Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 78043 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 390(@200wpm)___ 312(@250wpm)___ 260(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78043 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 390(@200wpm)___ 312(@250wpm)___ 260(@300wpm)
“Yeah, but he just kept looking at me strangely and asking me if I wanted to know what grocery stores he’d gone to as a kid.” Dean seemed to realize how weird that was but he shrugged and kept going. “Um, don’t tell him you grew up going to something like a Dollar Store or one of those last remaining Kmart’s that took forever to die, but any place else seems to be fine.”
“Is that why he won’t let us go to Aldi?” I just rolled my eyes when Dean nodded. “I’m not going to ask. I don’t care.”
Dean made a noncommittal hum. “Yeah, I couldn’t figure that one out either, so I just moved on from it since it’s not some kind of trigger or limit for me.”
There was probably something that tied into his preference for Target over Walmart too, but we’d figure that out later. We had enough on our plates just mentally getting ready to talk about our sex life with his mother.
Honestly, that should’ve been the part I was more stressed about, but it was looking like the easiest.
“Probably the best decision.” Because we wouldn’t understand the answer anyway. “I don’t want to know if going to Target is the equivalent of some kind of religious experience.”
Dean barked out a laugh and felt happier as he snuggled tighter against me. “Then my meltdown in the board game aisle was probably blasphemous.”
That would not have surprised me.
“You didn’t have a meltdown.” Turning, I kissed his head and pulled him closer. “You explained when you reached your limit and told us that you needed space. You did a good job. I was proud of you.”
It could’ve gone all kinds of fucked, but we’d all remembered the communication rules we’d set up and he’d done the right thing.
“Sometimes it feels like…I guess, like I should be able to control my frustration more.” Dean sighed, sounding disappointed in himself.
“That’s not how I see it at all.” I thought he’d done great with how stressful it’d been. “First of all, we’re in college and most of our relationships have been fairly casual or on the easy side of things. Cute dates in high school and no-stakes drama kind of stuff. This is grown-up even if it’s not just a vanilla relationship.”
Somehow we’d ended up in a serious relationship.
I wasn’t sure how we’d gotten there but I wasn’t going to bury my head in the sand about it…and that was why I’d spent an insane amount of time thinking about it over the past week.
“We’re board game and Olive Garden serious, dude.” When Dean started to snicker, I couldn’t help fucking with him. “But if that ends up meaning we’re engaged or something, who’s going to explain the real world to his parents?”
Groaning, Dean hid his face against my neck. “As long as you take the sex part, I’ll take the accidentally ending up engaged part.”
I couldn’t decide if I wanted to laugh or groan along with him. “I’m pretty sure you were supposed to tell me that I was insane.”
He scoffed. “Okay, but that would’ve probably been lying.”
Dean might’ve had a point.
“We’re too young to get married in our cultures and…and we’re not allowed to get engaged until we can provide for a partner.” Making sure he had a list of reasonable outs made me feel better even though it should’ve made me feel ridiculous. “And we need to make sure we’ve learned enough to make him happy in the long run.”
Dean sucked in a breath like he’d just been hit over the head in a cartoon. “I can’t tell his mother that we can’t get serious until you’ve learned how to…apply pain properly.”
He was insane, but that was my favorite part about him, so I nodded. “Deal. I will handle that part if it becomes necessary, but it’s a line of last defense.”
Dean’s heart might not make it if we actually had to pull that one out. But I was fairly confident the conversation would make Joel feel special…so that was the upside.
Sighing so big it felt like he was deflating, he buried his face against my shoulder. “She’s going to ask about it either way. I just know it. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have mentioned it in that phone call.”
That phone call was now infamous and would only be referred to as “that phone call” going forward.
“I’m prepared for that if it comes down to it.” I wasn’t sure how likely that was but I also hadn’t expected the flower catastrophe, so I wasn’t going to guess. “Do you want to be prepared in advance so you’re not surprised or do you want to ignore it for now?”
They both seemed like bad options to me but the best thing seemed to be to let him pick which bad option he hated least.