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There is never enough time.
You're learning that more painfully by the minute ever since Greta kissed you and everything in your life shifted into this amalgamation of want and need and a joy like you've never experienced before.
In how it has blossomed.
The sneaking around has been sexy and addicting but the true high is making her laugh and her eyes crinkle and in her letting herself go enough to want you back.
Everyone is in the house tonight celebrating after a win so unbelievable you're not sure how you pulled it off. But with Lu on the mound and Esti stealing twice and you and Greta hitting same inning homers, just to one up each other, you think you've finally found the recipe that makes everything click.
And it's euphoric.
But in everyone else's celebration together downstairs there's a tinge of sadness that you can't escape from, that you can't celebrate with her because they'd probably notice your absences and that's too steep of a price to pay. There are rules, after all.
The sun is just starting to descend towards the horizon as the cool air sets in through your open window, breeze fluttering the corners of your notebook as you tap your pen trying to decide what you want to say while this feeling is still fresh. Taking a few spare moments to offer her them for later, a distant connection so if there's ever any doubt, she'll always know there was never one for you.
---
Greta,
I know these are premature, I know that you're only minutes away from being near me at any given moment, but there's part of me, the logistical part of me, the weird part of me, that needs to plan. That needs to end the season with more than just uncertainty. That needs you to remember me. That needs you to have something tangible that reminds you of how happy and beautiful this is. That reminds you that maybe there's a future where we'll find each other, where we can build a life together, where we don't have to say goodbye.
That reminds you that you are worthy of being chosen.
---
You started writing her letters for when the season ends and she goes off to California with her movie star dreams, always chasing, always soaring, always looking for the next right step.
Maybe a little running too.
You're still not sure of anything, what it all means, why and how you can feel so much for and with this woman, and the letters have helped in your processing too. Made you feel safe. Made you feel close to her in ways you aren't always afforded in a house full of people and a world that sees you as wrong.
How loving someone like this could be seen as that is something you cannot wrap your head around.
She slides into view in the doorway as you flourish off the N in your name and you jump a little at the intrusion, your stomach dropping at her beaming, brilliant smile when you look up to meet her entrance.
"There you are."
The pen falls from your fingers, taken aback at her enthusiasm, at the gorgeous way she floats and twirls into a room that makes your heart expand and ache at the same time.
You quickly eye your notebook and gently close it so she's not too drawn to the motion that she tries to sneak a peek again, eyes back on her with a dumbstruck smile because wow.
"Whatcha doing up here all by yourself?"
You're not really saying anything, lost in her eyes, lost in her smile, lost in the way that your hands ache to reach for her and wrap her in a hug so tightly it'll keep her here with you in a forever sort of way.
"Oh, hey, hi, I uh... was just... reflecting, you know, big win today, still lots to plan before tomorrow."
Pointed and direct, she eyes you curiously, looking into your soul in the way that only she does, trying to figure out if there are parts of you that you're trying to hide in your ramblings, or if you're just being an awkward dork and she can simply be fond of you instead.
"Mhmm"
You jump to attention at the hum because you don't want her to press this, don't want her to think you're not excited that she's here. "I promise it's nothing, I just like to write this stuff down, you know me."
She smiles, full, bright and beautiful. "I do."
Her shoulder shrugs when you blush but she keeps watching you, watches for any subtle shifts that tell her you're not okay. That you need her. But then accepts your answer and you and it feels good to be understood and feels good that she knows you well enough now to know when she doesn't need to coax you out.
"Did you need something or...?"
Studying you, tilting her head, she turns to look out into the hallway and listens for any movement or noise, and when she's satisfied everyone is occupied, she slowly and silently closes the door, clicking the lock and pressing her back to the painted wood as she rolls the beer bottle between her palms.
"Well, I got you this beer and couldn't find you to give it to you... but now that I have..."
Slowly she pushes off the door and saunters over to you, staring you down in a gentle predatory sort of way that has your heart racing and you gulping and squirming in your seat because this Greta, the sultry presence about her makes you feel things you never thought were possible.
