Page 53 of On My Side (Quiblings #3)

Audrey

Playlist: The Bones - with Hozier | Maren Morris, Hozier

The next morning, I drool as Ren gets ready for work. I don’t think we went more than three hours sleeping before one of us woke the other, needy and feral.

It was fun, but now I want to stay in bed and see how desperate I can make him. I mean, this man is standing in front of a mirror, whistling the Bluey theme song while tying a neon pink tie with swirling music notes around his neck.

My ovaries are losing their shit, and I think I get the breeding kink thing.

“Call in,” I demand for what must be the six hundredth time.

He grins at me through the mirror. “But sweetheart, the winter concert is in two weeks, and it would be unbelievably cruel to put a poor sub in that position.”

“I need you to get me pregnant immediately,” I respond.

He laughs. “Okay, well, I’m otherwise occupied at the moment, so that will have to wait.

” He walks to the bed and sits on the edge.

I’m still blissfully bare and tangled in the sheets that smell like him.

“You can stay, if you want,” he offers before kissing me.

“Listen to that audio we made last night again…”

My nipples harden at the thought and I sigh. “Since you’re being a responsible adult, I probably should, too.”

“Adulthood is a scam,” he murmurs, pulling away from me. I don’t let him go far before grabbing the front of his shirt and pulling him in for another deep kiss.

Ren takes me home on his way to school, and I force myself to shower before going to the inn.

Doing such routine things without him feels wrong—he’s ingrained himself into so much of my life.

I’m finding that after years of choosing to be alone, of choosing not to let anyone get close enough to become part of the day-to-day, life isn’t as exhausting when I spend it with the person who makes it better.

When I open the door the night before Thanksgiving, there’s Ren, homemade pie in hand, and a cat carrier on his shoulder.

“Hey,” he says, stepping through the doorway and leaning in to kiss me.

I let his lips press to mine, for just a moment, before I take the pie from him and Piper runs in for her routine catnapping.

“Mom made the pie,” he tells me as he walks into the kitchen. “It’s blueberry. She insisted I bring it.”

His hands wrap around my waist, trapping me between him and the countertop. He ducks his head to kiss the side of my neck, one hand moves to grip my hip, and the other slides down the front of my belly.

I stiffen, and without giving it much thought, snag his wrists and step out of his way, pulling my big, threadbare t-shirt down farther.

“Aud?” he asks, and I hate hearing his worry.

“Sorry,” I say, turning to him, but refusing to meet his eyes. I try to smile as I wrap my arms around my middle. “Just warm in here because I’ve been cooking. The pie sounds great though, Piper’s gonna love it.”

He doesn’t seem to buy my lie. His gaze looks me up and down, and I feel nauseous that he sees me the same way I saw myself in the mirror this morning.

“What’s wrong?” he asks quietly, because of course he knows something is wrong.

“Nothing,” I lie again. I continue making the cheesecake we’ll eat for breakfast tomorrow, hoping he’ll drop it. “Was Piper happy you brought Leia?”

He’s quiet when he stands beside me, beginning to tackle the dishes piled in the sink. Then, he speaks again. “Talk to me, sweetheart,” he encourages softly. “What’s going on?”

Tears threaten to spill. How annoying that he’s able to see through me.

“It’s not important,” I say, voice trembling.

“ You’re important and so is the way you feel. Please, Aud? I want to try to understand.”

“When I got home, I took a shower,” I whisper, “And when I looked in the mirror, I hated what I saw. Most days I’m fine, but some days, it’s hard. And when I think about how you could have any woman you wanted but you’re stuck with me…”

“ Stuck with you?” Ren turns me around, confusion on his face.

He cups my face. “Audrey Elise,” he says sincerely, “it’s the honor of a lifetime to love you.

I know I said I’d love you no matter what your body looked like, and that’s one thousand percent true, but I do love your body.

All of it. I understand you don’t sometimes, and that society has ridiculously impossible beauty standards for women, but you’re a goddamn goddess, sweetheart. ”

I sniffle. “I doubt goddesses feel like this.”

He grabs my hand. “Come on.”

“What are you doing?” I ask, confused as he pulls me out of the kitchen and down the hallway. He opens my bedroom door, closing it once I’m in the room.

“I’m not doing anything,” he says simply, turning to face me. I bite my lower lip as I scan his body. God, this man calling me a goddess when he’s in front of me looking like that? All grumpy-looking with his unruly hair in his face and slutty little glasses on and sleeves rolled up to his elbows.

