Chapter 7

Chapter

Seven

Adrian

I stared at the clean containers on my counter. Victor and the kids had brought me enough food for three dinners and three lunches. Every bite was delicious. Maybe even better than what Josh’s family used to serve on the holidays. I’d been so surprised that they thought of me that I hadn’t been sure how to react. I still wasn’t. Victor hadn’t brought it up since he told me to enjoy my meal as I scrambled into the house Thursday night after we walked the dog.

Now that I needed to give the containers back, I was a wreck. I was so unsure what to do that I’d texted my supervisor that I wasn’t feeling well and took the afternoon off.

Picking up my cell phone, I called Josh. He answered immediately. “Are you okay?” he asked, sounding panicked.

“Of course I am. Why wouldn’t I be?”

He huffed. “Oh, I don’t know. Because we generally only talk when I call you.”

That was fair. “I need your help.”

“Don’t tell me. You finally met someone,” he said in a teasing voice.

My back stiffened. “Maybe. Yes? No. I’m actually not sure.”

“Holy shit. I want to close my office door so you can give me all the deets.”

Geez. This was why I hadn’t told him about going for walks with Victor and his kids in the first place. He made such a big deal out of everything. “You know what? Never mind. I’m overthinking this. I’ll talk to you later.”

“Adrian, don’t you dare hang up the phone. Tell me what’s going on. I tried to call you on Thanksgiving, and you didn’t answer, and I’ve been worried ever since. Now you tell me there might be a man. You better tell me what’s going on with you.”

A part of me really wanted to tell him to mind his business, but this was Josh. He was the first person I told I was gay. He was the first person who ever acknowledged that the way my mother ignored me was messed up. He was the only friend I had who didn’t give up on me when I withdrew from life. It hadn’t been purposeful. Hell, until my walks with Victor, I hadn’t realized how inept I’d become at socializing.

“I’m not sure where to start.”

“At the beginning. I want to hear everything,” he said.

So that was what I did. I told him everything that had happened since we hung up the phone the day the family next door moved in. He only interrupted me with questions a couple of times, understanding me well enough to know that if he broke the stream of babble coming out of my mouth, I’d clam up.

“Now I have no idea what to do. Do I just throw them in a bag and hand them back the next time we walk Goldie? Do I keep the containers and never say another word? Like, I already said thank you once, and this feels like bringing it up again, and I so don’t want to do that.”

Josh cleared his throat. “Um, I guess I need to understand your confusion to help you figure it out.”

I fell back on the couch, put the phone on speaker, laid it on my chest, and covered my eyes with my forearm. “Well, first of all, why did they bring me food? They don’t know me. They’re not responsible for me. It’s just so… weird. Everything about Victor is weird. Don’t you agree?”

Josh kind of choked, which pissed me off because I knew it was him suppressing laughter. “Josh,” I growled.

He quit hiding it and chuckled. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Adrian, what happened to you? You used to have so much game.”

“I never had game,” I mumbled.

“Okay, true. But you used to date.”

“What in the world does that have to do with this? I only called for you to tell me what to do with these damn containers. Are you going to help me or not?”

“All right, all right. Sorry, grumpy Gus. Let me make sure I have the facts straight. They borrowed sugar and brought you brownies?”

“Yes.”

“Then their dog?—”

“Goldie,” I interrupted.

“Yes.” He cleared his throat. “Yes, Goldie fell in love with you.”

I thought about the light cream-colored golden retriever. I’d like to deny it, but that sounded pretty spot on. Except for Jeremy, I was pretty sure I was her favorite person.

“Based on your nonresponse, I’m going to take that as a yes. So Goldie fell in love with you, and then the father, Victor, asked you to start taking nightly strolls through the neighborhood.”

“Forced me to. It wasn’t like I purposefully started walking the neighborhood every night.”

He snorted. “That makes more sense with your aversion to exercise.”

“This is all beside the point. You still haven’t told me what to do with the containers.”

“The containers are easy.” I could picture him waving his hand in the air like my huge dilemma was a minor nuisance. “Return them full of some of your chili. It’s fall and getting nippy out, and nothing hits the spot like your chili. So tell me about the kids.”

“My chili? Are you sure?” I asked, already heading toward my spice cabinet to check if I had all the necessary ingredients.

“Yes. So the kids are Marissa and Jeremy?”

While I was distracted assembling all the ingredients, he drew one thing after another out of me about the children. He whistled. “You sure know a lot about this family.”

“Not really, they—” I stopped, thinking about all the details I’d just shared with Josh. Sure, I’d never been in Victor’s house, and I’d never invited him into mine, but we’d spent countless hours talking at this point. What started as a fifteen-minute walk had evolved into forty-five minutes, sometimes even longer. “How did this happen?”

“You mean, how did you make friends with your neighbors?”

I shook my head, more confused than when I’d first called Josh. How was this my life? When had I started looking forward to the sound of his truck pulling into his driveway? When had I automatically set my evenings to an alarm ruled by a golden retriever? What was happening to me? This all had to be Victor’s fault.

“What did I do?” Victor asked as I glared at him.

I scowled, flapping my hands at him. “You inserted yourself into my life on purpose.”

He smirked. “I wondered if you’d ever figure it out.”

I was so prepared to argue my point that I faltered and stared. “You mean you did do it on purpose?”

He extended Goldie’s leash toward me. “Let’s walk the dog.”

He never had me hold the leash before. In fact, he only let Marissa hold it for small periods of time with him right next to her. What the hell? I snatched it out of his hand and stomped down the driveway. He strolled along next to me without saying a word.

