Page 120 of Give My Everything
My hope is that now I’ll get to make new memories in these rooms, with Ben and the baby.
My hand comes up to rest on my stomach, an emotional wave coming over me at the thought.
We walked through his house together a while back, discussing options for which room would be the nursery and whether or not I want my own room.
That was before the sex, before the intimacy I have felt with him over the past few days, the closeness I’ve never felt with another man before, not even Lucas.
I was indecisive then. Now, I know I want to share a room with Ben, want to wake up next to him in the mornings and fall asleep with his arms around me after we’ve sated each other’s needs.
Letting out a sigh, I head to the balcony and open the sliding glass door, wishing I’d gotten here earlier so I could enjoy the phenomenal ocean view from his bedroom’s vantage point, my first night at his place as a person who lives here.
I step outside and rest my hands on the cool, damp metal of the railing, closing my eyes and allowing myself a moment to myself. It’s a chance to take a calming breath and inhale the ocean breeze, to listen to the sound of the waves clapping against the shoreline.
Ben doesn’t have an oceanfront property like some of our other friends own. Instead, he sits toward the back of town, his property raised slightly so it has a view even if it doesn’t have direct access.
I was actually surprised the first time I visited a few weeks ago.
I want to laugh to myself. It’s crazy when I think about how little time has passed since Ben first proposed this crazy idea. It’s hardly been a month and I’m already moving in and trying to get settled, really settled.
Dominic looked a bit skeptical when he pulled up out front earlier this evening. I could see it in his face.
“This is where he lives?” he said, eyeing the two-story family home with fascination, like the idea of living in anything other than a beachfront mansion was a strange concept he might have heard of once but never experienced.
“It’s a family home,” I replied, rolling my eyes.
Even though I wanted to gag at my brother’s elitist attitude, I somewhat understood where he was coming from.
Most people we know don’t live in homes like this one. Hermosa Beach has multi-million dollar mansions, surfer cottages, and tons of apartment buildings. What it doesn’t have is traditional single-family homes on a decent-sized lot with a yard and a white picket fence.
Even in Colombia, my family owns a penthouse apartment in the richest area of Medellín, and twofincasoutside of the city with hundreds of acres.
In this town, if someone has the money, they’ll spend it expanding the square footage of their house. If they don’t have the money, they’ll live in an apartment or one of the shitty cottages that have been ‘upgraded’—and I use that term very loosely—by people who think they know how to gut a home.
People don’t waste money on yard spaces, on beautiful exterior refurbishments like potted plants and picket fences. Truth be told, I didn’t used to think Ben seemed like the guy who would choose any of that shit in the first place.
While he wasn’t a man who crossed my mind often before the day of the pier-to-pier swim, I can honestly say if I’d been asked, I would have bet he lived in a massive, ostentatious, Calloway-esque property with a racquetball court or a sauna or something boujee like that.
Not in a house that looks like the Cleavers live in it.
But now, knowing Ben as well as I do—or as well as IthinkI do—it makes complete sense.
He bought the house that represents the life he wants. He wants the family, the happy home.
And I hope to give it to him.
Dominic gave me a look that fell somewhere between disbelief and amusement as I stared up at the house from the street, knowing I was making the right choice but feeling nerves all the same. “Scoot,hermanita,” he’d finally said. “I have a meeting to get to.”
“At 8pm? Is this meeting in a hotel room?”
He just glared at me as I giggled and climbed out of his car, then he put his car in park to help me get my massive suitcase from the car to the door.
He kissed me on the forehead and said exactly the words I needed to hear.
“If he ever fucks up, just let me know and I’ll come kill him.”
I smiled and waved as my brother drove off to his own lady of the night.
Now, standing on the patio that gives me a direct view of the beach, even if it is a few blocks away, I begin to think about a way to make the inside look as much like a family home as the outside.
