Series: Like Us Series by Krista Ritchie
Total pages in book: 241
Estimated words: 236417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1182(@200wpm)___ 946(@250wpm)___ 788(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 236417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1182(@200wpm)___ 946(@250wpm)___ 788(@300wpm)
He unwraps his hoagie. “Verdict?”
“Let me try the other one first.”
“Girl, you know how to draw out the suspense.” He looks out at the river, like he’s ensuring no one has snuck up on us. It makes me a little nervous, thinking maybe we’re in a dangerous area, until he slips me a smile.
After a bite of the ham, I make an mmhmm noise with a nod.
“You like the ham better?”
I give him a thumbs-up, still chewing. It’s hard not to take another bite and keep eating, but I must rave first. “Earth’s best hoagie right here.” I raise my hoagie-half like it’s being abducted into my spaceship. “Away it goes. It’s boarding the S.S. Thebulan Starcruiser.”
“The royal guard gonna eat it?”
“Nope. It’ll be displayed in a museum. Full of Earth’s greatest artifacts. I’ll be sure to reference you as the donor.”
“Ham hoagie, donated graciously by Paul Donnelly, kickass human and the queen’s boyfriend.” He nods. “I dig it.”
I smile at his words and scoop fallen lettuce back between the bread. “Does that make you the king?” I ask him quietly.
“I hadn’t really considered it.” He’s swishing the fountain soda, trying to shift the ice for more of the drink. “I’d say you’re more so my queen.”
I think this over. “But if we’re together, then that would make you…”
“Queen’s boyfriend,” he says. “To be king, we’d have to be…”
Oh. Oh. Why did this hit me so slowly?! We’d have to be married.
My eyes pop a little bit.
He’s quick to add, “I’m not looking to be a king. I don’t want anyone kneeling at my feet, especially because I’m gonna be kneeling at yours. Gotta worship my queen.”
It fills me with warm fuzzies. The panic of accidentally surfacing the talk of marriage dissipates. Our relationship hasn’t even met the three-month mark, and I know I’m twenty-one—but with my amnesia, I feel eighteen too.
Marriage isn’t anything I’ve thought about for myself before. I’ve written a wedding or two in my fics, but those weren’t about me and my life. Last I remembered when I woke up, I was looking forward to graduating high school and being on my own.
In my long list of things I’d like to experience, I can confidently say that marriage lies close to the bottom. It feels extraneous right now. It’s not an artery to the heart. It’s not the blood rushing inside. It’s like an appendix. It can be removed, and the body functions more or less the same.
But what if marriage is something Donnelly wants sooner rather than later? What if our visions of the future aren’t even similar?
I don’t want to find out. Not right now, at least. Hypotheticals of the future feel disruptive to this perfect date.
I sink my teeth back into my hoagie. Devouring most of it. I’m only able to leave the butt of the bread for the museum. “You think it’s special enough?” I ask him. “The bread butt of the hoagie?”
“We can add an engraving: three-fourths eaten by the queen. Your alien-kind will probably worship the ham hoagie butt, not you.”
“I only really care about one person worshiping me anyway.”
He smiles over at me. “Who is he? I gotta kill him.”
I laugh. “You’re not allowed to hurt yourself. I forbid it.”
He kisses my knuckles like I am celestial royalty. My heart swells—then catapults at sudden movement out of the car. I intake a sharp breath.
“It’s just a bird,” he says, squeezing my hand in comfort.
I’m abnormally jumpy. “Can we go back home?” I ask so quietly. “I love Philly, but I’m anticipating a paparazzi attack at any second…and it’s…” I shrug, unable to find the words.
“We weren’t gonna be out here much longer anyway,” he says easily, like it’s not such a big deal. I ease, and when he reverses and we’re on the street, his hand slides into mine.
My heart hasn’t slowed, and I realize why. “This isn’t over just because we’re going home, is it?”
“The date?” he asks.
“Yeah.”
His grin lights up the road ahead of us. “It’s not over yet. Not until we go to sleep.”
We’ve been lounging on the floor of my room. Not sure why we end up on the ground and not the bed, other than it’s fun to lie on mounds of blankets and against pillows, and Orion can’t take up half the floor like he can the mattress.
My lava lamp casts purple shapes along the walls, and twinkle lights sparkle around my bed behind us. Donnelly and I have been reading the comic book series Saga by Brian K. Vaughn together. It’s an epic space opera, one we’ve both individually consumed before.
Apparently, I suggested it to him years ago, and I’ve learned he was quick to read anything I recommended.
As we study each panel, I love hearing Donnelly’s thoughts about the art. I planned to gift him a digital drawing tablet for his birthday, but I might not wait until August. I think he’d like messing around with it.