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Hope tastes like grocery store wine and sounds like someone saying yes when you expected them to run.

“Dinner,” I suggest as we sit in her hotel room, hands still linked, both of us pretending this isn’t the most terrifying conversation we’ve ever had. “Tomorrow night. My place.”

“Your place?”

“I can cook. Actual food, not just protein shakes and microwave oatmeal.” I pause, realizing how this sounds. “Not that this is some elaborate seduction plan. I just thought—neutral territory might be good. Somewhere we can talk without housekeeping interrupting.”

“Your apartment is neutral territory?”

“More neutral than a hotel room where we’re both thinking about how this all started in the hotel room in Vegas.”

She laughs, and the sound loosens something in my chest that’s been tight for months. “I wasn’t thinking about that, but okay. What were you planning to cook?”

“Something that won’t poison us. Beyond that, I’m improvising.”

“I like improvising.”

“Good. Because I think we’re about to do a lot of it.”

The next evening, I stand in my kitchen surrounded by ingredients I’m not entirely sure how to combine, wondering if there’s a correlation between cooking ability and relationship success. Chelsea’s supposed to arrive in thirty minutes, and I’m realizing that “I can cook” was optimistic at best.

My phone buzzes. A text from Weston that can wait.

I set the phone aside and focus on not burning dinner. Chicken, pasta, vegetables—basic combination that hopefully won’t embarrass me completely. The wine is better than what I usually buy, candles are lit but not overwhelming, music playing quietly in the background.

It looks like I’m trying. Which I am. Desperately.

The knock comes exactly on time, because Chelsea has always been punctual.

“Hi,” she says when I open the door, and the simple greeting feels loaded with eight months of distance.

“Vegas.” I step aside to let her in, noting how she moves through my space—careful but curious, like she’s cataloging details. “Wine?”

She smiles at the nickname. “Please. And fair warning, I stress-ate lunch, so if I can’t eat much, I’m blaming nerves instead of your cooking.”

“Noted. Though my cooking might actually be terrible, so keep your options open.”

“I thought you said you could cook.” She cocks her head at me.

“I had to get you over here somehow.” I smirk.

She’s wearing jeans and a sweater the color of autumn leaves, hair down instead of pulled back, looking like someone who decided to be comfortable instead of armored. It’s the most relaxed I’ve seen her since Chicago.

“Your place is nice,” she says, accepting the wine glass. “Very... adult.”

“Was that in question?”

“Hockey players aren’t exactly known for interior design skills. Too busy beating other guys on the ice.” She takes a sip of her wine.

“I’m not doing that anymore.”

“No?”

“No, but if you’re impressed by this. You should see my man cave.”

“You have a man cave?”

“I have a spare bedroom with a TV and a couch where I go to sulk after bad games. Calling it a man cave makes it sound intentional instead of pathetic.”

“I’d like to see this pathetic man cave.”

“After dinner. If you survive my cooking.”

We settle into easy conversation while I finish preparing food that’s actually edible. Chelsea perches on a barstool at my kitchen island, wine in hand, watching me navigate around the stove with probably more confidence than I actually possess.

“You know,” she says, “this is the longest conversation we’ve had without discussing my father, your anger issues, or professional ethics.”

“It is?”

“I want to talk about all the normal relationship stuff we never got to figure out.”

“Such as?” I ask.

“Movies we love, books we hate, whether you’re one of those people who puts pineapple on pizza.”

“I am absolutely one of those people.”

“Deal breaker.” But she’s smiling when she says it. “What else?”

“I read biographies exclusively. I think romantic comedies are lying to people about how relationships work. And I have an irrational fear of birds.”

“Birds?”

“Unpredictable. All that flying around, dive-bombing people for no reason. It’s chaos with wings.”

“Says the man who plays a sport where people regularly check each other into walls.”

“That’s controlled violence. Birds are just... random.”

“That’s hilarious,” she smiles at the thought for some odd reason.

I change the subject. “Your turn. Deep secrets and irrational fears.”

“I watch cooking shows obsessively but can barely make toast. I cry at dog food commercials. And I’m terrified of being ordinary.”

“Ordinary?”

“Average. Forgettable. One of those people who lives a perfectly nice life that doesn’t matter to anyone.” She pauses, swirling wine in her glass. “Phoenix has been good for me, but sometimes I look around and think, ‘Is this it? Is this all I’m going to build?’”

“What would extraordinary look like?”

“I don’t know. Something that helps people in ways that last. Something that matters beyond my own satisfaction.” She meets my eyes. “Something worth the cost of getting there.”

Dinner is better than expected—chicken that’s cooked through, pasta that isn’t overcooked, vegetables that resemble their intended form. We eat and talk and laugh, and it feels surreal how easy this is when we’re not carrying the weight of professional obligations and family expectations.

“Okay,” Chelsea says, finishing her second glass of wine, “your turn for deep fears and secret shames.”

“I’m afraid I’ll never be anything more than my worst moments. That people will always see the fights and suspensions and forget that I’m human, that I’m trying.”

