Page 43 of We Can Do
The room’s cool air raises goosebumps on my arms as I pull my shirt over my head, letting it fall somewhere beside the bed. My fingers shake slightly as I work the button of my jeans, shimming out of them with less grace than I’d like. But when I look up, Noah’s expression stops my self-consciousness cold. He’s looking at me like I’m something precious, something worth marveling at. Not the flawed, complicated body I’ve learned to merely tolerate, but something beautiful.
“Show me where else you like to be touched.” His voice is rough but tender. “I don’t want to do anything wrong.”
The vulnerability in his words matches my own, and I take his hand again. “Here,” I whisper, guiding his palm to cup my breast through the thin fabric of my bra. His touch is reverent, fingers tracing the curve before I move his hand lower, to the spot just beneath where soft flesh meets the ladder of my ribs. “And here.”
He follows my lead perfectly, fingers dancing lightly across each new territory like he’s reading braille, learning a new language written in the map of my body. When I direct his hand to the delicate hollow of my hip bone, the sensation is electric—not painful, never painful, but alive in a way that makes me gasp silently.
But then I move his hand to my middle back, and my voice turns serious. “Be careful here. I’ve had kidney infections. Sometimes it’s sensitive. Sometimes even light pressure...” I trail off, hating how clinical I sound, how I’m turning this moment into a medical consultation.
But Noah just nods, his eyes steady on mine. No pity, no frustration, no disappointment. Just understanding. “Tell me if anything doesn’t feel right. Promise?”
“Promise.”
“Lean back,” he whispers. “I’ll be gentle.”
As I lie back against his pillows, my biggest insecurity comes into full view. My belly is bloated from the recent flare, round and swollen in a way that has nothing to do with the bread I’ve been sampling and everything to do with inflammation and the cruel ways my body betrays me. I fight the urge to cover myself with my arms, to curl into a ball and hide this imperfection that feels so stark against the intimacy we’re building.
But Noah doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t pause. Doesn’t look away. Instead, he smiles—soft and genuine—and places his hand on the curve of my abdomen with the same reverence he’s shown every other part of me.
“You’re so soft,” he murmurs, and there’s no disappointment in it, no barely concealed disgust. Just tenderness, appreciation, like my softness is something to be treasured rather than hidden.
His fingers trace gentle patterns across my skin, each touch smoothing away layers of shame and self-consciousness I’ve carried for so long. This is what acceptance feels like, I realize. Not someone overlooking my flaws or pretending they don’t exist, but seeing them clearly and choosing to stay, to touch, to appreciate anyway.
“Thank you.” The words get tangled with the tears I’m fighting back, lost in the warmth radiating between our bodies, in this quiet understanding that fills his sparse bedroom with something that feels sacred.
We continue like this, slow and careful, each new touch preceded by his quiet “Is this okay?” and followed by my increasingly breathless confirmations. It’s a dance we’re choreographing as we go, every movement deliberate, every pause meaningful. When his lips find mine again, the kiss is different than before—deeper but somehow softer, full of promise and patience.
His mouth travels from mine to trace the line of my jaw, down to the sensitive spot where my neck meets my shoulder. Then lower, to the peaks of my breasts, each touch awakening cascades of sensation that ripple through me like stones thrown in still water. But he never pushes, never assumes, never takes more than I’m offering.
When we finally settle side by side, both catching our breath, the world beyond these four walls feels impossibly far away. His bedroom might be sparse, but right now it contains everything that matters. He props himself on one elbow, looking down at me with a shy smile that makes him look younger, almost boyish despite the stubble on his jaw.
“Stay?” The word is whispered against my lips, his breath warm and sweet. “We’ll go out to dinner tonight, and I’ll make you breakfast in the morning. Scrambled eggs, golden and fluffy, with buttered sourdough toast on the side—best you’ve ever had.”
The offer is simple but weighted with meaning. This isn’t just about tonight, about these stolen moments in his bed. This is about tomorrow, about the possibility of more mornings and more breakfasts and more careful, patient touches.
“Oh, yeah? And what time in the morning are we talking, Mr. Baker?”
His face scrunches up in an apologetic grimace. “Er... Four AM at the latest?”
“That’s still nighttime!”
“Sorry.” His laugh rumbles through his chest as he presses kisses along my neck, each one an apology and a promise. “I have to go downstairs to get the loaves in the oven. But I’ll bring you breakfast whenever you wake up. How’s that? And you can sleep as late as you like.”
The offer hangs between us, simple on its surface but layered with complexity underneath. Part of me, the part still raw andaching from the recent flare, wants to retreat. To gather my clothes and my dignity and return to the safety of my own space where I don’t have to worry about morning breath or how I look in the unforgiving light of dawn or whether my body will cooperate with whatever comes next.
But there’s more than just my body to consider. He’s my client. I’m his editor. We’re supposed to be professional, maintaining clear boundaries while we work on his cookbook—the cookbook that could launch my career as a full-time editor, the job that could change everything for me. If this thing between us complicates that, if it gets messy...
The doubts crowd in, each one sharp-edged and insistent. What if this ruins everything? What if I’m risking my future for something that might flame out as quickly as it ignited? What if, what if, what if...
I search Noah’s face for any sign that he’s wrestling with the same fears, the same practical concerns about our professional relationship. But all I find in those brown eyes is hope—bright and earnest and completely without reservation. He’s not thinking about the cookbook or careers or the dozen ways this could go wrong. He’s just here, in this moment, wanting me to stay.
“Okay.” The word is barely more than a whisper, fragile as spun sugar in the charged air between us.
It feels like standing at the edge of a cliff and choosing to jump, trusting that the water below will catch me. By staying, I’m not just agreeing to spend the night. I’m handing him all my carefully guarded vulnerabilities—my unreliable body, my fears about intimacy, my desperate need for this job, my equally desperate need for human connection that doesn’t come with an asterisk about my condition.
If whatever this is between us gets in the way of the cookbook, I can kiss that full-time position goodbye. Thepublishing house won’t want an editor who can’t maintain professional boundaries, who lets personal feelings cloud editorial judgment.
But maybe I’m being paranoid. Maybe I’m so used to things going wrong that I can’t recognize when something might actually go right. It’s been so long since I felt this kind of connection, this careful tenderness, this patient understanding. Don’t I deserve to let my guard down, just once? Don’t I deserve to see where this might lead?
