***
We were sitting right in front of the fire, our limbs tangled.
“How old are you?” I asked. “And don’t say ‘older than you.’ You’ve given me that answer before.”
He laughed. “Did I say that?”
“Yes you did. Now answer the question.”
He pushed his hair off his forehead. It was almost like he was nervous to tell me. “I’m 23.”
“Hmm.” Yup, I was right. Miller wasn’t a boy who had no idea what he wanted. He was a man. And 23 wasn’t that much older than me at all. Ever since my mom got sick, I felt like I was aging double time. According to that logic, I was pretty much in my twenties too now. And I wasn’t just some kid confused about what I wanted. I knew I wanted him. “So I guess you were 22 when we first met?”
“Yeah.”
“Your ‘older than you’ response back then was a little pompous then, don’t you think?”
“I just didn’t want you to get any wrong ideas.”
“What kind of wrong ideas?”
“Oh…I don’t know. I didn’t want you to think that you could climb into my bed. Or kiss me. Or anything like that.”
I laughed. “Well, that backfired pretty hard.”
“You’re very persuasive.” He hooked my leg over him.
“Am I?” I sat up so I was straddling him. “That’s good, because I really want to know your first name.”
He laughed, but didn’t tell me what it was.
“So…what is it?”
“Nope.”
“Nope is not a name.” I stared down at him. He’d stopped making eye contact with me. If anything he looked more nervous about this than the age thing. “Why won’t you tell me?”
“Because I like when you call me Miller.”
“I promise I’ll still call you Miller. Honestly, it would be hard to stop calling you that at this point. Just like you have a hard time not calling me kid.”
“How about you just keep calling me Miller and I won’t call you kid anymore.”
“No deal. Tell me your first name.”
“I don’t like my first name. And you won’t like it either.”
“I like everything about you.”
He laughed. “You won’t like this.”
“Oh come on.” I leaned forward, knowing perfectly well I was grinding against him. “Knowing your first name is all I want for Christmas.”
“I thought thatthat thingwe did earlier was your Christmas present.” He putthat thingin air quotes.
“Ha. Ha. Very funny. If anything that was more of a present to you.”
“Is that right?”
