Page 36 of The Call of Azure (Unexpected Love #3)

“I promise not to climb on top of you like you’re a comfy couch cushion in the middle of the night.

But what if I need, like a pill or a tissue, and I’m too close to death to get it myself?

You’ve already succeeded in making me completely dependent on you tonight.

If you leave me on my own, I might fall off the side of the bed and have to crawl to the bathroom to get a drink, and I’ll forget to turn the water off in my sick and delusional state, and the sink will overflow, and the floor will cave into the shop downstairs.

Then Max will stop exhibiting Blue’s work and fire Ethan because they’re friends with me and I ruined her building, and you wouldn’t want to take that risk, would you? ”

My throat burns, and my head is throbbing from the rambling and whining, but the grin on Liam’s face means he’s absolutely giving in to my demands.

“God, you’re whiny when you’re sick, aren’t you?”

I stick my tongue out like a child. “Babe, I’m whiny all the time when it gets me what I want.”

That’s not actually true. I just don't know what to do with this kind of care. My parents were loving enough, but they both worked long, hard hours just to put a roof over our heads and food on the table. I was the oldest of three, so I spent my youth taking care of others, not being taken care of. When I was seventeen, my grandfather left Puerto Rico, and after weeks and weeks of begging and planning and family discussions, everyone agreed I could move with him, which was sort of the end of any type of parental care in my life. I loved my grandfather with my entire heart, and I still miss him dearly almost a decade after his passing. To this day, I have to fight back tears when unexpected reminders push their way into my life. The murmured clip of a song drifting over from a block away. The momentary scent of another old man wearing the same old man cologne he favored as we pass one another on the street. Such little things shouldn’t be able to stir longstanding grief back to life so easily, but grief isn’t linear, and it’s not something we get to control.

There are things I do to keep him close.

I still make espresso at home in his old beat-up moka pot from time to time.

I still watch old black-and-white movies on nights I can’t sleep well.

And when I’m feeling particularly alone, I’ll light one of his favorite cigars.

Not to smoke, just to wrap myself in the scent that will always remind me of him.

He was kind and loving and thoughtful. But he was pretty old-school when it came to caretaking, and at seventeen, he considered me a fully grown adult capable of handling myself.

I’d graduated from high school a year early, months before our move, so technically, he was right, I suppose.

I wasn’t a kid anymore by then. When I was sick, he’d make me a double espresso instead of the single I usually had as we sat and started our mornings together, and that was about it.

If I needed money for the bus or clothes, I worked for it.

If I wanted chicken soup instead of whatever we’d originally planned for supper, I’d make it.

Even though I’m sure others might think he was a bit cold at times, I’m thankful that’s the type of person he was.

I learned a lot from him, including how to be self-sufficient, even when things got hard.

His passing when I was twenty-one was unexpected, and I was suddenly all alone in the world, aside from the random phone calls with my parents and siblings.

It was either stay here and make it on my own or head back to be with the rest of my family.

I love them all well enough, I suppose, but my relationships with them have always been strained at best. I’ve always been the odd duck.

Just a little too loud, just a little too vibrant, just a little too snarky.

They’d have welcomed me back, I’m sure, but during the few years my grandfather and I lived in California, I’d managed to pull together enough of a life that I could take care of myself.

I had a stable job at a café, so I was able to afford basic things like food and rent on my own, and the dreams I’d conjured up of a bright and colorful life filled with friends and performances weren’t something I was willing to give up.

So I stayed. I took care of myself, and I started working toward fulfilling my dreams. I moved around a bit, trying different places in California and Vegas and even three horribly cold and frustrating months in New York.

When I landed in Seattle after reading a stray news article about its vibrant arts scene, I knew I’d found the place for me.

Then I met Blue, and for a time, I took care of him too.

Eventually, we took care of each other, but making homemade soup and bringing me three kinds of cough drops isn't exactly his forte.

He's definitely more inclined to show his love by bringing me a hundred dollars’ worth of Chinese takeout, kissing my temple, and then heading off to his glass studio.

I love that I’ve always been able to care for myself, and I love that I’ve spent the past year learning that I don’t need to continually look for a romantic partner to feel like my life is complete.

I know that spending most of my life being hung up on the idea of true love and charming prince doesn't really mesh with the me who believes in strength and self-sufficiency, but it just sort of took root when I was a kid, and I’ve never really been able to shake it.

I’ve changed a lot since I started examining my history and relationship with love a bit closer last year, but I don’t think I’ll ever stop appreciating the concept.

I’ll always be the kind of person who enjoys sappy rom-coms, made-for-TV holiday movies, or curling up with a happy-ever-after book, and I have no desire to squash that part of myself.

I just don’t feel like I’m incomplete without love anymore.

Not everything has to make sense. I'm complex. People are complex, and I wouldn’t want it any other way.

We’re allowed to feel and think and even be things that seem contradictory.

I really am happy with the life I’ve built for Cupcake and me.

But tonight, right this second, while I’m sick and achy and still missing the way it felt to have Blue in the house just doing his own thing when I wasn’t feeling well, I don't want this to end. I don't want to forget even a moment of the way it feels to have someone take care of my every want and need, and to do it without even having to ask. Even though we barely know one another, Liam seems to care for me so completely that he’s voluntarily given up his evening and risked getting sick himself. Yet, in the same breath, I'm terrified to remember the way this feels. Until this moment, I’ve never really known what it’s like to be doted on, and if I remember this in the morning after all the restless sleep and foggy brain and cold pills, then things will be different.

After all, I’ve never had this before, so I’ve never had a reason to miss it.

Tonight, Liam has changed that. He’s changed everything.

I know that whining and sticking out my tongue and begging him to stay is just a way for me to shift my emotions so I won't break down in tears and ask to curl up in his arms. So that he won't find me weak or needy. So that what I’m offering is a playful, teasing kind of whining, and he won't think to look any deeper. If he doesn’t look any deeper, then he won’t find whatever it is about me that makes everyone leave.

He has every right to leave, of course, and I know that it will happen eventually.

It’s not like we’re dating or even really friends.

I’ve tied him once, we’re working on a performance together, and that’s it.

It’s not like I’ll get to keep him in my life when our time performing together comes to an end.

But tonight, while he’s here all smooshy and kind and thoughtful…

I'm not ready to watch him walk away just yet.