Makes you want things you never would have imagined.
The beer was an excuse, and you know her enough to call her on it but you don't because you like it. She's always getting and bringing things and putting them in your hands, making it normal for her to be near you, because she's a good friend. Thoughtful and helpful and not at all craving the brush of your fingers with hers as she passes whatever over.
Standing a little too close in the exchange.
Innocent, casual, to the untrained eye.
Just the best of friends.
She's watching your reaction, honed in and focused with a smirk dripping with intention and when she gets to you she stops, your body swaying forward in anticipation of touch as she puts a hand to your chest and watches your reaction as she places the beer on top of your notebook, following it with her eyes and then meeting yours again in a subtle knowing that you weren't just reflecting, but trusting you with your deflection anyway.
Instead of pressing you on it, she quirks an eyebrow when you drop your gaze to her bare stomach as it rises and then flexes as she exhales. She reaches for your shoulders to steady herself as she slowly settles down on your lap, using her hands to drag yours around her waist and rolls her hips in a delicious sort of motion to get comfortable.
She twirls the hair away from your face and then drapes her arms around your neck, watching, waiting for your reaction, waiting for your action, waiting for you to meet her.
"No, I don't need anything, but I missed... I couldn't find you so I decided I'd fix that." She nods to herself, proud of the gasp that escapes your mouth because the thought that you could mean enough for her to miss you is... electrifying.
---
Greta,
Do you remember after our first game when that asshole in the stands made you cry? I wanted to kill him, but I also told you that it's okay to want things. And I meant it.
What I didn't know I meant then, or didn't have the words to articulate... what I wanted you to want was me.
---
"So you missed me, huh?"
She hums. "Maybe."
"You came all the way up here for just maybe? That's interesting."
"Hey Carson? Look where I'm sitting, figure it out for yourself, yeah?"
She noses along your jaw, humming and sighing and moving and you're so lost in the sensations of her, so lost in her close and warm and soft that you're not even sure what your body is doing beyond reacting to her. She's kissing you slow and steady and deliberate, each press of her lips held and torturous as she builds the tension to make you want. To make you need. To tease.
Your hands lose themselves and slide down the back of her blue jeans, nails dug in in the tightness beneath her belt and when you push even lower as she arches her back, grabbing and touching as much skin as you can, she pulls away to look at you. Eyes dark, eyes wild, her tongue darting to the corner of her mouth and waits.
" Well that was new."
"New as in stop or..."
Drawing your bottom lip into her mouth, she kisses you, bites down, calculated and cunning, giving you the answer you crave without offering an explanation at all.
---
Greta,
You'd like to think you can handle me, that my words weren't made to turn you inside out. You push me to say and to do and to be, but sometimes I wonder if you know what you're asking for. Because I will show you. Against a wall. In the back of a car. In the woods.
I will show you how selfish I can be, how reckless I can be, how when I want something, truly want it, that I wouldn't just tell you. Ephemera. When that moment comes, when I decide that enough is enough, you'll know exactly what you do to me. I'll show you exactly how decisive I can be, show you exactly what happens when I take what I want. Show you exactly what it means when that's you.
---
It doesn't last long, but that's okay, you're used to any form of small intimacies being cut short. But you both hear the wood creaking somewhere in the house and she turns to attention, nervous, but not fearful since she remembered to lock the door.
She sighs and presses her forehead to yours as she nudges your nose, runs her fingers through your hair, twisting and twirling and redefining your curls down the length of them, drags her thumb across your bottom lip, the corners of your mouth, wipes the lipstick smudges with a smile so warm it makes your heart leap from your chest.
You wish she didn't have to hide. You wish you understood what's so scary about all of this. Because you are also realizing that this is your life now and there's really no going back to before. You feel a little lost in your ignorance.
---
Greta,
Sometimes I scare myself when I think about what this all means, what my life is supposed to look like now that I discovered this part of me. Why I didn't recognize these feelings before you. It feels like it's growing more every day but there's no time to stop to absorb it.