He looks positively scrumptious.

“You, however,” he continues, “are going to be stripping.”

“What?” I squeak.

“Can I show you how I see you?” he asks gently, stepping forward and rubbing my arms. “Do you think we can look at your body in a nonjudgmental way, sweetheart?”

I hate the idea. I hate it and I want him to know I hate it.

But more than that, I want to feel better. This shame I feel is a vicious cycle: shame about my body, then shame about feeling a certain way about my body when I have a daughter who looks to me for guidance.

“I can try,” I say, mouth dry and voice hoarse.

He presses his lips to my forehead and it feels like he’s trying to siphon out the bad thoughts in my brain and replace it with the way he feels about me.

I strip out of my clothes, and when I'm just in my underwear, Ren steps behind me and plants his hands on my shoulders. He gently guides me until we’re in front of the full-length mirror attached to my wall.

My stomach churns as I run my eyes over my body, my eyes immediately drawn to the lines and dimples, the rolls and dips. The cellulite on my thighs and upper arms, and the way the waistband of my underwear digs into the fat of my stomach. They scream at me, reminding me why I’m not good enough.

Ren gathers my hair, sweeping it over to one side to rest his chin on my shoulder as I instinctively raise my arms to cross over my body.

He catches my hands, lacing our fingers together and bringing one hand up to kiss the back of mine.

“Can you tell me what you don’t like?” he asks without an ounce of judgment in his voice.

I blink back tears. “I… my stretch marks. They’re everywhere.” I watch in the mirror as his eyes move down my body, stopping at my breasts, my hips, my thighs.

“What else?” he asks.

“The rolls on my sides and back,” I tell him, voice wobbly. He doesn’t say anything, only surveys my body.

“Keep going.”

“There are these dimples right above my elbow. And my breasts are so saggy and my belly so wrinkly. It hangs down, too.” I want to point to them, but Ren’s grip on my hands is tight.

I hate that he knows if he lets go of my hands, I’m going to cover up.

“And my thighs and upper arms jiggle and have cellulite.”

He squeezes my hands encouragingly. “It sounds like your brain is being really fucking mean to you.”

I let out a sob, the dam finally breaking. “Yeah,” I say, voice cracking.

He turns my body towards him, wrapping his arms around me and holding me as I cry. He doesn’t say I’m wrong for feeling this way, but lets me feel with no restrictions, no conditions.

After a few minutes of him rubbing my back and telling me that it’s okay to cry and to feel this way, I take a step back and wipe my eyes.

“I feel like such a bad person, such a bad mom,” I admit, shame washing over my body.

“I’m raising a daughter whose body will change, and this is how I am about my own changing. ”

He puts his hands on my waist and pulls me in a little closer, pressing his forehead to mine.

“You are not a bad mom or person for feeling very human things about your body,” he tells me, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear.

“You’re a person doing her best in a world that idealizes a certain type of body.

It’s not your fault you don’t fit in a tiny box, the box should have space for bodies like yours, and so many others. ”

“Says the male beauty ideal,” I say tearily, hoping my joke lands. I poke one of his abs.

“Hey.” He cups my face and adjusts my head so he’s looking directly into my eyes.

“My body isn’t better because society says it is.

My body isn’t better, period . It’s a body that could change, like yours has.

Like my sisters’ have. I am not better because my body type fits in the tiny box, and no one is worse because theirs doesn’t.

You’re not magically going to love your body, even if I do.

That’s okay. You don’t have to love it. I just don’t want you to hate it, because your body…

” He exhales heavily. “...Aud, you make me want to go back to church, because whoever created you deserves to be worshipped as much as you do.”

He drops one of my hands, tracing his own over the stretch marks.

I inhale sharply, and his eyes find mine in the mirror.

“I love these marks,” he murmurs, eyes intent on mine.

He’s taken to wearing his glasses more often and it makes me weak in the knees.

“I love them because they represent your body changing to accommodate the growth of one of my favorite people in the world.”

Hearing him refer to Piper as one of his favorite people in the world brings tears back to my eyes.

His touch is gentle as it moves upward, resting over the loose skin on my belly, his fingers spreading to cover it. “She grew right here. Your body did what it had to to keep her, and you, safe. It expanded with your universe to make room for Piper.”