bobby
a few days later
We’d had three funerals in nine days. The last of them was Tristan’s aunt.
My parents and I sat with Tristan in the small chapel and supported him.
He hadn’t spoken much since then. But I was there for my fiancé in any role he wanted me. If he wanted to make love to me, I was there. I was that for him if he wanted a shoulder to cry on.
I didn’t know what I would be today. I saw him taking a bag of trash to the trash can outside the front door of his aunt’s unit as I got out of my car. He smiled and waved as I walked around the back of my car, took the stack of pizza boxes from the passenger seat, and crossed the street to meet him.
“Hey,” I said, jogging up the stairs to the front door.
“hey,” he answered, putting one hand in his pocket. The other was out waiting to be thrown around my shoulders. I kissed him, and to my surprise, he held me there and kissed me back for more than a few seconds. There was even tongue.
I hadn’t spoken to or seen him since the funeral. He had wanted space to sort out his aunt’s affairs. And I had given him that.
But this morning, I got a text asking if I could pick up some pizzas and meet him at the apartment at around three in the afternoon. Thankfully, I was allowed to finish work before.
“How are you?” I asked, looking up into his gorgeous blue-grey eyes.
“I’m good. Better, now you’re here. Come in and see what I’ve done with the place.”
I smiled and let him lead me into the apartment.
Tristan’s aunt had left the apartment to Tristan in her will. And as it turned out, to everyone’s surprise, she had owned the entire block. She had been a secretive woman. Not even Tristan had known about the apartments.
He and his aunt had initially lived on the ground floor, so it was a surprise when Tristan led me to the top floor of the three-floor six-condo apartment complex. He pushed open the door to the one on the left and held it open for me.
The apartment block was in a sought-after real estate spot in the heart of downtown Summervale. It overlooked the ocean and was across the road from the cafes, boutique shops and restaurants.
I hadn’t been in this apartment, but Tristan had the French doors to the balcony wide open. The sea breeze made the sheer white curtains billow like ghosts into the empty apartment—the room smelt of cleaning supplies and sea air. Seagulls squawked below on the sand, and waves crashed in the distance. I glanced around the spacious apartment. It had a modern kitchen, oak wooden floors, and a fantastic ocean view.
“You cleaned all six apartments by yourself?”
“Nah. Three were already vacant. The lady next door is elderly and is getting too old for all the stairs. She will be moving out to be with her daughter next week. When she’s gone, I have big plans for that apartment.”
“Oh, yeah?” I asked, placing the pizzas on the kitchen counter. I went and looked throughout the rest of the apartment.
“Yeah. I was thinking of knocking out the wall adjoining both and turning the top floor into one big penthouse for myself and a certain sexy police officer. What do you think?”
I paused in the doorway to what would have been the master bedroom and turned to face him. I gasped.
“Seriously?”
He took a step toward me.
“Yeah. It will be a while until it’s all finished and ready, of course, but I was thinking you could move in with me downstairs in the meantime?” he said casually.
I didn’t hesitate. I ran at him and jumped up, wrapping my legs around his waist.
The momentum sent us crashing into the wall in the hallway. Our lips crashed together.
“I take that as a yes?”
“Dammit, Tris, everything’s a yes with you. I love you.”
“Thank goodness. I was preparing for life as a bachelor here. It’s a sick pad, hey?”
I kissed him to make him shut up.
“Don’t you dare.”
Thankfully, there was an air mattress in one of the bedrooms, and we crashed onto it, not wasting another minute tearing each other’s clothes off.