I see how cautious you are, see how living this life has affected you, and I'm confused why I feel more pride with you than I do fear. Someday I want to hear more of your stories, more than just Dana, someday I want to be the person you feel safe being afraid with. Because you shouldn't have to be alone like this, running from place to place, you need more than Jo.
Maybe you could learn to need me too.
---
"I really wish you didn't have to stop." The huff of frustration, of annoyance, makes her chuckle to herself and kiss the tip of your nose before she stands and backs away, floating to the door to unlock and open it.
All you can do is sigh.
But this time she doesn't leave. As soon as the door meets the wall she's walking back to you, drags her fingers across your shoulder and sits on your bed, looking out the window at the sunset off in the distance.
"You wanna tell me about what you've been writing while we're all having fun downstairs?" She crosses her leg over her knee and leans and you've never seen someone so majestic, so contemplative and comfortable as she waits.
It's not that you don't want to share with her, not that you'd care if she saw, but you worry that if she sees any of these she might get lost in her own narrative about what the gesture means. That even though she says that you'll go back to Charlie and she'll leave for California, you know there's a part of her that doesn't want to believe it. You're worried she'll think you've given up and already started saying goodbye.
You're not sure you could assuage her otherwise, not sure she wouldn't see the difference. This isn't goodbye, this is: there is not a single second that you don't want to fill with her and with baseball, and in the ones where the two of you can't be close, you want to offer her closeness, connection, a lifeline, for the future.
You don't want her to feel so alone.
She may be a bank robber, but you're desperate to be the getaway driver. You're just learning how to drive fast enough to keep up.
"Oh, a lot of different things, really." You awkwardly shift to reach for the notebook, but grab for the beer instead, trying to play it casually, like your whole inner world isn't spread bare on those pages for only her eyes to see.
You take a swig, savoring the bitterness and catch her watching you out of the corner of your eye. She does that constantly, she studies you in a way you've never experienced, like she knows and wants to know you at the same time, without words, without actions, just you and your smile and her and her eyes.
When you pull the bottle from your lips you smile at her because she's so beautiful like this, pondering and present, where you can feel her leaning into you, feel her a mile away, feel her like she's caressing your soul. "What?"
It's effortless how she transitions, how all encompassing she is, from one action to the next it's just flawless, gorgeous momentum, fluid and breathtaking and elegant. You watch her as she sighs and shakes her head, knowing she made you feel something, knowing she made you nervous in the best of ways, knowing that you'll need a reprieve or you'll blush and stammer and she won't be able to get anything out of you.
She reaches for the book she gave you that awkward day when your sister called and flips it open to check and see if you're actually reading it, finding the worn leather strap that you use as a bookmark, as a reminder of how far you've come. Of a home that made sense for as long as it did.
A gift from your mom.
She runs her fingers over it, pulls it from the spine and looks at you with such fondness, such affection, your heart feels like it could burst.
"From the mitt my mom got me as a kid."
She smiles, nods slowly, and you wonder what she's thinking. She's always in your head, always predicting where you'll go or do or say next, always prepared, and you sometimes wonder if that's just her or if it's layers of trauma built up over having to be ready to flee at any given moment.
But you surprise her sometimes, like this, like your letter to him, and you're never more proud than when you do.
There are quotes everywhere in that book, so powerful, so poignant that you underline and block, wanting to savor it, wanting to savor her through it, wanting to keep little pieces of her because she'd given it to you for a reason and you're learning her through it.
You know what page she's looking at, you know which line her finger is pressed without even having to look just in the way her breathing has changed and she's running her tongue along the corner of her mouth.
"Look at everything always as though you were seeing it either for the first or last time."
You'd underlined it three times and in the margin written simply: Greta.
