He laughs. A real laugh, the kind that moves his whole body and makes me bounce slightly against him.
“That’s what you’re thinking about? Pastries?”
“We’re croissants. Golden. Flaky. Dusted in powder.
He kisses the top of my head. “You’re weird.”
“You’re in me,” I point out. “Still. Technically. So you’ve chosen to be with the weird.”
He’s still inside me and soft and I should probably be self-conscious about any of this but instead I’m aware that I have exactly two weeks left on the 60-day clause and after that, I have to choose. Stay or go. Build something with this person or walk away from it.
The panic starts quietly. A small voice in my head doing math. Forty days are already past. Forty-one. Something around there.
“Hey,” he says, pulling back just enough to look at me. “Where did you go?”
“Nowhere,” I say. “I’m right here.”
But I’m also running calculations. I’m also thinking about Portland and timelines and the conversation Patrice just had with me about choosing. I’m also thinking about how if I stay, I’m choosing him, and if I leave, I’m choosing the life I hadn’t planned before I knew him. And both choices feel impossible.
“You got quiet,” he says.
“Good quiet,” I tell him, which is a lie. It’s worried quiet. It’s terrified quiet. “Just happy quiet.”
He doesn’t believe me. I can see it in his face. But he also doesn’t push, which is Jace’s gift—the ability to sit with something difficult without needing to solve it immediately.
We lie there, covered in flour, sticky and comfortable, while the panic does its quiet work in the back of my mind. Six weeks. Forty-one days and only a few left. A decision that’s coming whether I’m ready for it or not.
“We should probably get dressed,” he says eventually.
“Probably,” I agree.
Neither of us moves.
The flour is going to be everywhere. There’s definitely flour on his hair now too. We’re both going to smell like vanilla and sex and failure on my part to maintain professional kitchen standards, and I don’t care. I’m holding onto this moment like it’s going to end, because of course it’s going to end—everything ends, and I have the timeline to prove it.
He extracts himself reluctantly. We both dress. He helps me get the flour out of my hair, gently, like he’s done this before, or like he’s always known how to be careful with things that matter.
By the time the kitchen is somewhat back to normal, it’s nearly eight o’clock. The vanilla bean is still sitting on the counter. The soufflés are still perfect in their cooling rack. The shelf is still beautiful on the wall. Everything is as it was, except everything is completely different.
“Grand opening,” he says as I’m locking up.
“In three days,” I confirm.
“After that?”
“After that I have less than two weeks to decide if I’m staying or selling.”
He nods. He doesn’t ask which one I want. Maybe he already knows. Maybe I look like someone with one foot out the door, and the other foot is just visiting.
“Okay,” he says. “We’ll figure it out.”
I want to believe him.
The sky is still full of light even though it’s after eight. I’m going to spend the night stress-baking, probably. I’m going tomake something complicated that doesn’t need to exist, because that’s how I solve problems I can’t articulate.
It’s already been six weeks. Forty-one days. A man who builds things to last and a woman who’s recently learned how to leave.
The panic hums quietly in my chest.