Page 95 of The Rest is History
I stir, blinking away the confusion caused by that in-between moment of sleep and wakefulness. Soft silk strands brush against my chin and my senses are overcome by a powdery scent mixed with a distinct sweetness. I blink again, focusing.
Ezra’s soft hand, clenched in a fist now, moves upward in his sleep, opening to rub at his ear, and then he settles again. I hardly breathe, for fear I’ll wake him, but I can’t help the deep inhale.
“Hey.” Asher’s voice, low and gentle, carries from the door. I start to get up, but he holds out his hand. “No, don’t get up.”
He comes to stand next to the bed, dropping quietly onto it on the other side.
“I must’ve dozed off for a second,” I say.
“Tired?”
“A little.”
“You and Sawyer do hard work. He gets like that sometimes too. Tired enough to doze off anywhere.” He reaches over to cover Ezra with the baby blanket. “Are you okay?” he asks. I know the real question he’s asking, and I don’t know if I could ever love him more than I do right now.
“I’m okay, Asher,” I say.
“You would’ve been a good father.”
I gaze up at him. The dipping sun seeps into the room, bouncing off the walls behind him and landing right in his eyes, bright with happiness and also soft. A softness he reserves for me and Sawyer. The small upward tilt of his lips only lends to those beautiful eyes. I remember when his features were softened by youth and his smile was large and unbothered. He has always been handsome but now, as a man entering his prime, Asher is breathtaking. “You’re so beautiful, Ash,” I tell him, instead of acknowledging his words.
“You are too,” he says.
And we stay like that for a long time, with little Ezra between us sleeping soundly, the only sounds that blend in with the moment coming from low murmurs on the other side of the bedroom door and the lethargic settling of dusk outside.
“Do you really think so, Ash?” I ask eventually.
“Yes, I really think so.”
“My father said it’s best that I’m not a father.”
“Your father is a cunt, and I don’t want you to listen to another word he says.”
I look up at him again and his gaze offers no apology for his curse. The features on his face are drawn tight. And when he looks at me like this, he’s not the calm, gentle Asher I know. He’s a man, wronged once, and never again. He holds no power other than the power over his own life, and, I guess, it is all the power a man needs. And I know that Asher will never allow my father to control his life ever again. In that, there is a safety we never had as teenage boys. Now I know that if my father were to come between us again, Asher wouldn’t allow it. If only I could have the courage he has. To have that kind of power, that kind of agency, over my own life.
“Do you understand me, Reece?” His voice is steel. Cold and unyielding.
“I understand,” I say, his simmering rage covering me and hiding me away, and I don’t mind it. I want it that way. Asher’s hatred for my father is my safe place. I don’t have the courage to hate him like that.
When he speaks again, it’s so quiet I almost miss it. But I latch onto those barely spoken words like a drowning man. “You’re mine now.”
I am. I’m his. And I’m Sawyer’s, and they are mine and we belong to each other, equally and fully and this life is a life I don’t want to ever give up.
***
I drive back home – to Sawyer and Asher’s place – with Ash, following Sawyer’s truck.
My phone buzzes in my pocket several times. I know who it is, and I ignore it the same way I ignored the previous text that came in three days earlier.
My father isn’t known for his patience. It’s only so long that I can keep my head buried in the sand, pretending he and whatever he has to say don’t exist.
Later, Sawyer and Asher are outside on the back porch when I step outside. It’s a warm night. Linksfield is getting ready for nighttime. We are so far away from the next neighbor, it might as well be that we are the only people on the planet. The seclusion is right for us. No one to judge us here. To tell us that what we are doing is wrong or immoral.
Asher turns, lifting the hand holding his cigarette and touches his fingers to my hair, still wet from my shower. I still can’t believe how this disciplined, by-the-book man is also the one holding a cigarette and looking like the hottest thing on earth for it.
Sawyer pulls me to him, kissing me while Asher smokes, and I enjoy his mouth and the audience in equal measures. A moment later, he pulls away, takes Asher’s cigarette from his mouth and puts it into his.
“You smoke too?” I ask