---
Greta,
There's a way that you look at me when you think I'm not paying attention, but I do, more than you know. You look at me like it could be your last, as if you're memorizing everything so you'll remember forever. But you also look at me like I'm important, like I'm beautiful, like you can't look away. But then I feel it and I've never experienced being valued like that, desired like that, please never stop. Please never look away.
---
"You really are lovely, you know that?"
She smiles.
You blush.
She knows everything you can't say.
---
Greta,
You listen more than you speak, and I think you see more than you actually look. Your words are careful and crafted and eloquent in a way that makes me want to know every thought you have, hear every book and poem read by you.
Most of them were probably written for you anyway.
Maybe I'll write a few myself just in case.
I love how soft you are when you speak to me, and I love how full of life you are when you speak to everyone else. You are so effortlessly witty, laughing with you makes me as happy as any game of baseball I've ever played, because getting to have this with you is my walk-off-homerun-bottom of the ninth-to win the world series kind of dream come true. Well, second to that, but it's very close.
---
"Would you want to go have a catch with me?"
She eyes you curiously. "You mean play catch?"
You roll your eyes. "Why does everyone... okay sure, yes, play catch."
"Okay..." She says it in that way that she does where she's offering you the safe space to elaborate if you want to, gentle and encouraging. "Like right now?" She looks out the window at the sun, low and dusky, turns and looks a little confused because while you are teammates, you've never really enjoyed the game casually together.
"You've never thrown the ball around at sunset? My dad and I used to do it after dinner, there's something magical about it. And we could.. if you wanted... steal a little more time..." You sigh because you don't want to sneak off to fool around, don't want to put pressure on her, you just want to spend time with her, effortless unchaperoned quality time but you're fumbling this as you always do, still nervous to ask her for things, to know where you fit with her.
"Well, I don't see why not."
Her fingers run over your bookmark one more time before it's slid back in place, closing it gently as she runs her fingers over the smooth front of the cover reverently, turning to set it right back where she found it.
She adjusts it a little, angling it just right as if she'd never disturbed it. Reaching for the ball that's inside the glove to its right, she rolls it between her palms, grips the seams and winks as she tosses it to you and watches you as you catch it so effortlessly and sighs.
You focus on the way she puts on the glove, the contrast of her nails, red and refined as they slide into and out of the worn leather as she adjusts the fit, so sensually it'd almost be comical if she hadn't just been straddling you, if you didn't know her, if you didn't want her.
You run your own fingers over the seams, trace them and count them and remember a time when things were different. A different life. A different you.
Where baseball was an escape, a dream, not your life.
And then you look at her, hair haloed with sunbeams, skin glowing and radiant and breathtaking, and you wonder how you ended up here, wonder how that led to this, and when you feel so much gratitude, all you want to do is rush to her arms and hold her close.
"Did you ever play with Charlie?"
Oh.
You close your eyes and exhale deeply, slowly so you don't let that frustration out at her. She always does this, she always brings him into this life here, always reminds you, always takes special moments between the two of you and tells you that you are his and she is not yours and someday you're going to run back into his arms and hers will be empty.
The past is prologue to her.
But it doesn't have to be if she'd listen.
---
Greta,
You bring up my husband an awful lot for someone who helped me write that letter, who said I needed to tell him how I felt, but there's this part of me that wonders if you're paying attention. Sometimes I wonder if you can see me and realize I'm not like your others, that I could be real, that I could choose you. I wish your instinct isn't to run and push and keep me at arms length because I could. I want to, I just need to figure out how.
It is not September and I am not them.
Because as awful as this makes me, I don't think about him until you mention his name. I don't think of him when I'm kissing you, or when you're inside of me, and more and more every day I see less of him in my tomorrows.
Maybe this is too honest, but I can't keep pretending that the pain in your voice when you say his name doesn't stab me back, doesn't make me hate that it hadn't been you all those years ago.
Doesn't make me feel trapped.
---
You're sure you look like you've been slapped in the face, sure that the tears that are stinging your eyes as you try desperately to lock them in there's no crying in baseball are visible because she stands, removes the glove from her hand and kneels beside you so she's closer to your level, waiting for you to look at her.
