Page 28 of Winging It with You

No, I’m not going to let this irrational fear of mine be the reason we miss out on the prize money. “I…I just need a minute.”

“Of course.” Asher keeps his hand on me, and it’s unnerving how much I like it.

“How much farther ahead is everyone else?”

“Don’t worry about them,” he says, craning his head up the wall to where our competition is. “We’re fine. But while we wait, why don’t you tell me about your mom?”

His question catches me entirely off guard. “What…why?”

“Come on,” he pries. “What’s the first thing that comes to mind when you think of your mom?”

Flower pins.

“I guess she would always wear these pins on her jackets. Flowers,” I share, easily picturing the different fabric florals she’d adorn her outerwear with.

Asher smiles. “What else?”

It dawns on me that my mother will eventually be seeing this play out when I stare directly at the camera mounted on Asher’s helmet.

The last thing I want to do is make it appear like I don’t want to talk about her.

I try to hide the twinge of annoyance I feel toward Asher and the fact that he’s decided now is the time to bring this up.

On television. “She’s a simple woman,” I say, adjusting my grip on the rope.

“Simple but timeless and one of a kind.”

“Take a step with me,” Asher says. “Take a step and tell me what makes her one of kind.”

Oh. He’s distracting me.

And weirdly, talking to him—about this, of all things—is working.

I take a step and so does he. “I guess it was her quiet stability. Her guiding hand that led me to grow up in a home with someone I could count on,” I add, taking another step. He mirrors me.

“That’s really special,” he says, not breaking eye contact.

It really was. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve realized that like most parents, her everyday sacrifices went mostly unnoticed by all of us.

Her vintage and well-worn style wasn’t because she genuinely enjoyed sifting through the piles at our local consignment shop like she’d said.

She’d done that so my sister and I could start each school year with the new clothes we thought would help us fit in.

“Come on, take another step with me.”

Or how on every first morning in January, she’d declare that this was finally the year she and my dad would take that belated honeymoon to Europe they’d been talking about since 1987.

But each year like clockwork, Elise would discover a new, and expensive, hobby, or I would outgrow my basketball shoes.

One of us needed braces or wanted to vacation with a friend.

“It was special. She used to say she was happy to live a small life so that we could live a big one,” I say, a small lump growing in my throat. “And it took me a really long time to understand what she meant by that.”

We’re moving in sync now—hand over hand, rung after rung—in an attempt to make up for the time I’d wasted.

“You’re doing so good, babe,” Asher says across the space between us, the pet name rolling off his tongue quite naturally as he continues his encouragement every step of the way. “We’re almost there.”

For the longest time, I haven’t felt like someone who needed encouragement.

Hell, I haven’t let someone get close enough for them to even have a desire to encourage me.

But coming from someone like Asher—smart and successful and a little all over the place in the best ways—I’m beginning to think it could mean something different.

Something more.

Like allowing yourself to need someone doesn’t automatically equate to weakness.

I glance up after a moment, my arms and legs feeling the strain of our climb, and see that he’s right, we’re nearing the top.

And as much as I’d love to continue a conversation of this magnitude while strapped to the side of an oversize slab of concrete, I pick up the pace, closing the distance between us and the top of the ladder with Asher following suit.

When we reach the top—our hands finally gripping the edge—and we’re able to pull ourselves up and over, a pair of production techs comes and begins removing the tether between us. But a more permanent one just might have formed on that climb.

Some link or invisible string tying our lives together.

Me to Asher.

And I like the promise of an us . Or at least I think I could. The weight behind that word and what it would mean nearly knocks me on my ass because wanting it—wanting it so badly with him —is really the only thing that matters right now.

Asher launches himself at me when he’s finally free, fitting himself perfectly in my arms, and I can feel his smile against my neck.

“Hi,” he says, leaning back to look up at me, but I tighten my arms around him so he can’t go too far.

“Hi.”

His eyes find mine and really hold them. “You did it.”

“I have you to thank for that,” I say, pulling him closer. “You’ve been saving me a lot lately, Bennett.”

Asher’s smile widens. “Some would argue you saved me first.”

But I’m interrupted before I can tell him I’d do it over and over again as long as it gets us to where we are now.

“If you two will step over here…” a voice calls from behind us. “And we’ll get you down.”

Down.

After the climb up, and now having Asher in my arms, I’d completely forgotten that we still need to get down somehow. I should have been paying more attention during Dalton’s not-so-vague opening monologue.

Hands locked, Asher and I walk over to the other side of the landing, where we’re met with another set of harnesses.

“Think they get some sort of sick enjoyment out of tying us up?” Asher asks, leaning in.

“I would,” I say with a wink, which makes him laugh. Maybe we should take some of these ropes back to the hotel room.

Asher and I are marionetted by the crew. Moved and adjusted and strapped in tighter and tighter. We stand face-to-face as we’re fastened to each other.

“We’re about to jump, aren’t we,” I ask, trying to mask my growing nerves with a smile.

“Looks like it,” Asher says, searching my eyes. “You okay?”

I nod—unconvincingly, I’m sure. “Mm-hmm.”

We’re escorted to the daunting ledge, shuffling awkwardly, and when we reach whatever spot has been determined we’ll leap from, thick red cords are attached to our harnesses. Our pending descent becomes more and more real in my mind, and all I can think about is my mom.

Either because of Asher’s questioning or, more honestly, I just miss her. And though she’s never done anything like this before, I just know she’d be fearless in a moment like this.

“Ready?” we’re asked, and I for one am certainly not.

Reaching up to place a hand on either side of Asher’s helmet, I adjust his head slightly so the lens of his camera is right on me and just hope that Arthur uses this clip when he’s editing it all together.

“Hola, mamá,” I say, speaking directly to her because I now know she’s watching. “Te extrano y te amo. This one’s for you!”

Asher looks back up at me when I’ve finished, a tenderness behind his expression. “You’re kind of amazing, you know that?”

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” I say, looking down and away from his compliment.

He reaches up and places a hand on my face, forcing my gaze back to his. “I do.”

His sudden honesty makes me swallow hard. “You realize you’re going to be the one to get us over the edge, right?”

He smiles. “I’ve got you,” he says and wraps his arms tightly around me. We’re practically fused together now, standing on the edge of this free fall. Which isn’t something I’ve ever wanted to do or would even remotely consider doing.

But here I am, doing it for Asher.

There’s the prize money, sure. But being strapped together on the edge with Asher Bennett is an added bonus.

Something changed on this climb.

Something I’d been hiding from for far too long.

And it took Asher’s prying nature to open my eyes to just how much I’d been holding on to that lingering familial baggage.

I look back in the direction we just climbed from and it’s as if this climb was some cosmic nudge for me to leave everything I’d been grappling with on the ground behind me.

“Whenever you’re ready,” one of the crew members shouts over the wind, and it almost makes me laugh, because it feels like I’ve been waiting a really, really long time to be ready for a moment like this.

This moment with him.

Asher finally places his lips to mine, a soft reassurance that we’re in this together, and before I can think about it for another second, we’re falling.

Oh, shit, am I falling.