Page 35 of Up In Flames

EPILOGUE

O ren told me to wait for him outside our apartment, but he didn’t say why. I knew we were going on a date. Oren had taken care of everything, he’d said. All I had to do was wait for him and look pretty.

When I’d mentioned doing something for our anniversary, Oren had grinned at me, kissed me sweetly on the mouth, and told me he’d already planned it. Was I worried? No. But curiosity was eating me alive.

Oren had moved his things into our apartment months ago and given up his other place.

It wasn’t a hardship for him to move into a location that didn’t require him to use an elevator.

He swore he was fine, though, and that he even took the elevator at work again.

Sometimes. Just not that specific elevator.

A vaguely familiar car turned the corner and pulled up to the curb. I watched as Oren stepped out from the driver’s side and crossed the distance between us, his lanky legs carrying him swiftly to me.

“You drove? You’re driving?” I took Oren into my arms and kissed him soundly. He hadn’t driven since the accident that took his friends from him over a year ago.

“I’ve been working on it with Hal for months. I wanted to surprise you.” Oren’s happiness made him glow. “I’ve been dreaming of picking you up for a date for months.”

“Oren, I’m so proud of you. I would have helped you if I’d known you were wanting to get back behind the wheel.”

“I know you would have, but I wanted to do this my way. I wanted to see your face when I pulled up, and it was worth it.” He brushed his lips against mine, teasing me with a taste of him before pulling away.

Color rose in his cheeks and motioned to the car.

“Let’s go, because if you keep looking at me like that, we’re going to miss our reservation. ”

He walked me to the car, even opened the door for me before jogging around to the other side.

I watched him as we pulled away from the curb. His confidence behind the wheel had changed him in some not insignificant way. The accident had taken so much from him, but it was like he’d finally reclaimed all that he could in spite of his loss.

The way we’d met hadn’t been ideal, and more than anything I wished that we could have met some other way.

That his friends were still alive. That he didn’t still sometimes get migraines because of the accident.

I wished I could have known Byron and Rita, but Oren had started talking about them more often now.

“Are you going to stare at me the whole way?” he asked, a cheeky grin tugging at his mouth.

“You don’t seem to mind the attention.” I let my gaze drift down his form, taking in the dark gray Henley he wore, paired with slacks of a similar color.

He’d recently cut his hair, but I missed having something to run my fingers through.

Only the top was long now but, God, he looked amazing.

He looked happy, and my heart—and my ego—swelled because I knew I was a large part of that.

“I had to pull some strings, but I wanted some extra privacy for our date while still making sure it was going to be special.” Oren’s words didn’t confuse me until he pulled into the fire station where I worked.

“Oren? Um. I’m confused.”

He turned the engine off and looked at me, mischief dancing in his expression. “Trust me.”

Oren got out and jogged to my side of the car to open the door for me.

After coming out, the guys at the station had gone out of their way to do little things to show me that I was accepted.

The first step had been the rainbow flag that had mysteriously appeared outside the fire station one morning.

When I asked who put it up, no one confessed, but the captain had a certain sparkle in his eye that suggested he might have been the one.

Then the guys decided that our next community fundraiser would go to support a local LGBT organization dealing with youth homelessness. To further my surprise, when my parents heard about it, they rallied members of their new church and joined in on the cause.

Oren took my hand and tugged me forward and into the station. A few of the guys smirked at me, but it wasn’t malicious. Mostly, they looked pleased that I likely looked so fucking befuddled.

Then Oren took me up the first flight of stairs to the second level where the living spaces were.

He led me down the hall to the last door, the one with the sign indicating it went to the roof.

Oren opened a door that should’ve been locked and he beamed at me, probably the hugest smile I’d ever seen on his face.

“I told you I know a guy.” He dropped my hand and went up first. I followed, admiring the way he filled out a pair of slacks.

“Your ass is delicious in those pants.”

Oren’s laughter echoed in the stairwell. “Flattery will get you everywhere.”

He twisted a second doorknob that also definitely should have been locked, and he stepped through, holding the door open for me. “Right this way, please.”

The roof of the station had been transformed.

A table, with a white tablecloth, a centerpiece of roses, and two place settings sat off to the side.

The place settings had those silver domes over them to keep the food hot.

A bucket of ice sat to one side and there was a bottle of something chilling.

Oren didn’t drink—he probably would never drink again.

It was one thing that he had no interest in resuming, but he never stopped me from doing it.

“Oren,” I said, finding my voice. “This is unbelievable. You did all this? For me?”

He tugged me over to the table and pulled out my chair. “I always imagined picking you up for a date, but everywhere I could think of to take you wasn’t good enough. It wasn’t special enough. I wanted to bring you somewhere we could also have a bit of privacy.”

I didn’t have to wonder why Oren wanted privacy. Already I was as hard as a brick, and the way he looked at me certainly wasn’t helping.

Oren leaned in and kissed me sweetly. “Sit, please. We need to eat before the food gets cold.”

I waited until he had taken his seat across from mine before lifting up the dome.