"Hey, what happened?" She pulls at the seams of your pants, nervous and unsure, looking to the door because she looks like she wants to wrap you into a hug but doesn't know if she can.
She speaks of him so casually, her mask far too practiced, perfected, to even show an ounce of resistance to his presence, to him inside this, that it doesn't even seem to phase her. And sometimes it hurts.
Only you know it does phase her, you know her eyes gloss over and her voice drops or raises an octave depending on what she's bringing him into. Thats sometimes she can hardly get through what she's saying about him, can never look you in the eyes when she does. You wish she'd stop betraying herself by doing it, even if she's protecting herself, you wish that there wasn't a countdown or a third. A persistent reminder hanging over you.
Always a barricade that you wish you hadn't placed, could remove.
You blink a few times and take a breath, her eyes are still on you, cautious and calm, and you focus on her fingers as they smooth gentle circles on your skin, trying to ease whatever is wrong with her closeness.
"No, Greta, baseball was never for him. It's something special that I wanted to share with you."
She picks up the glove and holds it to her chest, hugging it a little so you know that it does matter to her, she just didn't realize that it was a gesture, an act of intimacy, that it was you trying to share your love language with her.
Baseball and time and dusk.
"I'd like that."
Reaching to help pull her up from the floor, she smiles at your strength, your chivalry, smiles that you can so effortlessly bring her to her feet when she's used to being the stronger one. You laugh at her shock and bring her hand to your lips, quick and easy, and start for the door, tossing the ball to her without looking, and you can hear the tiny gasp as she scrambles to grab it.
"You coming?" She stops adjusting her shirt, pauses with her fingers wrapped around the tie as she folds them into a knot, glove and ball now tucked under her chin.
You turn and give her a wink, turn and look at her, drag your eyes up and down with purpose as you bite your lip and you'd swear you heard her smile. "I like watching you too."
And then out the door you go, leaving her a little stunned as you head down the stairs and out the front door, sparing a glance to your teammates, your friends, as they prance around the living room clinking bottles and laughing.
You belong here. This is real.
----
You stand on the front porch, breathe deep with the night air as it cools and the crickets chirp off in the distance. You smell the smoke as Sarge stands at the corner and waves, going back about her business and staying out of yours. You lean on the railing, taking everything in, wondering how this can possibly be your life and you wait for her to join you out there, wait for her to collect her own glove and meet you.
Wait to show her how this can feel, what this can mean if she'll just stop a moment and live in one with you.
----
The smoke is still billowing from the corner of the porch as she emerges a bit later, she likes to space out your entrances and exits from each other when she's nervous, when she isn't in control of the situation, and she sees you already out in the grass as she comes down the stairs.
You're crouched down stretching your hamstrings from the game earlier and she shakes her head as she throws your mitt at you.
"You're not gonna make me pitch are you?"
"Are you saying if I asked you to, you wouldn't do it?"
She squints her eyes because that sounds a little familiar, to a different day, a different you, because time is measured now in before she kissed you and after, and she shakes her head with that soft smile again because you surprise her in just how well you listen and value what she says.
"Just catch the damn ball, Shaw."
"Oh, it's Shaw is it?"
Her eyes flash. She remembers. Of course she does.
The ball lands in your glove as she shakes her head slowly, fondly, and you give her a wink as she adjusts the fit on her fingers and shifts her weight as she gets ready for you to throw it back. But you're too lost in the way that she moves and the set determination on her face as she's slipped into baseball mode.
It's her hands as she throws them into the air because you're taking too long, always so serious, always so focused. God.
"Would you relax , this is supposed to be fun ."
You do, like watching her. You like the way her mouth relaxes into a smirk when the ball collides with her bat. You like the way she punches her glove when she's bored, when she's honed in and waiting. You like how she looks majestic when she misses, as if she'd meant to do that all along. There are so many nuances about her, so many that you're afforded as you're crouched down behind her watching.