When I couldn’t take the silence anymore, I said, “I made you chili.”

“No way. Did you really?”

Staring straight ahead, I nodded. “I didn’t want to return the food containers empty. I made a large crockpot full this afternoon and filled up most of the containers. The kids will be home tomorrow, right?”

“They will, so I’ll be sure to save them some.”

Frowning, I said, “You better. It’s for them, too.”

“That was really sweet of you,” he said softly.

Sweet? Me? “It was no big deal. I made it for dinner for myself, too.”

He bumped his arm to mine. “Then you should let me come over, and we can have dinner together. Or you can come to my house,” he said quickly when I frowned.

I stopped dead in my tracks and turned to him. “Why? Why do you keep like, hanging out with me? Are you lonely or something?”

“Or something.” He smiled. “You might have missed it, but I like you.”

My heart raced. Surely, he didn’t mean… I started walking again. “You’re the first person I’ve ever known to enjoy being my neighbor. You really are weird.”

He grabbed my shoulder, stopping me. “Adrian, look at me.”

Tilting my head up, I peeked at him from under my eyelashes. “Yes?” I squeaked.

“I like-you-like-you. I enjoy spending time with you. I enjoy our walks, it’s cute how much my dog loves you, and I appreciate how good you are with Jeremy and Marissa. I want to spend more time with you and get to know you even better.”

“But… that makes no sense. I’m grumpy.” I waved an arm down the length of his delicious body. “And you’re you. You’re happy and fun, and you have great kids. What can you possibly see in me?”

He tucked a strand of hair behind my ear and cupped my cheek. “I happen to adore how grumpy you are.”

Scrunching my nose, I fought the urge to lean into his palm. “You really are weird, Victor.”

He smiled. “Too weird to hang out with? I was serious when I suggested we have dinner together.”

I gulped. “I mean, I guess we are eating the same thing.”

He beamed, showing me his back molars again. Gah . Why was he so damn attractive? I couldn’t believe he was smiling like this at me.

The inside of Victor’s house was lovely. It already looked more like a home than anywhere I’d ever lived. That included my mother’s numerous houses. “You’ve been quiet tonight,” Victor said before taking his last bite of his second large bowl of my chili.

I shrugged. “I’m always quiet. It’s you people who talk all the time.”

He snickered. “We are a chatty bunch, even Marissa.”

I fought a smile. “I have noticed she doesn’t have the same sunshiny disposition as you and Jeremy.”

He shook his head, chuckling. “No, she takes after her mother in looks and personality. It takes her a little while to completely warm up to people.”

I could tell by his smirk that he was thinking the same thing about me. “Nothing wrong with that,” I said haughtily.

I felt his sock-clad toe tap the top of my foot under the table. We’d both taken our shoes off at the front door, so it felt intimate in a strange way. “No, there’s not. Personally, I find it rather attractive.”

Clearing my throat, I glanced down at Goldie. She’d lain on the floor, right next to where I sat, until I finished eating and pushed my chair back. Immediately, she’d stood up and rested her head on my thigh. It was soothing to pet her while I struggled for something to say.

Did I find Victor attractive? Absolutely. Did I understand why he seemed to like me? Not really. But this wasn’t like we’d just met. We’d spent time together every day for weeks. Would it be silly of me to take a chance on trusting that he really saw something in me?

Feeling self-conscious, I gently lifted Goldie’s head and stood up. “Let me clear the table for you,” I said, picking up my bowl and drinking glass and heading into the kitchen from the dining room.

“I’ll help.” He followed close behind me with his own bowl and utensils, then I felt him on my heels as I went back to the table to grab the bowl I’d served the chili in. Both his hands landed on my shoulders, and I felt the heat of his body as he pressed his front onto my back. “Hey,” he whispered

“Hello,” I croaked back, even as I leaned into him.

He lifted one hand and pointed up. I tipped my head to follow the direction of his finger and gasped. Mistletoe.

He hadn’t put up the Christmas tree yet since they were buying a fresh one, but he’d begun decorating the house while the kids were going to their mom’s. There was a large wreath with red and black bows and silver bells hanging above the fireplace. He’d wrapped garland around the mantle and strung lights around the ceiling. I hadn’t noticed the mistletoe hanging from the entryway between the kitchen and the dining room until now.

“So what do you think?” he asked softly. “Do we honor the tradition of kissing under the mistletoe? It’s one hundred percent up to you.”

I held still as I sorted through all the pros and cons of pursuing this with him. I had to admit that if it turned out to be a one-time thing, and he didn’t want to hang out with me anymore, I’d be devastated. I hadn’t realized how lonely I’d been until he’d become a part of my evenings. So, I’d kinda rather have a friend than nothing.

Based on the rapid staccato of my heart, that might not be entirely true. I was attracted to Victor physically, but sometime, when I hadn’t been paying attention, I’d fallen for all the other little things about him.

Things like him taking down Jeremy’s ladder to make sure he understood that he didn’t want him getting hurt. The reason he’d picked this house instead of all the other ones he toured, simply because Marissa loved nature, and this one backed up to the woods. Then there was how he’d taken Goldie before he’d even felt settled in his new home yet. All because she needed a new home, and he knew the children would adore her and help him take good care of her.

And last, but not least, I couldn’t forget his kindness in bringing me home Thanksgiving dinner. I blew out a breath and turned slowly, tipping my head up to him. “I think I’d like that.”

The last thing I saw as my eyelashes fluttered closed was the skin around his eyes crinkling as his smile stretched from ear to ear as he lowered his head. My last thought was I didn’t know how, but I knew to the depths of my soul, that this would be the most life-changing moment of my life so far.