“Breaded pork cutlets, twice-baked potato, and corn ribs,” Oren supplied with a smile.

“Did you make this?”

He nodded. “Downstairs. The guys let me access the kitchen.”

Oren and I had started cooking together soon after he moved in. It was kind of our thing now. I loved sharing that space with him, and he loved it when I taught him things. Like how to bread a pork cutlet and twice bake a potato, the sneaky bastard.

He reached for the bottle that was chilling in the ice and lifted it out. “Sparkling cider?” he asked, his smile dimmer and a little sheepish.

“That sounds perfect.” I didn’t care what we drank. I’d have happily sipped on tap water.

Oren filled our glasses and motioned for me to start eating.

Soft music started to play, and his shoulders relaxed a bit as he tucked his phone away. Clearly someone had a few tricks up his sleeve.

Everything was cooked to perfection, and I did my best to pay as much attention to the food as I could, considering all the trouble Oren went to cooking for us.

“You know, usually when I’m on a roof, I have to worry about it collapsing. This is much nicer. No open flame.”

He laughed, then balled up a napkin and threw it at me. “I don’t like to think of you on burning rooftops. Way to ruin the ambience.”

“The ambience is fine. The company is even better, though. I wonder if my date has planned a nice dessert, or if he is a nice dessert.”

Oren had clearly wanted privacy for some reason, and my lizard brain could only conjure up ones that involved us getting naked together. Or at least semi-naked.

He glanced away as though he were shy. “There might be plans for after dinner,” he hedged and delicately scooped out a bite of potato with his fork. The music in the background was some sort of love song playlist, each song was soft and sentimental.

“Thank you for this, Oren. For everything. It’s beautiful.”

“Have you been up here before? It has a great view.” He took another, smaller bite of potato.

“I haven’t, not that I can think of. It’s not like we have a lot of reasons to be on the roof.”

“The view from the other side is the best. Did you want to see?”

The firehouse was an old building, the kind with a wall that went around the roof’s edge. It wasn’t quite waist height, but it offered some kind of security against accidentally falling off.

Clearly Oren had something he wanted me to see.

“I’d love to.” I stood up from the table and followed him to the side of the building that he’d talked about. The city did look a bit different from up here, and it was rather nice to be on a roof that wasn’t burning underneath me.

I scanned the horizon, keenly aware of Oren’s gaze fixed on me and not on the view. And then I saw the fire truck pull out of the station and my gaze dropped down to see what was going on. Even up here, I’d have heard the alarm, but there hadn’t been one.

The truck made a wide turn, and I saw a banner with the words ‘say yes’ strung along the side of the vehicle.

“They insisted on being part of it.” Oren sounded apologetic and I turned as he lowered himself down on one knee. “It was the only way I could get their blessing. William Allan Dorsey, will you marry me? I had this whole big speech planned, but the only thing that matters is your answer.”

I’d dreamed of a moment like this my whole life and now that it had been given to me, my eyes burned, and my chest was so tight I could barely get the words out.

“Yes. Of course I will.”

Oren nearly fumbled the ring getting it out of the box and slipping it onto my finger. Then there was a second ring that he pressed into my palm before giving me his hand. My hand shook as I put the ring on him.

“I never thought I’d get to have this,” I told him.

Ever since I figured out I was gay, I’d all but abandoned the idea of having a forever with someone.

I’d thought all my dreams had gone up in flames, but then I met Oren.

He loved to tell people that I rescued him, but the truth was he rescued me right back. I’d been living half a life.

“You do, Will. You get to have anything you want. Everything. You deserve it.” He grabbed a fistful of shirt and hauled me close, slanting his mouth over mine as shouts and whistles erupted from the ground below.

Our kiss was consuming, breathtaking, and maybe a bit too hot for the guys below who shouted at us to get a room.

Laughing, we broke apart and waved at our adoring fans.

We returned to the table, but didn’t sit down. Oren pulled his wallet from his pocket and counted out a couple of bills. “I promised Briggs’s nephew a tip for clean up.”

As he pulled the money out, something caught my attention, and I reached for his wallet.

“Is that…”

Oren pulled out the other half of the photo strip and showed it to me with a sheepish smile. “I keep it with me all the time.”

He watched, dumbstruck, as I retrieved my wallet and pulled out the other half of the photo strip. “Me too.”

Oren gently took my photos from me and tucked them in his wallet; he then gave me the photos he’d held on to. “We can trade back at our next anniversary.”

My voice was gruff when I managed a response. “I’d like that.” I pulled Oren close. “What’s next on the agenda?”

He looped his arms around me and gave me a sly grin.

“Well, I figured if you said no, we wouldn’t be in the mood for anything, and if you said yes, we wouldn’t be in the mood for anything we could do in public. So, nothing.”

I let my hands slide down to grip his ass and pull him closer.

“You’re so fucking perfect.”

“I try.” Oren wriggled a bit and pulled his keys from his pocket and handed them to me. “Take me home?”

“Always,” I promised.