---
Greta,
Sometimes... all the time, I like to watch you too. Being your coach is an easy excuse when we practice, from the dugout during games, but I watch because the way you play is mesmerizing. There's softness to your power, your hitting stance is proof of that. But as your catcher I see every movement you make at the plate and sometimes I can barely focus enough to catch the ball.
As much as there's power, there's also a grace about you. Your grip and your swing and when you connect with the ball make my heart race. The way you follow through, the turn of your ankle, the way your body flows out of your swing is like watching ballet. The way you don't just hit the ball you lift it, sending it farther than if you weren't intentional about your game.
When you drape your bat behind your shoulders and then look at me I can barely breathe. I'll never understand how you know exactly what to do to make me feel you over every inch of my body.
I love the way you play this game, I love getting to be your coach, I love that you teach me more than I could ever teach you, but most of all I love getting to be your teammate. You're an incredible ballplayer, number nine.
---
"What're we doing out here, Carson?"
The ball lands centered and perfect, leather to leather as the sound echoes in your ears, settles and calms you, baseball is aesthetics, after all.
You pluck it from your glove, spin it to find your grip, hold it up, look at it, look at her with an answer without words, take a step, take a breath and toss it back to her.
Precision.
"Just wanted to throw the ball. No harm in... practicing."
Her eyes roll dramatically and you can see them from twenty feet away, don't be boring, she'd say, if she were the kind of person to repeat the cute, clever things that come out of her mouth.
While you're lost in that moment, the one of you telling her you just wanted to be friends because you were scared, the ball comes back to you hard and fast and you barely catch it with the help of your sternum. "Hey!"
It's the way she shrugs, casual and unbothered that makes your heart race, but when you go to lob the ball back to her, you catch the red hue, her lipstick, a kiss firmly pressed between the seams, a message, a moment, a memento, just like the book.
Tangible, real things that will help keep her close to you later.
You're doing the same, words scattered across pages upon pages, little ghosts that don't have to haunt, that don't have to hurt, but instead heal. She just doesn't know it yet.
Her and baseball, your forever kind of loves.
---
Greta,
I never really thought about destiny until I met you. That first night, as your fingers wove through my hair, in that black night dress that looked like it was made just for you. You told me, you said, I think you're running towards your destiny. And maybe I am. Maybe I was. Maybe a part of that, maybe one neither of us are ready to name yet, was to find you.
There are pieces of me that you see, that you've always seen. Pieces that you sow and water and then nurture with the softest of hands and gentlest care. They flower and bud and bloom and you watch them with awe, like they could be yours, like they'd fit perfectly in a bouquet next to you. I feel them inside me every time you look my way, every catch of your eye, every flash of want and affection and hope. You spoke of my destiny, but I think I might see some of yours too.
---
You slip it into your back pocket, bending over to grab another at your feet that you found in the flower bed while you waited for her and she stands there with her hands on her hips, affection in her eyes.
Her, her, her.
It gets to her four more times before Sarge clears her throat and taps her wrist letting you know it's time to wrap things up, curfew and dark and time getting between more of it alone with her.
She turns and acknowledges the intrusion, telling her that you'll both clean things up and head inside in just a minute. Sarge eyes you both with a shake of her head and walks away, giving you some space that you're forever grateful for.
Sometimes she seems to get it without getting it.
Greta is inches away from you quicker than you can process, grabbing you by the hand with a quick look behind her as she tugs you in the direction of the backyard, of quiet and dark and alone. You allow her to lead, certain that you're either about to be pressed against a wall or about to have to tell her what this was all actually about.
Either or works. Both are even better.
---
Greta,
I think a lot about walls. I think about pushing you against them. I think about our first kiss and our many after that. Being surrounded by you, pressed impossibly against you. I love that we can shut out the world like that, create our own, safe and sturdy. Us.
---
You were half right, her back is pressed, brick and cement and texture as she's gripping you and pulling you closer to her and kissing you, rushed and desperate in a way that you're definitely used to.
