I Pretend You're Mine

14. Ridiculous

"Tonight is the night," Lucy said, holding Tim's hands in the middle of the reading room of Dave's bookstore.

Tim gathered her meaning quickly. "Oh. Really?"

"Yes, really."

"W-What changed?"

She sighed and squeezed his hands. "Nothing...and everything."

"That's helpful," he joked with a scoff.

A smile broke out on her face, and she pushed up to stand on her tip toes. "I mean...I just realized that we're in a really beautiful place."

He nodded in understanding. That was a very eloquent yet simple way of describing their budding relationship. To bide their time until "tonight" and to avoid getting too caught up in the excitement of their plans for the evening, he knew they both needed a distraction. "You wanna keep reading the book?"

"Sure." She agreed and moved to return to the couch that they had been seated on before Aunt Amy and Dave had arrived and interrupted their reading. Lucy felt him settle in next to her and then brush his lips against her shoulder. "Tim?"

"Mhm."

"You make me happy."

He angled his head to look up from where he had rested on her shoulder. "You make me happy, too," he replied softly.

Lucy kissed his forehead and resumed reading their book with Tim curved into her side.

♡ ⋆˙⟡ ♡ ˙⋆ ⟡ ♡ ⋆˙⟡ ♡˙⋆ ⟡ ♡

Tim was so comfortable cuddled with Lucy, lulled by her voice as she read to him, and soothed by her fingers in his hair; it was all so perfect that he almost fell asleep. The sound of a phone ringing brought him out of his state between waking and sleeping, but he refused to move from where he was tucked into her side.

"Hello, this is Chen," Lucy answered the call. She listened as the town mechanic provided her with an update on her car's repair. After a long exhale, she looked down at Tim who was nuzzling her neck adorably and said, "My car's ready. Looks like we can go home." His arm around her midsection tightened.

"Can we...can we leave in the morning? Stay for one more night?" He wondered.

"I'd like that." She smiled.

He kissed her at first lightly, but it quickly evolved into something heavier. "Baby," Tim whispered against her lips, his voice somewhere between a question and a plea.

The seriousness in his tone caused her to open her eyes. "Yeah?" Lucy asked quietly.

He wrapped his fingers around a corner of the book and took it away from her grasp; she let it go willingly and simply watched him set it down on the coffee table in front of them. Maybe they didn't have to wait until tonight. He cupped her cheek as the rest of his body hummed. Tim just needed to find the words.

Lucy turned to face him properly as she read his mind easily. "Right now?"

"We don't have to," he started to pull away.

"I want to." She dragged her pointer finger up and down his bicep while leaning in but resisted the urge to kiss him even though the energy between them crackled. Lucy wanted to take a moment to look into his eyes and see how they dazzled with desire for her.

He paused. Was this really happening? Tim dove into her for a kiss and put his hands on her back to help her lay down onto the seat.

With their lips connected, she blindly searched for the hem of his shirt as he climbed on top of her but decided to abandon the task of removing it in favor of kissing him some more. Their movements were so slow and gentle. Lucy wanted them to take their time and Tim seemed to feel the same way. His hand dipped beneath her shirt and smoothed over her bare stomach, and she started getting dizzy from how his tongue so expertly explored her mouth while he tenderly touched her skin.