Page 17 of Grace Notes
“And?” Brooks asks, his voice full of smoke and gravel.
“Would you cheer for me even if I quit?”
I didn’t know it was a question I needed an answer to until it was past my lips—too late to take it back.
Brooks pulls his head from mine, leaning back, and I tilt my chin to look at him. He stops dancing, and we stand in the middle of the dance floor—me on his feet and his arms still wrapped around me—as couples twirl around us. “I’ll be your cheerleader no matter what you decide to do, but I’m also going to be your husband who tells you how he sees it, even if you don’t want to hear it. And right now, I think you need that more.”
My feathers are bristled by Brooks’s straightforward tone. “Then go on. Tell me what you think I need to hear—but just know, you might be sleeping on the couch.”
I don’t mean it, but I’m slightly annoyed.
He doesn’t get mad, though. He just lifts my hand and brings it to his mouth, kissing it and then grinning. “Never again, pretty girl. I spent too many nights sleeping on the couch without you last year. Where you sleep, I’m sleeping, too.”
It’s stupid how fast I melt when he says things like that.
“Fine,” I say with a shake of my head, but a smile plays on my lips, “no couch. Let’s hear what it is you have to say then.”
“I think you’re scared.” He says it like that’s the simplest explanation in the world, and I scoff.
“I’m not scared.”
Brooks doesn’t answer. He doesn’t have to when his face screams, “Really?”
Offering him the same deadpan stare, I wait for him to say what he has to say.
Sighing, he says, “Come on. Let’s sit for a while, and we can talk about it.”
He leads me off the dance floor, weaving through the other couples until we are standing in front of a bench at the far back of the room. I move to sit, but he’s faster, taking the spot I was going for and pulling me into his lap.
“People are looking.”
“And?” Brooks asks, clearly unbothered. “You’re my wife. I can hold you if I want to. Let them look. Besides, you can’t smack me when I’m holding you.”
“Fair point,” I say, despite the heat crawling up my neck from the stares thrown our way. “Now tell me what you think I’m scared of.”
My husband shrugs, “Yourself.”
He’s right. It’s a good thing I’m sitting here. Otherwise, I would have smacked him.
“What an insightful answer.” My voice is flat as I stare at him.
He huffs, exasperated with my sarcasm, and then he takes my face between his hands and holds it gently. “Whether yourealize it or not, you think you have to be perfect in everything you do. So if you give up, then you don’t have to fail.”
I narrow my eyes. “You’re one to talk.”
The corner of his mouth lifts, and I think about leaning in and kissing the spot that makes his dimple pop. “You’re right. I’m the same way, and I’m working on it. But the first step is acceptance.”
“You think you’re so smart, don’t you?”
His smile tugs into a full-blown grin when he says, “Generally, yeah.”
And even though I have to scoot off his lap to do it, I stand and smack him in the shoulder, finding satisfaction with the thunk that comes with the contact.
“Hey,” he cries, “what was that for?”
Leaning down, I drop a kiss on his lips and say, “For being you—and for being right. It’s kind of annoying.”
I committed his laugh to memory a long time ago, but the memories could never compare to the real thing. It’s deep and raspy—a sound I never want to forget.