She does this when she's telling you something without words, but usually not in a semi-public place where anyone who steps out for a smoke could easily see. Her fingers are in your hair and then in your belt loops tugging you closer, trying for more friction, breathy and rushed and delicious.
"What're we uh..." She kisses you again, whimpering a bit when you bite down on her lip, just to defy her a little because she's trying to keep your mouth occupied, trying to keep your brain that way too, it seems. Sometimes you like having the upper hand.
If you're not careful, you've learned, eventually this will lead to her grabbing your hand and sliding it down the front of her pants, taking her pleasure, encouraging you to take it with her, and while you're never one to refuse, you try very hard to be respectful of her rules and regulations, her stipulations, her fear.
You pull back a bit, resting your foreheads together, relishing in the calm and the quiet, crickets and exhales and her when she wraps her arms around you fully, burying her face in your neck as she inhales, pressing a kiss at your pulse and holding .
She smiles against your skin and you feel it everywhere.
---
Greta,
There's a way that you taste after twilight, the first press of your lips to mine, after a day of sweat and sweetness and you. You reach for me in the darkness, you pull me close and breathe me in and you smile.
I can never see much of it, but enough of it that when I fall asleep I dream of you. dream of the way your body ebbs and flows in perfect rhythm with mine. I dream of the sounds you make when I drag my teeth along your collarbone, when I press into you a little more forcefully or push you a little harder against a barroom wall, or a table, or a tree.
I dream of the way my fingers have learned the curves of you, I dream of the way your bottom lip trembles when I pull away, when you weren't quite ready to stop kissing me, when you wanted more.
You think I don't see you? You think I don't notice when your façade breaks and you allow yourself to crave? I can feel the desire, your pulse gives you away, your eyes, hungry and wild. I can taste it on your tongue.
There's a way about you, sultry and sweet, but there's another now, one you may not recognize but you will... mine.
---
She kisses you one last time, you can always tell when it's the last one because she lingers and hums into it, lovely and sweet and warm. "Guess we got a little carried away?" It's framed as a question and you're not sure what's going on, why she's shifted, why she suddenly feels so small.
"Don't we always?" You laugh a little, trying to lighten the mood. It doesn't work. "Hey, are you okay?"
You feel the nod more than you see it, only the lights from the window offering any illumination. She takes a deep breath and releases it, preparing. "I saw what you wrote."
"Yeah, you're always doing that aren't you?"
She shrugs. "I like your handwriting."
Your nails dig in a little at her waist and she jumps, unprepared, not on the same banter wavelength as she usually is, something is off. "Bullshit, you like snooping."
"You still haven't told me what you were writing about." It's clipped and quiet, vulnerable where her last syllable raises an octave and she stops breathing in the middle of the word. Laced with emotion where she sounds much younger, much more vulnerable, much more in need of a hug.
You close your mouth and sigh, meet her eyes and chew a little on your bottom lip, which she watches, licking the corner of her own. She can never help herself, even when she's nervous. "You."
It's obvious she's shocked at your honesty, maybe a little taken aback, that you'd deem her worthy of your pages, of meaning more than your time spent physically together, of an existence now unambiguously stapled into your life as important.
The fear runs through her, briefly, but you catch it only in the recoil of her body just an inch, immediately trying to figure out where it'd come from. You remember the last thing she'd read a letter of yours, to him, remembered that it said goodbye, that you couldn't do this anymore. That you had to leave.
She thinks it could be an ending.
---
Greta,
This was never just a fling for me.
It was always a choice, and that choice was always you.
You push back at me, never believing your worth as more. As everything.
You are not borrowing time or borrowing another person's wife. We are building this piece by piece, together.
You are allowed to choose and want and exist in harmony with love. You do not have to let it go.
You can be chosen, you can be desired, adored, because you're you. Because you deserve to be. I want to do every one of them with you. Please let me.
This isn't just an... adventure to me. It's a lifeline, and you should know.
