Everywhere, All At Once

Chapter 32 - Don't Read the Last Page

 It tired Kenna, the making up, the saying sorry, the fighting. She was sure she and Aaron both were tired of it. So they didn't make up so much as fall back together.

It felt wrong, though. Strained. Or maybe she was projecting. Maybe everything was the same and she felt weird because they'd never resolved the fight. They'd called an unspoken truce, yes, but never worked through the issue. And she'd never gotten a chance to explain all the things she'd talked about with her brother, about how her walls were a necessary part of her life, how she wanted him to help her feel safe instead of making her face her demons head on. Instead, every conversation, every kiss, every night together felt tainted by the conversation they'd never had.

"So I was talking to Fiona," Aaron said one night two weeks before Christmas. They'd made and had dinner, watched a movie, put the kids to bed. It was all normal, all routine, but something about it felt desperate, like they were clinging to how they wanted things to be. "And we were thinking it might be nice if we all went to my parents' for Christmas dinner."

"W-we? Like, including me?"

Aaron smiled and nodded. "Yeah. What do you think?"

What did she think? She thought it was a terrible idea, meeting his parents when they barely knew what was going on with just the two of them. But turning him down would mean another argument about her resistance to moving their relationship any further. And with that, she plastered a smile on her face and said, "Yeah. Sure. Sounds like a plan."

"Really?" He asked, his face lighting up, and Kenna knew - she just knew - that she would regret saying yes to this.

"Yeah. Wanna do Christmas Eve at my mom's, then?" She asked.

"That sounds perfect," he said, leaning over and kissing her for the first time that night.

She hummed against his lips, savoring the feeling.

"You wanna head up to bed?" He asked, voice now thick with desire.

Yes, she would regret this entire night at some point, but right now was not that time.

***

"I'm not sure how this happened, but I managed to find the only man on the planet who likes to shop." Muttering behind Aaron as he browsed the kitchen section of the mall department store he'd dragged her into, Kenna glared at the KitchenAid mixer box he lifted into the cart.

Smirking over his shoulder, he winked at her.

"I can hear you," he sang.

"I know," she sang back.

"The question that really needs answering is how I ended up with the only woman on Earth who doesn't like to shop."

"I like to shop," Kenna argued, resisting the urge to stomp her foot. She was hangry and ready to go home. "Just not for four hours in one day in which I buy nothing for myself!"

Aaron pushed their cart toward the nearest cash register.

"Thank God," Kenna groaned.

"Why come back out into the holiday shopping madness when you can get it all done in one shot?"

"If I'd know you hadn't the slightest clue what to buy for anyone on your list, I wouldn't have come with you."

She'd bought the handful of remaining Christmas gifts on her list within the first hour of shopping and had been trailing him in his shopping marathon ever since.

Now she stomped her foot. "I'm hungry," she whined. "Feed me, Seymour."

The woman checking them out was probably wondering how Aaron even tolerated her with all the whining, but when she was hangry...