasn’t taken a single one—at least that I’ve noticed.

“It’s probably all expired,” she says, grinning. “But I’d love to take one anyway.”

“It’s not expired,” I say gruffly. “I, uh … restocked it with new stuff not that long ago.”

I drag a hand up the back of my head, thinking she’s probably going to think I’m a complete stalker now. “I wasn’t going to kidnap you, I swear.”

“Did you, like … stage your heart attack or what, big guy?” she jokes, poking her nail into my side. “I’m beginning to wonder.”

“Har har.” I roll my eyes, shaking my head and grinning at her. “I’ll let that slide, but only because you’re kind of hot.”

She blushes, biting her bottom lip as I get up and start toward the bathroom.

“Oh, you meant … in there?” She nods toward our bathroom. “I figured you meant the guest bathroom.”

“I mean, you can take a bath wherever you want, babe. But you know this one is the only one with jets, and it’s the biggest.”I stop. “I probably don’t need to tell you that, seeing as you designed every bathroom in this house.”

She wrings her hands together nervously, deep in thought. Finally, she stands. “Today, I made the step of coming into our room. So, it’s only right if I take a bath in my old tub. After all, I picked it out just for me.”

I nod my head once, keeping my eyes on her. “You’re right. Except one thing.”

“What’s that?” she says softly.

“You said your old bathtub. But guess what, Buttercup. Everything in this house still belongs to you.” I swallow thickly. “Especially me.”

Gradually, I turn toward the bathroom. And I run my wife a bubble bath just the way she likes it. Even though it almost fucking kills me to not slide inside of it with her, I don’t.

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