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“I guess we’ve got a whole new house to christen,” I muse. “And there are lots of rooms.”

David’s eyes darken, and there’s that familiar shift where my practical, buttoned-up farmer transforms into the man who once pinned me against the kitchen counter because I wore his flannel shirt and nothing else to make pancakes.

“There are lots of rooms,” he echoes.

Our house is bigger than we technically need for just the two of us. But it’s our plan to fill some of the empty rooms with kids, whether it be our own or ones we foster. I can’t wait to see David as a dad. I’ve already watched the way he tends to the orphaned lambs, his gruff exterior melting away as he gently coaxes them to take the bottle. I’ve seen how he kneels to eye level to talk to Lance and Emma’s two-year-old daughter Lily, how he helped her plant carrot seeds in the vegetable garden with infinite patience.

Some people are just natural parents waiting to meet their children.

“Talking about our new house, do you think we should actually get inside?” David asks. The late afternoon sun catches in his eyes, highlighting the tiny laugh lines that have deepened since we’ve been together.

“Sure. If you’re not going to carry me, I guess holding hands and stepping across the threshold together is the best alternative.”

“That works for me,” he says, fishing the keys from his pocket. He holds them up, sunlight catching on the metal, turning them momentarily golden. “Ready?”

I place my hand over his, feeling the familiar roughness of his skin. Together, we guide the key into the lock, turning it with a satisfying click.

The door swings open, releasing the scent of fresh paint. We continue to hold hands as we step across the threshold.

Inside, the walls are that soft gray David pretended to hate when I painted my weatherboards and the kitchen window perfectly frames his new vegetable garden. My purple gate has been repurposed as our garden entrance, weather-beaten but still defiantly bright against the Canterbury landscape.

I nod out the window. “Pepper looks happy in her new paddock.”

Because yes, Pepper the lamb grew up to be Pepper our pet sheep, who now produces her own lambs for us to dote on every spring.

Lance mocks us constantly about how two farmers with eight thousand sheep between us have sheep as pets, but if it wasn’t for Pepper escaping her paddock, who knows how long it would have taken my loveable grump to get his head out of his ass?

Of course not many people can say that their relationship was helped by spying on New Zealand rugby’s most bitter rivals kissing each other. Not that we’ve ever shared that part of our story.

I still love holding it over David’s head how I figured out what was happening between us two years before he did.

I’d just broken up with my latest boyfriend, James, the week before. James was a dentist, and he’d been a nice guy, and I was beating myself up again for always falling for people who seemed like a match on paper but couldn’t hold my interest past the three-month mark.

I’d been in a bad mood all day trying to figure out why my experimental organic fertilizer was turning my best pasture into something that looked like a nuclear testing site. Three different soil experts had given me three completely different opinions, my online research had yielded nothing but contradictory advice, and I was about ready to admit defeat and go back to the commercial stuff that made my skin crawl with environmental guilt.

I’d just arrived back at the house, and when I saw my grouchy, finicky neighbor had turned up, no doubt to berate me about some farming practice I was doing wrong, my mood had soured further.

David was leaning against his truck, his dark hair slightly mussed and his brown eyes fixed on me with their usual disapproval. Even annoyed and covered in a day’s worth of farm grime, the man was unfairly attractive. It was unfair how someone with such a permanently furrowed brow could still look like that.

“Your sheep are getting into my clover paddock again,” he’d announced without preamble, following me onto the porch. “Your southern fence line has got more holes than my granddad’s socks.”

I hadn’t had the energy for a snarky reply. “I know. I’ve got materials on order, but the supplier’s back ordered until next month.”

David’s eyebrows had knitted together in that way that made him look perpetually disappointed with the world. “I fixed it this morning.”

I’d stopped halfway through unlocking my door. “You what?”

“Fixed your fence.” He’d shrugged like it was nothing, like he hadn’t spent hours doing a job that wasn’t his responsibility. “Used some of my spare posts and wire. Should hold until your order comes in.”

He’d bent to retrieve something from behind my porch steps. It was a wooden crate filled with vegetables from his garden. Heirloom tomatoes in three different colors, those stubby Italian eggplants I’d mentioned liking once over beers at the pub, and right on top, a bundle of purple asparagus.

“You grew purple asparagus?” I asked, staring at it dumbly.

“Yeah, well.” His ears turned pink. “You said at the farming conference dinner last year that the regular kind was boring.”

As I stared at the asparagus, something had shifted inside me, like tectonic plates rearranging. I remembered that conference. I’d been drunk on mediocre wine, rambling about how everyone should experiment more with heritage varieties. David had sat there in silence, seemingly uninterested.

Except he’d been listening. Really listening.