I remember what you told me after the game how you said whenever you let yourself want something it never really goes right. But we did, we are, and while I was selfish then and didn't hear you, I do now.
I want to make this the one time something goes right.
---
"Your smile, mostly. And your butt. And maybe some other parts of you." It's as clever as you can come up with with her fear held in the palm of your hand and you hope it's enough, enough of a deflection, enough to keep her heart safe. "But also that it feels good to be seen by you and that I never want you to stop."
Her body relaxes as she lets out a slow breath, releasing a little of her anxiety, learning to feel safe inside of your heart. You forget sometimes that even though she has history, she's either had it ripped from her heart or been left behind with nowhere for it to go, haunted and harrowed, and navigating the trauma of those things are now part of the journey.
Part of the honor of being here and hers and in this.
She stops. "Never?"
You shake your head with enough force to convey your sincerity. "Never ever."
It won't be long before Sarge comes looking for you, she's been generous with your time so Greta sighs and presses her lips to yours one more time, hands to your shoulders as she makes space for herself away from the tree.
She drags her hand down to grasp for yours in the dark and leads you back around the side of the house, hand in hand, slow and steady, turning to look at you, connect with you, skin to skin, soul to soul.
It's a gesture, it's a tiny permanence in a life and an environment that offers you little and you're grateful she's thoughtful enough to understand.
----
The door closes and locks quietly and she looks to the girls hanging all over each other and dancing and then to you and then upstairs. She knows what you'll want to do, knows that she interrupted your train of thought and you'll be restless if you can't finish whatever it was you were up there doing.
"Do you wanna?"
"I'm gonna..."
With a shake of your head at being exactly on the same page at the same moment, you point and a nod to upstairs letting her know where you're going and why, so she doesn't feel like you're leaving her, that after sharing time and intimacy and together, you're not leaving her behind, not squandering her gift.
"You'll come down when you're finished writing in your little notebook?" But this time it's said with fondness, with a dopey grin and lovestruck eyes. She checks once more and drags her fingers over the back of your hand, a casual sort of brush that couldn't be seen as more than accidental but makes you feel things everywhere.
She's been giving them to you a lot lately and it's reaffirmed you, sustained you until either or both of you are ready to speak the words, put a name to what all of this means.
---
Greta,
I'm in love with you.
---
"I won't be long, save me a beer?"
She smiles, smiles, smiles.
You take the steps two at a time, wanting to hurry, wanting to get back to her, jogging a bit to the end of the hall and toss your glove onto your bed. You remember the ball, kiss stained and for you and you take it from your back pocket and slip it into your desk drawer for safe keeping.
You settle down into your chair, grab some leftover stationary from the front desk leftover from that letter, and decide to rewrite history.
---
Greta,
Thank you for stealing moments with me, for making memories, for being real. Thank you for seeing me, for staying and listening, for being encouraging even when you think I'm weird. I know sometimes you'd rather touch, rather I focus, but you always meet me where I am. I'm grateful that you're you and you found me and we're right where we're meant to be. I meant when I said never ever. It feels good to be seen by you. Please don't stop.
Xo
Carson
---
You wonder if you should sign your name to this, wonder if it'll break one of her rules, but if it's something permanent that she can keep with her, you don't even care. She has to know that you were telling the truth, that you'll never say goodbye if you can help it. That this was not that.
It's sealed with a kiss, faded but permanent, mostly hers leftover from before, leave a drop of your perfume over your name, fold and slide it into an envelope. It's maybe a little ridiculous, but she deserves pageantry, she deserves a love letter, she deserves to have someone leave something for her that lifts her rather than chisels away.
She deserves someone to love her fully, and all the little nuances that entails.
You make sure everything is in order in case Shirley comes up early, that nothing is left out or where she could ever snoop to find, and you shuffle down the hall to Greta's room. You place the letter under her pillow, rub your wrist where you'd dabbed some of your perfume near where she sleeps and head downstairs to celebrate with your family.
Because she is and they are and it's everything.