“What else?”

“I’m afraid you’ll realize this is a mistake. That nostalgia and good intentions aren’t enough to build something real.”

“And?”

“I’m afraid I love you more than you’ll ever love me, and that imbalance will eventually destroy whatever we try to build.”

The words hang between us, too honest and too loaded. Chelsea sets down her wine glass carefully.

“Can I tell you something?” she says quietly.

“Always.”

“I’ve never loved anyone the way I love you. It terrifies me how much I want this to work.”

“But?”

“But I’m here. In your kitchen, eating dinner you cooked, having the conversations we never got to have. If that’s not love, it’s the closest I’ve ever come.”

The space between us feels charged, but different than it used to be. Less desperate, more intentional. Like we’re choosing each other instead of just reacting to each other.

“Chelsea,” I say carefully.

She reaches across the table, fingers brushing mine. The contact sends electricity up my arm, but I don’t pull away. Don’t overthink it. Just let myself feel the simple pleasure of touching someone I love who’s choosing to touch me back.

“You sure?” I ask, because consent matters more than want.

“I’m sure I want to try.”

“Just try?”

“I’m sure I want to stop running from the only person who’s ever made me feel like myself.”

I stand, moving around the table to where she’s sitting. She looks up at me, eyes bright with wine and something that looks like hope.

“Hi,” I say softly.

“Vegas.”

She smiles.

I kiss her forehead first, then her cheek, then finally her mouth. Soft, careful, like relearning something precious I thought I’d lost forever. She tastes like wine and promises, and when she kisses me back, it’s with the kind of tenderness that breaks something open in my chest.

“Bedroom?” she whispers against my lips.

“You sure?”

“I’m sure I love you. I’m sure I want to be here. Everything else we can figure out as we go.”

My bedroom is dark except for streetlight filtering through curtains. We undress each other slowly, carefully, like we’re unwrapping something fragile. Her skin is warm under my hands, familiar but somehow new, marked by months of distance and growth.

“I missed you,” she breathes as I trace the line of her collarbone. “More than I let myself admit.”

“I know. I missed you too.”

I seek permission by dropping to my knees for her. I carefully remove her clothes as she runs her hands through my hair.

“Sit,” I command.

She sits on the bed, and I wrap her legs around my shoulders.

“I’m going to take my time with you, Dr. Clark.”

I don’t give her a second to reply, flicking my tongue on her clit and then fucking her opening with my tongue. She tastes so fucking good. I get hungrier, more aggressive the more noise she makes.

“Reed,” she cries out, so I finger her.

Her back arches off the bed. I pump my dick a few times. Fuck, she’s everything.

I suck one last time, making her orgasm. Then I push my dick against her entrance. Every nerve ending comes alive. She cries out my name with clenched teeth.

“Oh, fuck,” she breathes, and I’ve never seen anyone so beautiful.

She’s finally allowing herself to enjoy this, enjoy me. Just like it was in Vegas. This is the most connected I’ve felt to her. She starts moving her hips on my cock, riding me like I’m a fucking horse. Bucking her hips, up and down and round and round.

I lean down and kiss her, needing her to understand how much I’ve missed this, craved her, need her. God, I need her like I need air.

“You’re so fucking beautiful,” I whisper. “You have no idea how grateful I am that you flew out here. I’ve missed you so fucking much.”

I kiss her and she starts moaning in my mouth, a second orgasming ripping through her body. I pound into her harder, unable to withhold my come any longer.

I come alongside her, grabbing her face and kissing those luscious lips.

“Okay?” I manage.

“Perfect. God, you feel...” She pulls me closer, legs wrapping around my waist. “Don’t stop. Keep going.”

I fuck her until she begs me to stop, relearning rhythms and responses, building toward something that feels bigger than just physical release. When she comes for a third time, it’s with tears streaming down her face, and I follow her over the edge with her name breaking apart in my throat.

Afterward, we lie tangled together, breathing hard, both of us processing what just happened.

“Are you okay?” I ask, because she’s still crying quietly against my chest.

“Yeah. Yes. Just...” She wipes her eyes. “It’s been a long time since I felt this safe with someone.”

“Safe?”

“Like I don’t have to perform or be perfect or earn the right to be wanted.” She looks up at me. “Like I can just be Chelsea and that’s enough.”

“It’s more than enough. It’s everything.”

She settles back against my chest, and I hold her while she cries out months of loneliness and fear and the overwhelming relief of coming home to someone who sees all your broken pieces and wants them anyway.

“Reed?”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you for waiting for me to come around.”

“Thank you for coming back to me.”

I kiss the top of her head.

Outside, Boston settles into night around us. Inside, we hold each other like people who’ve found something worth keeping, something worth the cost of getting here.

Tomorrow we’ll figure out logistics—her life in Phoenix, mine in Boston, how to build something real across distance and time zones. Tomorrow we’ll face whatever complications come with choosing each other again.

Tonight, we just hold on and let ourselves believe that love might actually be enough.

That some things are worth fighting for.

That we might finally have learned how to stay.